Cuban Missile Crisis Research Paper

What was the Cuban Missile Crisis? Many people have heard of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and may have learned about it during school, but they do not know the nitty gritty details of the whole fiasco. The CMC was the first threat of a nuclear world war. The real “crisis” was between the United States and the Soviet Union and not Cuba. Cuba played a relatively small role in the grand scheme of it all and was basically the field on which the two powerhouses played on. The Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the most tense 13 days that the world has ever known and had the possibility of completely disintegrating the world we know today. In this paper we will learn exactly what happened.

Thirteen days in October of 1962 changed the course of the World in the nuclear age forever. The Cuban Missile Crisis represents the closest brink of mutual nuclear destruction the World has ever been close to reaching. The leadership in place throughout the crisis is critical to the story of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Three men dominated the nations involved in the crisis and captivated citizens of all corners of the world. President John Fitzgerald Kennedy of the United States, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, and Cuban Dictator Fidel Castro dominated the airwaves and news circuits leading up to the infamous crisis, which put the three leaders and nations in a cold silence of misperceptions, miscommunications, and unprecedented

armed forces, Castro felt a second attack was inevitable. Although he was reluctant to accept the missiles at the beginning, he was finally persuaded. It could be argued that Castro pursued closer relations with the Soviet Union mainly for the protection of Cuba, and therefore was more open to Soviet suggestions such as placing nuclear weapons in Cuba to ensure its security. Che Guevara, a major figure to play a central role in training the military forces for the Bays of Pigs invasion and in bringing the Soviet nuclear weapons to Cuba, stated that "all the Cuban people must become a guerrilla army, each and every Cuban must learn to handle and if necessary use firearms in defence of the nation.1" Guevara's statement suggests that if the Cuban people had to fight, they were willing to fight, which shows the Cuban enthusiasm towards protection and, therefore, towards the Soviets. The Soviets, seeing an opportunity to make their international position feel close to the one of the US, rushed to aid Castro in order to double their military strength. Having said that, it could be argued that the Cuban-Soviet relationship was inevitable due to the poor U.S.-Cuban relationship. Placing the missiles in Cuba was a huge military step for the Soviets as it could enable them to reach and destroy most of the continental U.S. And, for that reason, the Cuban Missile Crisis was an event of a very high international importance.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States and the youngest person ever to be elected president. He was also the first Roman Catholic president and the first president to be born in the 20th century. Young people especially liked him. No other president was so popular. Kennedy was assassinated before he completed his third year as president; therefore, his achievements were limited. Nevertheless, his influence was worldwide, and his handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis may have prevented war. The thirteen days Kennedy spent fighting for the safety of this country back in mid-October of 1962, were probably one of the most difficult times faced by Kennedy during his presidency.

There was no way for Americans to know and, at that point, no Kennedy could bring himself to inform them that Cuban protestations of a purely defensive purpose for the missiles were genuine. We did not know what Castro knew that thousands of [CIA] agents were plotting his death, the destruction of his government’s economy, the sabotaging of his mines and mills, the crippling of his sugar and copper industries. We had invaded Cuba once; officials high in Congress and the executive department thought we should have followed up with overwhelming support for that invasion; by our timetable of a year to bring Castro down, the pressure to supply that kind of support in a new “rebellion” was growing.

“During the Cuban Missile Crisis, decisions made by President John F. Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev could have plunged both countries into thermonuclear war (Kessler).” The Cuban Missile Crisis lasted thirteen days (“Cuban Missile Crisis”). This is the closest this world has ever came to a nuclear war.

On the dawn of October 16th 1962 began a 13 day standoff that would be formally known to the western world as the Cuban Missile Crisis. Growing tensions between the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) resulted in the closest the world has ever been to all-out nuclear war. This essay will talk about the initial weaponization of nuclear power, the events that led up to the missile crisis, the thirteen days the missile crisis took place and the measures taken to stop nuclear war.

In 1962 United States intelligence discovers that the Soviet Union were building nuclear missile sites in Cuba. The american presidency believed that the soviets were protecting castro from an american invasion of Cuba. The challenge that the U.S. faced was how to force the soviets to withdraw the missiles from Cuba without starting a nuclear war. During this crisis several points will need to be discussed such as the U.S. and Soviets rationale for this crisis, the link to the “Bay of Pigs”, and the effect that the Cuban Missile Crisis had on President John F. Kennedy’s legacy as a president.

Three more days and everything would have been gone. The Cuban Missile Crisis could have led to the end of the World. The Cuban Missile Crisis almost led to the end of the Earth and life because Russia tried to put missiles in Cuba causing the U.S. to set up a blockade, and almost started WW3.

Many agree that the Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest the world ever came to nuclear war; but exactly how close did it come? The Crisis was ultimately a showdown between the United States and the Soviet Union from October 16 to October 28, 1962. During those thirteen stressful days, the world’s two biggest superpowers stood on the brink of a nuclear catastrophe. The Crisis started as a result of both the Soviet Union’s fear of losing the arms race, and Cuba’s fear of US invasion. The Soviet Premier, Nikita Khrushchev, thought that both problems could easily be solved by placing Soviet medium range missiles in Cuba. This deployment would double the Soviet arsenal and protect Cuba from US invasion. Khrushchev

The Cuban missile crisis in 1962 nearly brought a nuclear confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union. This is due to the fact that the Soviet Union put nuclear missile into Cuba and US installing missile in Turkey. The Soviet Union made friend with Cuba’s President, Fidel Castro because the US wanted to overthrow Castro. After coming to a compromise a nuclear war was averted between Cuba and the US. The sequence of events occurred during the Cuban Missile Crisis begins on August 31, 1962 which eventually came to an end on October 28, 1962. However, it was not until July 1963 that the Atmospheric Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was signed.

The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was the closest the world has ever come to nuclear war. The crisis was a major confrontation between the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The confrontation was caused by the Soviets putting missiles in Cuba, just 90 miles off the coast of the United States of America. The world was in the hands of President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khruchchev. These two men would have to reach a compromise or else the results would be fatal.

Castro intended on helping Cuba’s high poverty, but Castro did not turn Cuba into a democracy like he said he would (“Cuban missile Crisis”2). In 1960 the soviet premier attempted to convince Castro to become communist, soon after this castro became communist, probably influenced by the soviet premier (“Cuban missile Crisis”3). A new american president, that could probably change the war, was coming into office around this time, President Kennedy. The new president would take on the problem of this new cuban leader (International Encyclopedia of the… 1). Before him, Eisenhower trained about 1,500 Cuban Exiles in secret to try to take over Cuba, Kennedy allowed this to go on. On april 17, the exils attempted to invade Cuba(“Cuban missile Crisis”3). Since Castro had found out about the invasion, he was ready and defeated the the incoming force easily(“Cuban missile Crisis”3-4). The failed invasion seemed to help the Cuban opinion of Castro. He was now an obvious threat and so the U.S. decided to start operation Mongoose. Operation Mongoose was a secret operation to get rid of Castro, it was an operation where the U.S. would try to sabotage Cuba, but Operation Mongoose never ended up happening. The U.S.S.R. did not want to lose Cuba so they decided to secretly send weapons into Cuba, including nuclear weapons (“Cuban missile Crisis”4). These arm shipments would lead to one of the

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a frightening moment for the entire world. It started October 14th, 1962 after the Soviet Union planted nuclear missiles inn Cuba. The U.S. found out that these missiles were being planted without their knowledge, but the Soviet Union continued the construction of these nuclear missile sites, even after President Kennedy, the president of the U.S., sent out a warning against these weapons in Cuba. Even after this warning, Kennedy once again found out that the construction was still happening. Following the discovery of the ongoing construction, Kennedy wanted to meet with people at the White House to solve the problem that they were encountering. There were multiple sides during their talk about the missiles. Some of the people at the meeting wanted to take a more aggressive approach and destroy these missiles and then follow up with an attack. Kennedy eventually decided to quarantine Cuba. After Kennedy quarantined Cuba, there were many messages sent between the White House and the Kremlin to try and solve the problem. The Cuban Missile Crisis lasted for thirteen extremely tense days. At the end of these thirteen days, the Cuban Missile Crisis ended with an agreement between the United States and Soviet Union. The Cuban Missile Crisis greatly impacted history. It strengthened the bond between the United States and Soviet Union, showed people how to come to a

On April 15, 1961 the Bay of Pigs invasion began to invade Cuba and remove Castro from the leadership. The unsuccessful invasion was stopped two days later. Now Castro needed the strong arm of the Soviets even more. With the Cold War arms race in effect, Castro knew that the Soviets could protect him from future invasions from the United States.