For 13 nerve-wracking days in October 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the Earth closer to a nuclear WORLD WAR III than ever before. It was a direct confrontation between two major superpowers, the United States and the USSR (Soviet Union) during the so-called Cold War. It was the worst confrontation since the construction of the Berlin Wall a year earlier in 1961.
The U.S. Bay of Pigs Invasion in 1961 spectacularly failed to overthrow Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. So in 1962, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev reached a secret agreement with Castro. The Soviets would place nuclear missiles on the Caribbean island to deter any future U.S. invasion. The Soviet Union’s Kremlin also disliked the number of nuclear weapons pointing at them from Western Europe’s NATO allies. They saw missiles in Cuba as a way to level the playing field.
So the secret construction of Soviet missile sites on Cuba began.
In September, President John F. Kennedy issued a public warning against the introduction of any offensive Soviet weapons into Cuba. Despite this, in October, a U–2 spy plane flew over and took aerial photos. It clearly showing construction of a medium-range ballistic nuclear missile site in Cuba. The Pentagon rushed these images to the White House on October 16th, beginning what would be called the Cuban Missile Crisis. Cuba was a mere 90 miles from Key West, Florida. The range of these missiles included New York and Washington DC!
Kennedy quickly summoned his security advisers to the West Wing, a group called the Ex Com (Executive Committee) to consider options and a course of action. The Joint Chiefs of Staff argued for an immediate air strike on the sites, followed by a U.S. invasion of Cuba! Non-military advisers recommended only stern warnings and sanctions to the Soviet Union. Kennedy and the ExCom all agreed that the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba was unacceptable. The challenge was to get them removed without triggering a nuclear world war.
In tense deliberations that stretched for nearly a week, they came up with a variety of options to end the Cuban Missile Crisis, including diplomacy, a bombing attack, and a full-scale U.S. invasion of Cuba. In the end, President Kennedy decided upon a middle-of-the-road course. On Monday, October 22nd, he ordered a U.S. Naval “Quarantine” of Cuba. Calling it a “quarantine” technically meant this was not a “blockade,” which assumed a State of War existed between the superpowers.
That same day, President Kennedy sent a strongly worded letter to Premier Khrushchev.
In it, he declared the U.S. would NOT permit offensive weapons of any kind in Cuba. He demanded the Soviets dismantle the missile bases under construction, AND return all offensive weapons to the Soviet Union. President Kennedy then went on national TV that night and informed American citizens, and the world, of the threat to national security these Cuban missiles represented. He explained the naval quarantine he had ordered, and the global military consequences if the crisis escalated. His stern message was clear:
“It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba anywhere in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union.”
President John F. Kennedy, 1962
The Joint Chiefs of Staff moved the USA to DEFCON 3 as naval ships began to surround Cuba, preparing for a possible military strike. People around the globe nervously worried and waited. WHAT WOULD THE SOVIET RESPONSE BE? Many feared the Earth was finally at the brink of nuclear annihilation and looked for the location of the nearest bomb shelter.
Americans began hoarding food and gas in their basements.
In schools around the country, teachers ran daily Duck and Cover drills in their classrooms. In Duck and Cover, students drop quickly to the floor and scramble under their desks. Then they lie curled up in a ball, face down, and cover their head with their hands. The goal being to protect against a nuclear blast where the force of the explosion could shatter glass windows and create an immense blast of heat.
On Wednesday, October 24th, Khrushchev responded with his own statement. He said the U.S. “Blockade” was an “Act of Aggression” and that Soviet ships would proceed to Cuba. The crisis had reached a superpower stalemate. A crucial moment arrived later that day, when Soviet ships neared the line of U.S. Navy vessels enforcing the quarantine outside Havana, Cuba. Any attempt to breach the blockade would spark a military confrontation that could escalate to a nuclear exchange and World War III. But the Soviet ships stopped short of the blockade!
Meanwhile, U.S. spy planes showed the Soviet missile sites were nearly operational and ready to fire. The Pentagon placed military forces at DEFCON 2—meaning war was imminent. President Kennedy and the ExCom huddled at the White House and prepared for an attack on Cuba. On October 26th, Kennedy told his advisers it appeared that only a U.S. attack on Cuba would end the Cuban Missile Crisis, but he insisted on giving diplomacy … one last chance.
“I thought it was the last day I would ever see.”
U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, 1962
That afternoon, the crisis took a strange turn. ABC News told the White House they’d been approached by a Russian agent. He suggested the Soviet Union would remove their missiles from Cuba, IF the U.S. would not to invade the island. While the Pentagon scrambled to validate this “back-channel” offer, Nikita Khrushchev sent Kennedy a communication in the middle of the night, October 26th. It was an emotional message raising the specter of nuclear holocaust, and proposed a resolution that matched what ABC had heard!
“If there is no intention to doom the world to the catastrophe of thermonuclear war, then let us not only relax the forces pulling on the ends of the rope, let us take measures to untie that knot. We are ready for this.”
Kremlin message to the White House, 1962
The next day, Saturday, October 27th, Khrushchev sent a second message, indicating that any proposed deal must include the removal of U.S. missiles from Turkey. That same day, a U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba. 35-year-old pilot Major Rudy Anderson was killed in the crash. President Kennedy decided to ignore the 2nd message and respond only to the 1st. That night, he sent a communication to Khrushchev proposing the removal of Soviet missiles from Cuba under supervision of the United Nations, and a guarantee that the U.S. would NOT invade Cuba.
It was a risky to ignore the 2nd Khrushchev message. So Attorney General Robert Kennedy (the president’s younger brother) met with Soviet Ambassador, Anatoly Dobrynin, in Washington. He said the U.S. was planning to remove the missiles from Turkey anyway, and that it would do so soon, but this could NOT be part of any public statement. The next morning, October 28th, Nikita Khrushchev issued a statement that Soviet missiles would be dismantled and removed from Cuba!!
The planet and its anxious population took a collective sigh of relief.
By the end of November 1962, the U.S. was satisfied with the complete removal of Soviet missiles and ended its naval quarantine of Cuba. The U.S. also quietly removed their Jupiter missiles from Turkey the next year, in 1963. The resolution of Missile Crisis strengthened President John F. Kennedy’s image both in the U.S. and internationally. It also helped turn the negative world opinion surrounding his failed Bay of Pigs Invasion a year earlier.
In an effort to prevent this type of confrontation from ever happening again, a direct telephone link between the White House and Moscow’s Kremlin was established in 1963, known as the famous “HOTLINE” (though never red) phone. So a direct verbal conversation could now take place between the U.S. President and Soviet Premier when needed, and avert a World War III.
The tense Cold War between the East and West was far from over though. It would last another 29 YEARS, until the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Of course, the world’s nuclear arsenals, though greatly diminished by subsequent arms reduction treaties, still contains tens of thousands of nuclear warheads. They remain under the control of the U.S., Russia Federation, Britain, France and many other countries, including China, North Korea, Israel, India and Pakistan. Let us hope another such nuclear crisis does not evolve between any of those players.
2 thoughts on “The Cuban Missile Crisis – the Day Russia Blinked”