The Cuban Missile Crisis: US Aggression and Nuclear Threat

This essay delves into the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962, examining it as the closest the world has come to nuclear war. It explores the escalating tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States, focusing on the placement of Soviet missiles in Cuba and the resulting Cold War stand...Read More

Running head: CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
Cuban Missile Crisis
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1CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
1. Introduction
The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 is by far the closest the world has come to a
nuclear war. There was considerable tension during that year between the Societ Union and the
United States. The Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the major confrontations between these two
states (Heller, 2016). This confrontation took place when the Soviets put missiles in Cuba, just
twenty miles away from the coast of the U.S.A. During this period, the cold war reached its
height due to the possible confrontation between the two superpowers of those times- the USSR
(Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) and the US. It is one of the significant parts of world
history as because of the high risk of the nuclear war which could result in the massive
destruction of the entire world. During that time, the world was under the rule of Premier Nikita
Khrushchev and John F. Kennedy. They were required to reach on a compromise; otherwise, the
outcomes would be more fatal. The intensification of the Cuban missile crisis was the product of
the United States’ aggressive military decisions made during John F. Kennedy’s early presidency
which almost risked a nuclear holocaust. This paper shall elaborate on identifying the events
before the Cuban Missile Crisis, its causes along with the actual events that took place in the
crisis and its final impact and outcomes.
2. Body
The Cuban Missile Crisis began during the end of the second World War (October 1962).
When the war was towards its conclusion, the USSR and the US started to disagree on the major
ideas of how post-war Europe should improve and look like in the near future (Risse-Kappen,
2016). The main aim of the US was to spread the concept of democracy and economic
opportunities for the companies present in Europe. However, this aim was greatly differed from
that of the USSR. The USSR wanted to protect themselves from the other wars which might take

2CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
place shortly as well as to spread communism all over the world. This difference in the thoughts
of these countries leads to significant problems and tensions between them. The shelves of the
supermarket were emptied of the bottled water, and soup cans, the school going children were
ordered to remain in shelters, and the common public was forced to live in fear and turmoil of
the crisis. It is one of the most dangerous periods of the very crisis and that of the Cold War.
U.S and Cuba, both fought to be superior to the other. However, after waging a
successful guerrilla war against the corrupt and repressive dictator of Cuba- Fulgencio Batista,
Fidel Castro came into Power on 1st January 1959 (Marshall, 2018). It is to note that Casto was
not yet a communist and the policymakers of the United States initially took a very cautious
wait-and-see approach to his regime. Furthermore, within a year, the relations of the United
States and Cuba got worsened as Castro wanted to cut off the ties between the two. He made
some anti-US radical and rhetoric policies and also refused to hold the elections. When it became
clear that he intended to follow an alliance with the Soviet Union, the then President- Sir Dwight
Eisenhower cut off all the ties to Cuba and started preparing some contingency plans to
overthrow Fidel Castro and replace him within someone who is more amenable to the US. The
US believed that if they remove Fidel Castro, the United States could quickly end the Cold War.
According to Whitehead (2016), as the relations between the United States and Cuba got
worsened, Fidel Castro sought help from the Soviet Union. They helped him by signing several
trades and aid agreements with Cuba and provided him with nuclear arms and weapons. With the
same, they also gave him political support for the Cuban revolution in the United Nations as well
as in the other international organisations.
It is to mention that the origin of the Cuban Missile Crisis lies in the unsuccessful
invasion of Bay of Pigs, at the time of which the armed forces of Cuba overthrew the Cuban

3CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
exiles hoping to instigate an uprising against the Castro (Risse-Kappen, 2016). After the
invasion, the Castro sought protection from the Soviet Union against the future aggression from
the United States. Soviets tried their best to help Castro, providing nuclear weapons. However, it
was based on a condition that the deal would remain a secret between the two until and unless
the missiles are entirely operational. At that time, Cuba does have a restriction like those in the
US (Marshall, 2018). There were many wealthy own sugar plantations in Cuba, and the country
was ruled by a corrupt and repressive dictator, named, President Fulgencio Batista. Nikita
Khrushchev had claimed that his motivation towards providing the Castro (Cuba) with the
nuclear weapons was only to guard the Cuban Revolution against the aggression of United
States. However, it was because of the mishandling of the Bay of Pigs invasion by John F.
Kennedy that had resulted in this missile crisis in the first place.
The Cuban Missile Crisis was also convinced Kennedy regarding the dangers of the
nuclear brinksmanship. Its intensification was the product of the United States’ aggressive
military decisions that were made during John F. Kennedy’s early presidency ana that had almost
risked a nuclear holocaust. Khrushchev and Kennedy had squinted into the void of atomic
destruction, but ultimately, it had managed to pull back from it (Powell, 2015). For preventing
the future crises, they set up a hotline called Moscow Washington hostile within the White
House for facilitating direct communication between the leaders of the United States and the
Soviet Union. With the same, in the year 1963, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United
States signed a treaty to ban the underwater and atmospheric nuclear testing. Notwithstanding the
fact, this test-ban treaty was unsuccessful in stopping the arms race because Kenney concurrently
authorised a vast arms buildup which expanded the atomic arsenal of United States and at the
same time, amplified the strategic superiority of United States in the Cold War.

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On 3rd June 1961, the Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and John F. Kennedy met in
Vienna for a 2-day Summit (Rasmussen, 2017). Through a letter that was delivered to Nikita in
March, Kennedy proposed a meeting of the two leaders for an informal exchange of their
viewpoints. As per the same, they conferred in the absence of a set agenda. The following
accounts confirmed that the two-day summit did not go well. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev
left think Kennedy was weak. Khrushchev decided to bond with the Castro and took a tough
stance over the Berlin, a Western enclave within East Germany, which was controlled by the
East Germany, where Great Britain, France and the United States maintained a very symbolic
military presence because Germany was defeated in the Second World War (Marshall, 2018).
With the same, it is also to note that Kenndey later claimed that Khrushchev had rebuked him on
a wide range of issues regarding Cold War, including the nuclear weapons as well as the "wars
of the national liberation". However, gradually, in the final summit, it was Kennedy who won the
approval of the Congress for an additional 3.25 billion dollars in the defence spending, the civil
defence program and the tripling of the draft calls (Rogowski, 2017). Again, on 13th August of
the same year, the Eastern Germans started building walls which quickly divided the Berlin into
two different parts.
Fidel Castro wanted to ensure that his country Cuba is protected from the United States
since the Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961 (Whitehead, 2016). Although he had defeated the
invasion of the Cuban exiles at the Bay of Pigs, he was in utter fear that the United States still
wants to invade his country for getting rid of him, changing the government and destroying the
Communist Revolution of Cuba (LeoGrande, 2016). Therefore, he asked help from Khrushchev.
However, Khrushchev was secretly sending the nuclear missiles to Cuba, and the weapons of the
mass annihilation were now just 90 miles away from the US. He was very reluctant at first for

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accepting the missiles as they were nuclear. The relationship between Cuba and the Soviet Union
was inevitable as the relationship of United States with the Soviet Union was not good. With the
same, the USSR sent materials to Cuba for building missile bases and the launch sites. It is to
mention that Fidel Castro also warned Khrushchev for not moving the missiles in secret. He told
him to consider the launch of a nuclear strike against the United States in the event in which the
nation attacked Cuba. He wrote a letter in October 1962 to Nikita Khrushchev where he briefly
detailed his concerns that the attack on Cuba was “imminent”. He also recommended him two
possible variants- a) the air attack for destroying the specific targets b) a full invasion.
After much consideration between the Cabinet of Kennedy and the Soviet Union,
Kennedy finally agreed to eliminate all the missiles that they set on the border of Soviet Union in
a condition that Khrushchev would remove all the weapons from Cuba. Khrushchev claimed that
he was dismantling the weapons in Cuba. On the other hand, the Americans declared that they
would not favour or invade Cuba, but they did not say anything regarding the removal of the
Jupiter missiles of theirs, that they set in Turkey (Marshall, 2018). Because the withdrawing of
the weapons from Turkey was not informed publicly, Khrushchev seemed to be losing the fight
and become weakened. It was considered that Kennedy had won the contest between the then
superpowers and Khrushchev was finally humiliated. However, Kennedy and Khrushchev
successfully negotiated a very peaceful result to the very crisis.
Furthermore, it is also to state that the extraordinary miscalculation of Kennedy has cost
him his reputation as a powerful president. In case if the Bay of Pigs invasion had not taken
place, then Khrushchev might not adopt the “penchant for bullying and intimidation” for
Kennedy as well as the other deployed missiles of Cuba. It has become clear that Castro
gradually became a figure who was associated with his failure and with the same, he was also

6CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
regarded as an enemy of extreme importance. This, in turn, had led to even more tensions
between the superpowers in the lead up to the Cuban missile crisis.
3. Conclusion
From the above analysis, it is to conclude that the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the
human civilisation close to being destroyed. On October 1962 the Soviet provision of the
ballistic missiles to Cuba resulted in most dangerous Cold War between the Soviet Union and the
United States and this had brought the entire world to the verge of the nuclear war. However,
gradually, throughout two tensed weeks, John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev successfully
negotiated a very peaceful result to the crisis. However, although the US and the Soviet Union
were able to come in front for compromising and resolving the crisis peacefully, not everyone
was satisfied with this result, and one of them was Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader. It evoked the
fears of the nuclear destruction and had also revealed the danger of the brinksmanship and the
energised attempts to stop the arms race.
However, it is clear that the intensification of the Cuban missile crisis was the product of
the aggressive military decisions made by the United States at the time of John F. Kennedy’s
early presidency that almost risked a nuclear holocaust. Moreover, it is ironic that this Cuban
Missile Crisis that hardly involved the Warsaw Pact have had such a significant and long-lasting
impact on the alliances. With the same, it is also scathing that the actions taken by the third
party, i.e. Fidel Castro, have imposed one of the notable dangers at the time of an event which
had traditionally been considered to be bilateral U.S.-Soviet confrontation.

7CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
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Heller, J. (2016). Kennedy, Israel and the Cold War before the Cuban Missile Crisis (1961–62).
In The United States, the Soviet Union and the Arab–Israeli conflict, 1948–67.
Manchester University Press.
LeoGrande, W. M. (2016). The December 17, 2014 announcements that Cuba and the United
States had agreed to begin normalising their bilateral relationship significantly reduced
the threat that Washington posed to Cuban national security—a threat that has been acute
for the past half-century. From 1959 to 2014, except for brief interludes in the. A New
Chapter in US-Cuba Relations: Social, Political, and Economic Implications, 53.
Marshall, J. (2018). The Dictator and the Mafia: How Rafael Trujillo Partnered with US
Criminals to Extend His Power. Journal of Global South Studies, 35(1), 56-86.
Powell, R. (2015). Nuclear brinkmanship, limited war, and military power. International
Organization, 69(3), 589-626.
Rasmussen, K. G. (2017). Clash of Emotions: White House—State Department Relations during
the Kennedy Administration. American Studies in Scandinavia, 49(1), 19-40.
Risse‐Kappen, T. (2016). Collective identity in a democratic community. Domestic Politics and
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Rogowski, J. C. (2017). Bargaining Commitments and Executive Reputation: Legislative
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Cuba. Third World Quarterly, 37(9), 1666-1682.