The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962
- American's supported a corrupt regime under Fulgencio Batista until the Cuban revolution in 1959
- Fidel Castro took over
- Alligned with the Soviets
- The Bay of Pigs (Failed invasion of Cuba)
- 1962 Soviets begin to put Nuclear weapons into Cuba (Noticed by U2 spy planes)
The Crisis
- The US had 3 options:
- Diplomatic solution (negotiated settlement)
- A conventional attack (air attack followed by invasion)
- A naval blockade
- Robert Kennedy, attorney general, convinced Security Council to go with blockade
- Ships turn around at the quarantine
- 2 letters sent from Krushchev to Kennedy
- Brinkmanship ensues (U.N. gets involved)
- Russians pull out of Cuba in exchange for a removal of missiles in Turkey at a later date
- Directly resulted in the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1962
Summary
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, leaders of the U.S. and the Soviet Union engaged in a tense, 13-day political and military standoff in October 1962 over the installation of nuclear-armed Soviet missiles on Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. In a TV address on October 22, 1962, President John Kennedy notified Americans about the presence of the missiles, explained his decision to enact a naval blockade around Cuba and made it clear the U.S. was prepared to use military force if necessary to neutralize this perceived threat to national security. Following this news, many people feared the world was on the brink of nuclear war. However, disaster was avoided when the U.S. agreed to Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev's offer to remove the Cuban missiles in exchange for the U.S. promising not to invade Cuba. Kennedy also secretly agreed to remove U.S. missiles from Turkey.