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Cuban Missile Crisis
In October 1962 the world came closest to a nuclear holocaust than it has ever done before or since in a critical standoff between the two major nuclear powers (the U.S. And the U.S.S.R.) over the deployment of missiles in Cuba by the Soviet Union. This paper discusses the causes and consequences of the Cuban Missile Crisis and assesses President Kennedy's handling of the crisis.
Causes
After the Spanish-American War of 1898 that ended the Spanish Empire and Spain's control of Cuba, the United States had given itself the right to intervene in the internal affairs of Cuba and U.S. businesses established extensive interests on the island. All of this ended with the Cuban Revolution under Fidel Castro in 1959. The U.S. was not prepared to accept a leftist revolution so close to its borders and the CIA carried out several covert and overt attempts to dislodge Castro, which culminated in the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961. The failure of the invasion did not deter the U.S. And it continued to threaten the Cuban regime with covert operations and hostile acts and the Cubans feared another imminent invasion by the U.S.
The...
strategic forces by the Kennedy administration that the Soviet Union was unable to match due to the costs involved but felt obliged to counter because of the Cold War imperatives. Subsequent release of classified documents indicate that one of the five approved strategic plans at the time based on the U.S. military build-up at the time called for a nuclear first-strike against the Soviet Union. (Brenner) Khrushchev reacted in an admittedly risky venture by secretly deploying nuclear missiles in Cuba to discourage U.S. aggression against Cuba and prevent a nuclear first strike on the Soviet Union.
Consequences
The Cuban Missile Crisis is considered to be the high point of the Cold War after which the confrontation between the two military super powers began to subside and led to the signing of the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963. The reason for the relative decrease in tensions was the realization by the two countries of the dangerous consequences of brinkmanship in such a high-stakes game. Following the crisis, there was a temporary strain in relations between Cuba and the U.S.S.R. As Castro felt that…
References
Cuban Missile Crisis." (2003) Article in Encyclopedia Encarta. CD-ROM Version, 2003
Brenner, Philip. (2002) "Turning History on its Head." The National Security Archive. The George Washington University Web Site. Retrieved on June 1, 2003 at http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/nsa/cuba_mis_cri/brenner.htm
May, Ernest and Zelikow, Philip. (Feb 1998) "Eavesdropping on History: Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis." Encarta Yearbook, 1998
Through the passing of the Platt Amendment by the U.S. Congress in 1901 that backtracked on the Teller Amendment passed before the War pledging the U.S. intention of not annexing Cuba
Cuban Missile Crisis The reports of the arrival of missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads to the island of Cuba. These warheads are capable of reaching almost any part of the continental United States. The presence of these warheads represents an escalation of the conflict with the Soviet Union and its allies, and it represents an existential threat to the United States. For the first time since the arms buildup between
Cuban Missile Crisis: Why we need more balance of power in the world. Cuban Missile crisis in 1960s may raise a serious political question in retrospect i.e. should America be allowed to exist as the sole superpower and what could be the repercussions of such an existence? Now fifty years or so later, we are in a much better position to answer this question. United States or any other nation for
Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was a major cold war confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev decided to install ballistic missiles in Cuba although they had made a promise to the U.S. that they would not (Chayes). When the U.S. discovered the construction of missile launching sites, President John F. Kennedy publicly denounced the Soviet actions, demanding that they remove the nuclear missiles
Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 is widely regarded as the most dangerous moment of the Cold War, and one which, "brought the world to the brink of the unthinkable" (Blight & Welch, 315). Although the successful resolution of the crisis led to an immediate improvement in relationship between the superpowers, and focussed the world's attention on the issues surrounding nuclear capability and deterrence, it also led to the development
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