The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962
- American's supported a corrupt regime under Fulgencio Batista until the Cuban revolution in 1959
- Fidel Castro took over with communism
- organized crime people were very unhappy
- Aligned with the Soviets
- The Bay of Pigs (failed invasion of Cuba)
- Trained people to go and start a counter revolution to get rid of the communism, they got annihilated
- 1962 Soviets begin to put Nuclear weapons into Cuba (Noticed by U2 spy planes)
- this brought in the crisis
- The US had 3 options:
- Diplomatic solution (negotiate)
- 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= threatening each other with war (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 (meant that they had to stop testing their Nuclear Weapons)
- Hot line= phone connecting Kennedy and Krushchev (could talk to each other to negotiate nuclear war rather than sending letters)
Summary
Fidel Castro was the communist Cuban leader that was aligned with the Soviets. USA trained people to start a counter-revolution to get rid of communism but were annihilated. This was the closest that the world has ever come to Nuclear Warfare, it was also the first time that Mutually Assured Destruction had been discussed to determine an international arms agreement.