How did the world come the closest it had ever been to full-blown nuclear war in October 1962? The Cuban Missile Crisis not only threatened the lives of Cubans and Americans but also had the potential to destroy the world.

Cuban Missile Crisis summary

In May 1962, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev began shipping ballistic missiles and trained personnel to Cuba. Cuba’s proximity to the USA meant that the Soviet Union now had a strategic launch pad to attack the other superpower from. One could see this move as levelling the playing field. The US had already created their own strategic launch pad to attack the Soviet Union in 1954 by establishing a joint base with nuclear weapons, the Incirlik Air Base in Turkey.

Fig. 1 - Map showing the range of missiles being based in Cuba

However, the US viewed this move as a major threat to their security when they found out. President John F. Kennedy blockaded Cuba on 22 October 1962, and sent a letter to Khrushchev, urging him to remove the missiles. Cuba was in ‘America's backyard’ and the range of the missiles shown in the map above explains Kennedy’s concern.

Fig. 2 - US reconnaissance photograph of a medium-range ballistic missile launch site in San Cristobal, Cuba

The days that followed were incredibly tense and brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. Two events almost tipped the scales:

• On October 24, Soviet vessels approached Cuba’s blockade line but turned back.

• On October 27, Cubans shot down a US reconnaissance plane.

Recognising the severity of the situation, Khrushchev and Kennedy came to an agreement. Khrushchev offered to withdraw the missiles from Cuba in return for an end to the blockade and a US pledge to not invade Cuba. As an assurance, the US also agreed to remove their missiles from Turkey. Based on these agreements, Khrushchev agreed to remove its missiles from Cuba on October 28.

The crisis and blockade ended on November 20 when the missiles’ removal was officially verified.

What events led to the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Although it only lasted a few days, the Cuban Missile Crisis was a culmination of years of tensions and disputes between the USA and USSR. To understand how the two countries got to such an acute crisis, we need to look at the events leading up to it.

The Cuban Revolution

The Cuban Revolution took place in 1959 and changed the country forever.

US-Cuban Relations

Cuba gained independence from Spain in 1898, helped by US intervention. This marked the start of the US’s long-term political dominance in the region. From the early 1900s, the US maintained a strong influence in Cuba, controlling its main export, sugar. Most Cuban industry was owned by US businesses, and many Americans had bought land in the country.

Batista

From 1940-44, General Fulgencio Batista ruled as the elected President of Cuba. After a US-backed military coup, he regained his power in 1952 and ran Cuba as a military dictatorship until 1959. Batista was corrupt and oppressive and hated by the Cubans, but the US profited from him being in power due to his leaning towards the United States. During his rule, the US established almost complete domination of Cuba’s economy and the number of American corporations in Cuba increased dramatically.

Revolution

In 1956, in retaliation against Batista’s oppressive rule, Marxist-socialists Che Guevara and Fidel Castro gathered a force of guerrilla fighters to start a revolutionary war against government forces. Cuba entered a state of virtual civil war, with the revolutionaries staging uprisings and attacks.

In the early hours of 1 January 1959, Batista relinquished his presidency and fled the country. Castro formed a new liberal nationalist government.

Fig. 3 - Photograph of Che Guevara and Fidel Castro

Deteriorating US-Cuban relations

Castro resented the Americans providing aid to Batista and wanted to rid his country of US influence.

Castro’s attitude towards the US

Castro wanted the Cuban economy to benefit poorer Cubans, rather than Americans and the corrupt upper classes. He did this by:

• Nationalising US businesses.

• Introducing land reforms to limit the size of farms.

In 1960, after President Dwight D. Eisenhower refused to trade with Cuba for sugar, Castro infuriated the US further by:

• Nationalising all foreign assets in Cuba.

• Increasing the taxes on US imports.

• Establishing trade deals with the Soviet Union.

The US attitude towards Castro

The US had placed an arms embargo on Cuba in 1958 during the armed conflict and refused to accept Castro’s government afterward. By 1960, the US government had started planning to help overthrow Castro.

Eisenhower considered banning the purchase of sugar from Cuba, which would cripple the country, as Cuba was heavily reliant on US sales.

In 1961, Castro announced that Cuba was Communist, which heightened Eisenhower’s concerns about the country. He was motivated by the Domino Theory, which suggested if one state fell to communism, the neighbouring countries would follow. He felt that Cuba might trigger a domino effect in the rest of Latin America.

The US, on the other hand, regarded itself as the protector of South and Central American countries due to the Monroe Doctrine, a US policy that opposed European colonialism in the Americas. In Eisenhower’s opinion, communism would threaten US power and America’s economic interests.

When Castro introduced reforms that penalised the US in 1960, Eisenhower retaliated by:

• Freezing Cuban assets in the United States.

• Slashing the import quota for Cuban sugar.

• Imposing an almost complete trade embargo.

• Cutting off diplomatic ties with Cuba.

Bay of Pigs invasion

Relations deteriorated even further when in April 1961, Kennedy approved a CIA plan to send over 1000 Cuban exiles into Cuba with the aim of overthrowing communism by initiating an uprising. This plan became known as the Bay of Pigs invasion due to the name of the southern coast of Cuba where they landed. The plan was unsuccessful as Kennedy pulled out US Air Force support at the last minute, resulting in all of the exiles being captured or killed. Castro's knowledge of this plan inflamed American-Cuban relations further.

Cuba-Soviet alliance

As relations with the US deteriorated, Cuba looked to the Soviet Union to forge an alliance. After the US cut quotas on sugar, Cuba looked to set up more trade agreements with the Soviet Union on sugar and other goods. An alliance was agreed and Castro and Khrushchev formed a strong relationship after meeting in New York in 1960.

Khrushchev

Accepting Cuba’s request for help was a strategic move for Khrushchev, who was losing support at home in Russia. He needed to be seen as supporting an endangered communist state, and Cuba offered the opportunity to spread communism in Latin America.

Khrushchev had lost support and power for several reasons:

• Domestic policies: his agricultural programme was a failure, resulting in food price rises, shortages, and widespread hunger. Revolts broke out as a result.

• Secret Speech: Khrushchev denounced Stalin in what was known as his ‘Secret Speech’. It alienated hard-line Stalinists and caused revolts abroad in Poland and Hungary.

• Berlin Wall: the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, though it stemmed the flow of refugees, painted the Soviet Union in a bad light. It looked as though they had to imprison citizens to avoid them defecting.

• China: relations with China deteriorated under Khrushchev as Chinese leader Mao Zedong did not support de-Stalinisation. The Sino-Soviet split in the late 1950s meant that the USSR had lost one of its valuable allies, weakening its position on the global stage.

How did Khrushchev’s view of Kennedy influence the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Khrushchev’s view of Kennedy as a weak, ineffectual leader meant he felt confident placing ballistic missiles in Cuba, believing that the American president would not intervene.

Bay of Pigs invasion

Kennedy’s failure in handling the Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961 established him as a weak and ineffective leader in the eyes of Khrushchev. He felt that Kennedy did not have the expertise or power to resist any Soviet military build-up in Cuba.

The Vienna Summit

The two leaders had met at the Vienna Summit in 1961 and formed impressions of each other from those discussions. Whilst Kennedy had not agreed to Khrushchev’s demands on Berlin, the Soviet leader still saw the American president as weak and unable to mount effective military resistance. This belief was confirmed when Kennedy did not intervene to prevent the building of the Berlin Wall that year.

Fig. 4 - President Kennedy meets in the Oval Office with General Curtis LeMay and reconnaissance pilots who flew the Cuban missions

What were the consequences of the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Although it never came to nuclear war, the missile crisis still had long-lasting effects.

Khrushchev’s ousting

Kennedy emerged from the Cuban Missile Crisis as a highly regarded leader, his calm and firm stance in the negotiations demonstrating his skills. His failure in the Bay of Pigs invasion was overridden in the minds of many.

Khrushchev, on the other hand, emerged less than victorious. His decisions were seen as reckless, and he was seen to have bowed down to Kennedy’s demands. This, along with his failed domestic policies in the Soviet Union, provided evidence that he was unable to lead effectively. Soviet officials forced him into retirement in 1964. He was replaced with the new leader Leonid Brezhnev.

Brinkmanship

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a prime example of a policy that dominated foreign relations throughout the Cold War: brinkmanship. This was a foreign policy practice used by Eisenhower, which forced the enemy to the threshold of conflict to gain better-negotiating power. The word originated from a 1956 Life Magazine interview with the US secretary of state John Foster Dulles. In the article, he is quoted as saying,

The Cuban Missile Crisis demonstrated the dangers of brinkmanship. Formerly, interactions between states were predicated on the balance of power, whether military or economic, but now a state’s possession of nuclear weapons changed the game, allowing it to influence others. At the beginning of the Cold War, the US’s supply of cataclysmic nuclear weapons often meant these negotiations were skewed in their favour. By the time of the Cuban crisis, however, the USSR had caught up in the arms race, and posed a formidable threat.

The Cuban Missile Crisis significance for communication

The threat of nuclear war is often credited with preventing the Cold War from turning hot, but events like the Cuban Missile Crisis highlighted the potentially devastating effects of this policy. Clear communication between the two leaders had prevented the worst possible outcome. Recognising this, Kennedy and Khrushchev established a Moscow-Washington hotline to facilitate direct communication between them.

Test ban treaty

In August 1963, Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union signed the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

• Nuclear weapons tests underwater, in the atmosphere or in space were prohibited.

• Underground nuclear tests were allowed.

• A pledge was made to work towards an end to the armaments race and aim towards complete disarmament.

However, the treaty did little to stall the arms race as the US and Soviet Union continued to stockpile arms and their nuclear arsenals.