The Cold War Continued: The Cuban Missile Crisis

THE COLD WAR CONTINUED: THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS

Rumors of Soviet Missiles

During the summer of 1962 there were frequent reports of unusual Soviet activities in Cuba, including rumors that the Soviets might be installing missiles there. By late August intelligence re-ports confirmed that several large ships had brought Soviet military equipment and personnel to the island, although neither were thought to provide any offensive military capability. For some time the United States had used aerial reconnaissance and photography to monitor all Soviet ships coming to Cuba and had been making twice-monthly reconnaissance flights over Cuba itself. On 29 August President John F. Kennedy ordered periodic flights over Cuba by high-speed, high-altitude U-2 spy planes. Although U-2 flights through 7 October showed Soviet antiaircraft missile (SAM) sites under construction and the introduction of Soviet-built patrol boats, they turned up no hard evidence of offensive missile sites or introduction of such missiles.

A Soviet/Cuban Alliance

These Soviet activities followed Fidel Castro's takeover of Cuba in 1959 and an alignment soon thereafter of the new government with the Soviet Union. They also followed the abortive Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961 and extensive naval and military maneuvers carried out by the United States in the Caribbean during spring 1962. On 2 September 1962 the Soviets announced that they would supply additional arms and personnel to meet the so-called imperialist threat to Cuba. They further warned on 11 September that attacks on Cuba or Soviet ships going to Cuba might result in war, perhaps even nuclear war.

Electoral Politics

The U.S. congressional elections of 1962 also played a role in the developing crisis over Cuba. According to political folklore, it is normal that the party of an incumbent president will lose House and Senate seats in an off-year election. Sensing that the Democrats were vulnerable, the Republicans charged that Kennedy had not responded adequately to the increasing Soviet presence in Cuba. In August Republican Sen. Homer Capehart of Indiana demanded that Kennedy order an invasion of Cuba. More Republicans joined the fray in September and early October. Former vice-president Richard Nixon, campaigning for the governorship of California, demanded that Kennedy order a quarantine of Cuba. Republican senators Karl Mundt of South Dakota, Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania, and Kenneth Keating of New York called for a naval blockade of Cuba, while Republican senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona and Democratic senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina joined Capehart in his call for a U.S. invasion of Cuba. On 10 October Sen. Keating charged that the administration was ignoring the placement of Soviet missile sites and missiles in Cuba. In mid October the Republican national chairman declared that the Kennedy administration's policy on Cuba had become the primary issue in the fall elections.

Evidence of Missile Sites Is Found

On 14 October 1962 a U-2 mission over Cuba took photographs showing clear-cut evidence that two MRBM (Medium Range Ballistic Missile—range about 1,100 miles) sites were under construction. Additional flights three days later found even more evidence, showing a total of nine MRBM sites and three IRBM (Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile—range about 2,200 miles) sites, Later flights found evidence that these launch sites—which had the potential of mounting nuclear strikes on Washington, D.C.—would possibly be operational by the end of October.

Kennedy Convenes Excomm

Upon receipt of the first evidence that the Soviets intended to place offensive missiles in Cuba, President Kennedy put together an ad hoc group of cabinet members and agency heads normally responsible for foreign affairs and military policy, some of whom were also statutory members of the National Security Council. Additionally, the group included trusted advisers such as his brother U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy, White House aide Theodore Sorensen, and a few private citizens, such as former U.S. secretary of state Dean Acheson and former U.S. secretary of defense Robert Lovett. This group functioned so well during the crisis that its existence was later formalized as the Executive Committee (Excomm) of the National Security Council. They began meeting on 16 October 1962 and met daily throughout the crisis to consider possible responses to the threat of Soviet missiles in Cuba and to assess developments as the crisis resolved itself.

Possible Responses

Among the alternatives considered were (1) secret talks with the U.S.S.R. without public disclosure of the missile presence, (2) a public announcement that there were Soviet missiles in Cuba followed by negotiations, (3) an air strike and an invasion of Cuba, (4) a surgical air strike aimed at the missile sites, (5) a quarantine or blockade of Cuba, and (6) private negotiations with Fidel Castro. The military members of the group favored an air strike accompanied by an invasion. Attorney General Robert Kennedy led the opposition to this option on the grounds that any kind of air strike would be reminiscent of the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and that in so doing the United States would forfeit any moral position they held in the crisis. Instead the attorney general, together with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and Sorensen, persuaded the group to adopt a quarantine and a naval blockade of Cuba. On 22 October President Kennedy briefed congressional leaders and then gave a dramatic, televised address announcing the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba and demanding their removal. He explained the imposition of the quarantine and blockade, promising continued close surveillance and the reinforcement of the naval base at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, and he called for emergency meetings of the Organization of American States (OAS) and the United Nations. He warned that a missile attack on the United States launched from Cuba would be met with a U.S. attack on the Soviet Union and that the United States would respond to Soviet counter-moves elsewhere in the world, especially in Berlin, with any means necessary. On 23 October President Kennedy activated reserve units, and by Wednesday, 24 October, the blockade of Cuba by U.S. naval forces had become operative. During a 25 October televised meeting of the U.N. Security Council, U.S. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson presented the photographic evidence of the missile sites to the world, in the face of denials from the Soviet ambassador.

The Soviet Response

The initial Soviet reaction on Tuesday, 23 October, was to condemn the decision of the United States and to accuse President Kennedy of pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war. Soviet forces and other Warsaw Pact forces were put on alert. Yet on Wednesday, 25 October, Soviet ships en route to Cuba halted at sea. On the next day a Soviet-chartered Liberian freighter was searched by U.S. vessels enforcing the quarantine and blockade, but it was allowed to continue when no contraband was found.

THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST

In his inaugural address President John F. Kennedy stressed that leadership had been passed to a new generation. Not only was Kennedy twenty-seven years younger than his predecessor, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, but the new administration's top appointees were on average two decades younger than Eisenhower's. More-over, Kennedy drew more from universities and think tanks than Eisenhower—appointing three times as many academics and far fewer businessmen. Educated at the best universities, Kennedy's appointees had a self-confidence derived from early service in positions of great responsibility during and immediately after World War II.

Some, like Kennedy and his brother Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, saw military service during World War II. Secretary of State Dean Rusk served in military intelligence during the war and had then been an Asian-affairs expert in the U.S. State Department before becoming president of the Rockefeller Foundation. Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, a staff officer during the war, was a member of a group in charge of logistics for bombing raids. When the war was over, the group, which had become known as the "whiz kids," reorganized the financially troubled Ford Motor Company. McGeorge Bundy, Kennedy's special assistant for military affairs, had helped to plan the invasions of Sicily and France and had worked for the agency that implemented the Marshall Plan before becoming a political analyst for the prestigious Council on Foreign Relations and then going to teach at Harvard.

Among Kennedy's top economic advisers, University of Minnesota professor Walter Heller, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, had an important job in the U.S. Treasury Department during the war. Harvard professor John Kenneth Galbraith, who advised Kennedy on foreign economic policy, saw wartime service as deputy administrator of the Office of Price Administration (OPA), while Charles Hitch, a member of the Council of Economic Advisers, was on the War Production Board.

Many of Kennedy's advisers worked for the CIA or its World War II predecessor, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Chairman of the U.S. State Department Policy Planning Council Walt W. Rostow, Secretary of Labor Arthur Goldberg, and Special Assistant to the President Arthur Schlesinger were veterans of the OSS. William Bundy, younger brother of McGeorge Bundy, re-signed from the CIA to join the Kennedy administration as deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security.

Though the intelligence and self-confidence of this "Kennedy Brain Trust" were widely admired, some people worried about the group's brashness. House Speaker Sam Rayburn said to Vice-president Lyndon B. Johnson, "They may be every bit as intelligent as you say, but I'd feel a whole lot better about them if just one of them had run for sheriff once."

Sources:

David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest (New York: Random House, 1972);

Jim F. Heath, Decade of Disillusionment: the Kennedy-Johnson Years (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975);

Nelson Lichtenstein, ed., Political Profiles: The Kennedy Years (New-York: Facts on File, 1976).

Back-Channel Messages Sent

On 26 October ABC newsman John Scali was contacted by the top Soviet intelligence official in the United States. This official stated that the Soviet Union would agree to remove its missiles from Cuba under United Nations supervision and would not reintroduce them if the United States promised not to invade Cuba. Scali immediately contacted Secretary of State Dean Rusk, who sent a message expressing interest back to the Soviet official via Scali. That evening President Kennedy received a rambling letter from Premier Nikita Khrushchev, in which Khrushchev suggested similar terms but was not as explicit. The Crisis Escalates. Saturday, 27 October, was probably the darkest day of the confrontation. That morning Radio Moscow broadcast a new message from Khrushchev to Kennedy, adding the condition that the Soviets would take their missiles from Cuba only if the United States removed from Turkey its missiles aimed at the Soviet Union. A U.S. U-2 flight over Cuba was shot down that day by Soviet SAMs, which had just become operational. On the same day another U-2 flight strayed over the Soviet Union, resulting in Soviet interceptors being scrambled to shoot it down and U.S. aircraft in the area being scrambled to escort it safely back to base. U.S. intelligence reported that Soviet embassy officials at the United Nations in New York had begun destroying sensitive documents, a step normally undertaken as war is about to begin.

Kennedy's Response

At the Excomm meeting that day, Robert Kennedy suggested the unusual ploy that the United States ignore the second Khrushchev message and reply only to the first. The group agreed, and President Kennedy sent Khrushchev a message agreeing that, if the Soviets would withdraw their missiles from Cuba under U.N. supervision and promise not to reintroduce them, the United States would agree not to invade Cuba. The next day (28 October), in another broadcast from Radio Moscow, Khrushchev signaled full agreement, making nomention of U.S. missiles in Turkey. He further stated an interest in future diplomatic efforts to reduce tensions and control the burgeoning nuclear arms race. In reply President Kennedy issued a statement welcoming the Soviet decision. He stated that the naval blockade would be lifted after verification of removal of the missiles and dismantling of their launch sites, and he promised that the United States would not invade Cuba. The crisis that had brought the United States and the Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war was effectively over. Subsequent photo reconnaissance showed the missiles gone and the launch sites dismantled. The quarantine was lifted on 21 November.

Election Results

In the aftermath of the crisis the Republicans did not do as well as they had hoped in the 1962 elections. Kennedy's handling of the Cuban situation helped the Democrats gain six seats in. the Senate accompanied by a minimal two-seat net loss in the House, a far better outcome for the Democrats than had been expected. In a postelection about-face the Republicans—who had criticized Kennedy for inaction on Cuba—now accused him of manipulating the crisis to the benefit of Democratic candidates.

The Seeds of Détente

The Cuban missile crisis was also a cathartic event in U.S./Soviet relations. The realization that they had come close to nuclear war had a sobering effect on the way the two nations dealt with one another and contributed to a relaxation of tensions. In the short term the United States agreed to a hot line, a direct communications link with Moscow so that in future crises the two leaders would be able to communicate directly rather than relying on other parties to carry messages or on signaling through public broadcast messages. The initial hot line became operational in August 1963. On 25 July 1963 a treaty banning aboveground nuclear testing was signed by representatives of the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. Kennedy also announced that the United States would begin selling wheat to the Soviets. He also indicated a willingness to reduce tensions by suggesting in a speech given at American University in June 1963 that it was time to reexamine attitudes toward the Cold War. Yet the nuclear arms race between the two superpowers did not slow down. One reason the Soviets had not challenged the U.S. naval blockade of Cuba was their lack of sufficient naval power. Determined not to be in a similar situation in the future, the Soviets made a conscious decision to increase their naval capacity substantially.

Sources:

Elie Abel, The Missile Crisis (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1966);

Graham T. Allison, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston: Little, Brown, 1971);

Raymond Garthoff, Reflections on the Cuban Missile Crisis (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1989);

Ole R. Holsti, Crisis, Escalation, War (Montreal: McGill University Press, 1972);

Robert F. Kennedy, Thirteen Days: A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis (New York: Norton, 1969);

Robert Smith Thompson, The Missiles of October: The Declassified Story of John F. Kennedy and the Cuban Crisis (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992).