Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
AR+ CMC - Coggle Diagram
AR+ CMC
Nuclear Balance
4 October 1957 Soviet launched the world's first artificial satellite Sputnik to be followed a month later by Sputnik II. demonstrating an apparent capability for intercontinental ballistic missiles ICBM. Sputnik flights sparked panic in the US about an impending missile gap.
Decision to place nuclear missiles in Cuba to correct strategic imbalance caused by the construction of NATO missile bases in Turkey which could reach the major industrial+ population centres of the SU
By establishing Cuba as an unsinkable strategic missile base, Americans guessed, Khrushchev sought to double Soviet capacity to hit targets in the continental US more cheaply+ easily than with intercontinental ballistic missiles stationed at home. The nuclear balance did indeed vex Khrushchev- esp. in view of his lagging ICBM program+ enhance the deployment's attractions.
-
-
Disappearance of missile gap with the Kennedy administration becoming certain that the US held an enormous lead in capacity to deliver nuclear weapons at intercontinental range+ in a second strike no less than in a first
Options
-
1) JFK felt deterred by the prospect of a single Soviet nuclear warhead detonating on an American city+ military advisors could not guarantee a suprise airtrike would wipe out all the missiles. 2) JFK derived a thin comfort from the hawks forecasts that the Soviets would swallow a first strike on Cuba without retaliating elsewhere. Expected a strike on Cuba to provoke Khrushchev to seize West Berlin 3) Kennedy worried that military action to erase a threat Europeans learned to endure would undermine the support of the NATO. 4) Limited blockade could also be intensified
Suprise attack: not all sites that had been found could be destroyed in a single attack+ all Soviet sites had not been yet discovered; massive invasion of Cuba would need prior air strike to remove missiles but this would eliminate surprise; suprise attack reminiscent of Pearl harbour
-
-
Cuba
Protect Cuba: Khrushchev memoirs states that the reason was to protect Cuba. John Lewish Gaddis believes that he put missiles in Cuba because he feared another invasion. Bay of Pigs invasion may have seen as a determination to crush the Cuban revolution. Should the US gov succeed in this aim it would be a defeat for Communism worldwide. The fact that the US had missiles in Turkey provided a justification for installign missiles in Cuba to protect the island. View supported by Zubok+ Pleshnakov.
Besides US open campaign to isolate havana diplomatically, politcallly+ economically following failed April 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, Kennedy administration sponsored secreat actions- covert harassment (Operation Mongoose), assassination plots, military muscle flexing-that might have fanned fears of attack both in Havana+ Moscow.
Safeguarding Cuba- strategic missiles to 'restrain the US from precipitous military action'- tactical weapons to fight if deterrance failed- was a key Khrushchev aim
Geographical location: While it did not really affect the worldwide nuclear balance it increased the Soivet first strike capability+ meant that warning time for missiles fired at the US would be far less than for missiles fired from within the SU. Cuba was only 90 miles away from the USA
US interests: US companies controlled most of the financial, railway, electricity+ sugar industries. Castro's nationalisation of US econ interests.
Development within Kennedys inner circle of personal animus against Castro. Kennedy+ his brother longed for some redeeming opportunity. Organised a new set of covert operations- Mongoose to stir up trouble in Cuba+ bring down castro if the opportunity presented itself
Re-emergence in connection with the congressional elections of 1962 of public debate about the role of Cuba in the role of global Cold War .Republicans belief that the Soviets turning Cuba into a missile base was imagination to gain Senate+ House seats .
Wider Context
Berlin Crisis 1958
West Berlin appeared to be a glittering example of what capitalism could achieve. This along with the politcal freedoms+ open lifestyle of the West Berliners encouraged East Germans to escape from the hardships of the East to the prosperity+ freedom of the West through the open frontier in Berlin
Exodus of mainly young+ skilled East Germans meant that between 1945-61 about 1/6 of the whole german population took the opportunity to move to the West via Berlin.
27 Nov Khrushchev gave a 6 month ultimatum demanding the demilitarisation of West Berlin, the withdrawal of Western troops+ change of status into a free city. If the Western allies refused to sign a peace treaty with the 2 German states, Khrushchev threatened to conclude a peace agreement just with the GDR+ recognise its sovreignity over East Berlin. This would enable the GDR to control access to West berlin+ interfere at will w/traffic using the land corridors from the FRG.Western allies would be compelled to deal with East Geramn not Soviet officials and so recognise its sovreignity
-
-
Increasing tensions over Berlin--> increase number of refugees. 12 Aug 1961 40,000 refugees fled to the West. 13 Aug 1961 barbed wire was erected+ followed by a concrete wall
Cuban Missile Crisis provided a leverage point. Counted on it to enhance his overall position on the Cold War chessboard for subsequent moves in Berlin/elsewhere. Hoped that they would alter the political+ psychological correlation of forces in his favour
Wall in Berlin was not seen as a culmination or even a caesura in the long-building Berlin crisis. It was common assumption that the Wall was a temporising device that Khruschev would soon resume an effort to take possession of West Berlin
-
Sino-Cuban relations
Khrushchev wanted to avoid losing ground to Beijing in Havana itself. While dependent on Soviet econ aid since the rupture w/Washington, Cuban leaders e.g., Che Guevara ideologically skewed closer to Beijing avid support for armed uprisings throughout Latin America. With Soviet-Cuban ties strained in early 1962, as Castro purged pro-Moscow Communists, Khrushchev believed that sending missiles might reinforce the alliance+ fence out China
Aleksandr Fursenko+ Timothy Naftali speculate that Laos may have been the ultimate trigger for the decision to put missiles in Cuba. On the eve of his Cuban adventure, Khrushchev raged at JFK’s rushing troops to northern Thailand+ grumbled that he was pursuing a Dulles like position of strength policy
-