Deconstruction of Cuban Missile Crisis - Coursework Example

The Cuban Missile Crisis Introduction: The month of October was significant because it produced a situation where the world moved the closest it ever had to a nuclear war. According to Belkin and Blight(1991), the conflict represents “the nadir of the cold war”, being a 13 day confrontation that moved the closest to explosion point in terms of the threat of use of nuclear weapons, yet ended in a clean cut conclusion that finally settled the conflict (Belkin and Blight, 1991:731). In April of 1962, the USSR moved intermediate range nuclear missiles into Cuba located ninety miles from the United States. This move was also supported by Castro as a means to defend the island from a potential attack by the United States. Aerial reconnaissance photographs picked up signs of the military installations and the news went to President Kennedy(www.library.thinkquest.org), he formed a group of twelve senior government officials/advisors known as EX-COMM (Garthoff, 1989:43). The position taken by the EX-COM was simple – the Soviet Union had secretly began to install missiles with nuclear capability in Cuba which posed “a threat to peace” and as a result, their deployment was “intolerable and not acceptable.” (Weldes, 1999:41). Based upon deliberations carried out between President Kennedy and this select group of advisors, the United States imposed a naval quarantine to prevent the entry of any more military materials or missiles into Cuba. The United States also stated clearly that any missile fired from Cuba would be considered to be an attack by the Soviet Union and threatened retribution through a nuclear attack if the missiles were not removed and after the critical 13 day period since the beginning of the crisis, the missiles from Cuba were indeed removed by the Soviets. The period immediately preceding this was however a time of escalating tension and strife between the two superpowers. By the 25th of October, President Kennedy raised the level of military readiness to DEFCON2 and this prompted Khruschev to send a letter to President Kennedy on the 26th October, assuring him that the Soviet Union would remove the missiles if the United States provided an assurance that it would not attack Cuba. This Report presents two major aspects to be examined: (a) The Cuban missile crisis can be deconstructed (b) It is useful to undertake a deconstruction of the crisis This Report questions the clean cut approach and the public image associated with the Cuban crisis. It examines whether the missile crisis can be deconstructed and if so, what are the underlying scenarios that can be uncovered and how useful this deconstruction can be to provide lessons about the relevance to public policy in the present day and age. Analysis: The significance of the Cuban missile crisis lies in the fact that it was the closest that the world came to a nuclear war, because both the United States as well as Cuba harbouring Soviet missiles, were poised in a state of readiness to strike using nuclear missiles. The crisis erupted in October 1962, emerging from the existing differential between the United States and the Soviet Union in terms of their level of preparedness and arming with nuclear missiles. During an era when the Cold War was raging, the United States was far ahead of the Soviet Union in its possession of nuclear arsenal. The Soviet Union, in order to equalize the playing field, decided to place some of its missiles in Cuba, in order to make it easier to launch the missiles from there and therefore gain some territorial advantages as well as the advantage of lesser time frames in launching an attack. The United States however, responded sharply and swiftly to the placement of Soviet missiles in Cuba, viewing it as a potential threat that was intended to send an aggressive war mongering message to the United States. When the Cuban missile crisis erupted, the primary confrontation was between the United States and the USSR. However, since the missiles were located in Cuba, which was an ally of the Soviet Union, it was this small country that became the target of the United States threat to escalate the situation into a nuclear conflict that could have potentially been devastating for the world. In essence, Cuba had functioned mainly as a receptacle for the missiles of the Soviet Union, but it became an active player in the conflict as the diplomatic war between the two super powers escalated. It was Cuba that was blockaded and made the subject of American aggression, its ships subjected to searches and controls levied upon what went into and out of the country (Freedman, 2000:182). Moreover, as the American blockade continued and the Soviet Union continued to hold back on removing the missiles from Cuban territory, it created enormous amounts of anxiety and desperation in Cuba, which felt that the Soviet Union had deserted it. As Marfleet(2000) points out, the delay from the Soviet Union in speedily removing the missiles and the protracted extension of the crisis was caused by the belief of the Soviets that the placement of the missiles in Cuba would pass easily, because the United States was too liberal in its political beliefs to actually resort to a fight or a war. As a result, when Kennedy issued a sharp ultimatum to the Soviets to either withdraw their missiles immediately from Cuba or be prepared to fight a nuclear war, this came as a shock. When Kennedy took such a firm stand, the Soviets chose to back down and withdraw the missiles rather than engage in a direct confrontation which could have exploded into a nuclear conflict. Marfleet(2000) has examined the manner in which the Cuban missile crisis affected the belief systems of one of the most prominent people in the crisis, i.e, the American President John F Kennedy. In deconstructing the Cuban missile crisis and examining it from this angle, Marfleet has relied upon information that became available only in the late 1990, i.e, transcripts of private conversations that occurred between 16th and 25th October when the missile crisis was at its height (Stern, 2000). On the basis of his analysis of these transcripts, he has spelt out the public view that existed about the Cuban missile crisis and then outlined some of the beliefs associated with the crisis which he deconstructs on the basis of the fresh evidence uncovered, i.e., the transcripts, in order to unearth a fourth perspective. The overall public impression of the Cuban missile crisis was that of the Americans issuing an ultimatum and the Soviets withdrawing their missiles as a result of the ultimatum. The private impression however consists of different perspectives. One of the existing beliefs equated the Cuban missile crisis to the “Gettysburg of the Cold War”, because the crisis brought both the United States and the Soviet Union to a point where they were confronted with the horrific spectre of a war that could have potentially been fatal to the world (Marfleet, 2000:546). Secondly, there is a belief that Kennedy initially reacted with anger and aggression at the news of the Soviet missile build-up in Cuba, but later he changed into a shrewd and calculating politician. Thirdly, another important aspect of the crisis were the overconfident assertions from the United States and its faith in coercive diplomacy, i.e., using the threat of use of nuclear weapons as a means to ensure that its political agenda was satisfied.(Marfleet, 2000:546). Based upon the findings in the transcripts, Marfleet identifies a fourth trend that arises in comparison with these three, i.e., there is a significant diversity between the public versus the private conduct involved in the management of the crisis. While the public image appears to suggest that Kennedy was aggressive and responded to the threat of Soviet missile presence in Cuba with an ultimatum to the Soviets to either withdraw the missiles or face a nuclear attack, the private view is that despite the outward veneer of aggression, Kennedy was in fact quite prepared to negotiate with the Soviets. He was ready to offer some concessions from the United States side in exchange for the removal of the missiles from Cuba, for example, withdrawal of the American Jupiter missiles from Turkey. Decision Making in the Cuban missile crisis: Derrida has defined grammatology as the science of writing, which through being interspersed with metaphor, metaphysics and theology shows signs of liberation all over the world.(Derrida, 1976:4). As a result, there could be different means of interpreting historical events and the decisions taken by Governments, depending upon which perspectives are applied and what kind of metaphors are used. Buzan (1991) offers an interesting foundation on the basis of which the narrative of international relations can be studied, i.e., security. This writer’s discourse is based upon security which he suggests is a useful concept to understand the play of power in the international arena. Applying this to the Cuban missile crisis, security as the basis for decision making serves to explain the power balances that instigated and perpetrated most of the events that occurred. For instance, as Hilsman (1996) states, the EXCOM came up with several reasons why the Soviets could have placed the missiles in Cuba, one of which was that the missiles were intended to defend Cuba (Hilsman, 1996:79). As Allison (1971) points out, the forceful manner in which the United States responded to the missile threat suggests that the fear for the security of the United States and the threat posed by the missiles being planted in such close vicinity may have been the guiding factor. Haas(2001) has applied the prospect theory in analyzing the Cuban missile crisis. He has tried to assess the anticipated benefits, costs and the probabilities of success that are associated with each of the policy choices that the two major leaders would have considered before a final decision was made. The author then applies the prospect theory, which states that when an individual is making a decision and all of the available options appear to suggest that there will be large scale losses, then the individual will tend to make a decision that allows for a high element of risk, which might not necessarily be one that maximizes value. When the chances of success appear limited, the individual tends to be more ready to accept a high level of risk in the option that is finally selected when the decision is made. In deconstructing the Cuban missile crisis, different authors have out forward different perspectives on decision making and the underlying processes that led to those decisions. Three different perspectives are discussed below: Haas(2001) has assessed the decisions that both Kennedy and Khruschev made during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 and arrives at the conclusion that they do indeed conform to the prospect theory. In Kennedy’s case for instance, the presence of the Soviet missiles in a geographical location so close to the United States posed a grave threat and risk of accidental explosion, thereby prompting him to take the extreme decision of threatening nuclear retribution of the missiles were not removed. Where the Soviets were concerned, the probable choices that would have been available were (a) refuse to remove the missiles (b) shift the missiles elsewhere within Cuba or (c) move the missiles out totally. The option that the Soviets finally selected was the last one because the situation that existed screamed of losses for the Soviet side. The USSR was already in an inferior position in terms of its nuclear armaments, however by insisting upon retaining the missiles in Cuba it would have (a) put itself into a situation where further losses occurred due to the United States carrying out its threat or (b) the anxiety and desperation experienced by Cuba put it in a position where it would have lost an ally. The move by the Soviets to put the missiles in Cuba in the first place was fraught with risk, however the selection of this choice is explained by the prospect theory where a risky option has been selected. As Thorson and Sylvan(1982) point out, the main significance of the Cuban missile event is that it was the first time that the world came so close to a nuclear confrontation. However, these authors point out that there is an underlying significance to the event because there is evidence that decision makers use existing precedents in developing ways and means to deal with new problems. The manner in which the United States made its decisions in resolving the Cuban missile crisis is regarded in a positive manner, largely because of the benign outcome that resulted. However, upon deconstruction, the positive nature of this resolution of the crisis is questionable, because if the outcome had been somewhat negative, the positive nature of this decision making would not have been as apparent. Anderson(1983) on the other hand, sees the process of decision making in a different way, he does not see it as the process of making a choice between different alternatives; rather according to Anderson(1983) the process of arriving at the decision represents the path through a binary maze. As the author points out, decision making is generally the result of differing systems of control and coordination within organizations, which purportedly explains how Government decisions often lack coherence. Anderson’s proposal is different; he suggests that the lack of coherence in governmental decision making is a natural consequence of the decision making process being akin to the binary maze, where there is general confusion and lack of knowledge which complicates the issue. As a result, Anderson’s view differs from Thorson and Sylvan who propose that decision making is the result of following existing positive precedents, because the general assumption is that a decision that generated a positive outcome in one instance is also likely to generate a positive outcome in a subsequent decision. The perspective offered by these authors differs drastically from Haas (2001), who applies the prospect theory in explaining the lack of coherence arising in governmental decisions, which was also in evidence during the Cuban missile crisis. Hence, on the basis of application of the theory, it is the default losses that occur in any instance which prompt leaders to take decisions with a high element of risk, decisions that may not necessarily be the value maximizing kind. The common aspect underlying the views offered by all of these authors however, is the lack of coherence that is a part and parcel of the decisions made by the American and Soviet leaders during the Cuban missile crisis. Both Kennedy and Khruschev demonstrated a remarkable willingness to take decisions that involved a high level of risk and a lack of coherence. Kennedy took a substantial risk by issuing the threat to take nuclear action if the missiles were not withdrawn from Cuba and Khruschev took a substantial risk by placing the missiles in Cuba in the first place, because Cuba was its ally and was being subjected to the danger of retributive action from the United States. A fourth perspective that varies considerably from any of the three options discussed above is the application of the rational expectations theories from the field of economics into political decision making, as elucidated by Graham T Allison (1971). His proposals are based upon three models, one of which is the rational expectations model which in turn, is based on the assumption that when filtered through a set of internal market institutions, the sum total of all the decisions made by individuals and organizations is not systematically wrong. Applying this in the context of political decisions made by international players, the Governments in question are the actors and the basic premise would be that the actions taken by these States are analyzed on the basis that they have considered all options and have acted in a rational manner to maximize their utility. The second model is the organizational model, which attempts to address one of the weaknesses in the rational model, i.e., it tends to ignore many facts which may be important. Allison (1971) points out that the propositions underlying this model are as follows: (a) Government leaders do not view a crisis as a whole; rather they break it down and assign it along pre-established organizational lines (b) Leaders practice “satificing” while arriving at a decision, i.e., because of the limitations in terms of time and resources, leaders tend to use the option that appears to be most likely to work (c) leaders tend to adopt solutions that reduce the levels of short term uncertainty (d) organizations tend to follow certain set procedures when taking their actions and (e) since implementing solutions within a large government organization take more time, leaders may be limited to selection of choices that implement pre-existing plans. The third kind of model that Allison(1971) applies is the government policies model, which differs from the organizational model in that it also takes into account the internal government politics. For instance, this model proposes that the decisions leaders reach are influenced by the nature of the negotiations that take place between them. Despite the existence of a shared objective among the leaders, there may be differences in terms of how such an objective is to be attained. If a leader is very powerful and his major advisors are essentially yes men, the decision reached is likely to reflect the will of the leader. If on the other hand, advisors are willing to express disagreement, then working towards achieving a consensus could help to generate the kind of solutions that could be valuable and effective. In the context of the Cuban missile crisis, Allison (1971) assesses the decision making on the basis of three different models – the rational actor model, the organizational behaviour model and the Governmental politics model. For each of these three models, he proposes that three different questions be posed: (a) Why did the Soviet Union choose to place missiles in Cuba? (b) Why did the United States choose to respond to the Soviet Union’s actions by placing a naval blockade around Cuba? (c) Why did the Soviet Union finally withdraw the missiles? Applying the rational actor model, the United States Government considered several different alternative solutions to dealing with the Cuban crisis. These ranged from doing absolutely nothing about the situation to invading Cuba to deal with the problem posed by the missiles. But after evaluating all the available alternatives, the Government decided on the optimal solution of enforcing a naval blockade on Cuba, because this ensured that the Soviets were pressured into doing something about the missiles, while also minimizing the grim possibility of the conflict escalating immediately into war. If the organizational model is applied however, leaders would tend to utilize solutions that were most likely to reduce the levels of short term conflict and fit in with established government procedures that were pre-existing or had been tried and tested before and were able to fall in with government bureaucracy. As a result, Kennedy’s choice of the naval blockade is explained as being the best one that helped to address the short term uncertainties created by the presence of the missiles. If an invasion through an air attack had been selected instead, there was no guarantee that the nuclear missiles would be disabled. The choice of naval blockade best “satisficed” the needs generated by the crisis situation. When applying the Government policies model, the internal politics in both USSR and USA affected the decisions of the two leaders. Khruschev was under pressure from his political colleagues because his country did not possess ICBMs which the US had and he had just made the decision to cut down on the number of members in the Red Army. As a result, the decision to place missiles in Cuba was a quick, fairly cheap and easy way to regain his political credibility. In Kennedy’s case, Cuba was a particularly delicate issue for the United States because the Bay of Pigs invasion which had been initiated in 1961 was not very successful. Hence, as opposed to this, Kennedy decided to take a stronger and more forceful stance in dealing with the crisis. This could partially explain the force of Kennedy’s response, which has been questioned as puzzling by the Soviet Union and as Lebow and Stein (1994) point out, this may be justified because the missiles did not directly threaten American missiles, apart from Cuba’s proximity to the United States. In their analysis of the Cuban crisis, Belkin and Blight(1991) have deconstructed it by shifting the focus from the perspective of the superpowers to Cuba, the third world country that was caught in the midst of the crisis that erupted between the two superpowers. These authors have argued that in general, when superpowers move closer together, they must also take into account, the security concerns of third world states that are caught in the midst of the crossfire, because a failure to do so could pose a security risk and threat to the superpowers themselves. The ongoing Cold War crisis has not been conducive to maintaining world peace and has caused a state of constant tension and restlessness that is prevalent at all times. As Belkin and Blight (1991) have stated, this is one of the reasons why Secretary of State James Baker called for a mutual framework in 1989 in order to promote better relations between the superpowers so that the world is a more secure place to live in. Prior to this stage when the process of initiating a more cordial relationship between the two super powers was implemented and prior to the breakdown of the USSR, third world States such as Cuba used the underlying hostilities between the US and USSR to play the two superpowers off against each other and thereby secure financial aid for themselves in exchange for the promise to be loyal to one side or the other. Belkin and Blight (1991) argue that the plight of third parties caught in the crossfire or peace negotiations between the two super powers is often ignored and can boomerang back on the super powers. During the Cuban missile crisis, the third party was Cuba – tied up in a triangular entanglement with the two super powers. The authors offer the view that many of the elements that characterize an eruption of unexpected conduct from a third party caught in the contretemps between the two superpowers is evident in the Cuban missile crisis. First, the involvement of two superpowers, i.e., the United States and the USSR, second, the development of anxiety and finally desperation within a third party involved in the conflict, i.e, Cuba and thirdly, the relevance of the Cuban missile crisis to contemporary policy. For instance, the Cuban missile crisis has demonstrated the importance of third party countries and the role they play in international conflicts involving superpowers. In his review of the book titled “What if they gave a crisis and nobody came?” by Ron Hirschbien, Rich (1999) discusses the author’s analysis and deconstruction of the Cuban missile crisis in the context of Kennedy vacillating between adopting a Churchill or a Chamberlain image as follows: “Deconstructing the Cuban missile crisis sets us among the columns of ancient Greece. [In] the story amphitheatres, playwrights such as Sophocles scripted narratives that would echo through the centuries.” (Hirschbien,109-19; cited in Rich, 1999:287). Rich suggests that in his approach to the handling of the Cuban missile crisis, Kennedy was influenced by the Churchill-Chamberlain metaphors. This was the reason why, despite the fact that neither Cuba nor the Soviet Union had overtly made a threatening war move, Kennedy nevertheless viewed the placement of the Soviet missiles in Cuba as a crisis that warranted the issue of a serious threat of rebuttal and retribution to the Soviet Union, which could have erupted in a nuclear war and posed near fatal consequences for planet earth. The Cuban situation deteriorated into a crisis mostly because of Kennedy’s reaction to the event and as Hirschbien argues, the question of whether or not a crisis arises lies in the eyes of the beholder. Conclusions: At the outset the question that was to be addressed in this report is whether or not the Cuban missile crisis needs to be deconstructed and whether or not it is useful to do so. As detailed above, it may be clearly seen that the Cuban missile crisis was not necessarily the clean cut confrontation that ended in a definitive conclusion, as has been projected in its public image. The notion that the crisis was a near-miss nuclear situation which was definitely concluded within a time span of 13 days may not necessarily be an accurate conclusion, because it had several implications for current foreign exchange policy, which are set out further below after examining the salient points of the deconstruction. A deconstruction of the Cuban crisis unearths several important policy implications that are also relevant in the current time. Deconstruction allows the option of looking deeper into an issue by applying different models and perspectives, which help to provide a better understanding of the real contextual elements that could be applied to the situation. For example, as Allister (1971) has described, during 1941, US military commanders had enough evidence to suggest that Pearl Harbour was imminently under threat; yet no steps were taken to protect against attack. Rather the US assumed the intent was to sabotage Pearl Harbour and accordingly, lined up US planes wing to wing, surrounded by armed guards. This appears to belie the notion that the threat of mutual destruction on both sides may serve as a deterrent to conflict; therefore applying the organizational model helps to explain how a miscommunication or differing viewpoints could generate different outcomes. Ina similar manner, application of this model to the Cuban crisis however, shows that depending upon the leader and his/her advisors’ understanding of the situation, the threat of mutual destruction could serve as a deterrent. The Government model serves to explain what seems to be an inconsistency in United States policy. During the Bay of Pigs invasion, the US responded with a diplomatic solution but its response to the Cuban crisis was not diplomatic in accordance with its general policies; rather, it was a forceful response. The influence of the team of twelve set up by President Kennedy, i.e, EX-COMM, was responsible for the change in policy and response. Deconstruction helps in the analysis of the discourse and helps clarify and shed light on the underlying contextual situations and factors that could have propelled the decisions and actions of the players in a conflict. Deconstruction of the crisis also highlights the importance that needs to be accorded to the third party countries that are trapped in the negotiations, confrontations and/or diplomatic ties between the super powers. The Cuban crisis demonstrates how easily a conflict can escalate depending upon the viewpoint and perspective of the players, i.e, the manner in which each party views the problem in question. The Cuban crisis also illustrates how the role of a third party can become crucial when it is entangled in the midst of a face-off between two super powers. When the missile crisis erupted in 1962, it was the Soviets who had placed the missiles there, not necessarily with the idea of using them immediately but rather with the objective of placing them there in such a manner that they posed a potent threat to the United States, to counterbalance what the Soviet Union perceived as its own weakness in the level of armament with missiles as compared to the United States. Since the missiles had been placed in third country territory however, it was Cuba that faced the naval blockage and therefore reacted sharply to the threat from the United States (Sorenson,1997). As Belkin and Blight (1991) have pointed out, for a dark period stretching from late October to early November, Cuba felt abandoned by the Soviet Union while simultaneously being threatened by the United States and this produced a state of acute anxiety that very quickly escalated to the point of desperation. This led to Cuba taking power into its own hands and forcing the Soviets to take a decision to withdraw the missiles and appeal to the United States not to attack Cuba, so that they could preserve their alliance with Castro’s state. The deconstruction of the Cuban missile crisis thereby underlines the need to take the concerns of third party countries into account in resolution of power conflicts between super powers. The Cold War was largely characterized by the ongoing conflict between the two super powers. Every other country therefore, became a potential ally with both super powers trying valiantly to draw the country on to its side. The differences arising out of the two super positions were essential differences in political philosophy, with the United States pushing democracy while the Soviet Union was pushing communism on to its ally States. Cuba was a vital ally of the Soviet Union due to its proximity to the United States; hence although it was a third party to the conflict, the manner in which its interests were likely to be affected were an important factor in the Soviet decision to withdraw the missiles. From the perspective of policy making by superpowers, the Cuban crisis sharply demonstrated that third party interests cannot be ignored, neither can their support be automatically taken for granted. A failure to take the interests of third parties into account or provide the support they need and expect could prove damaging to the interests of the superpowers, as the Soviet Union discovered when it took Cuba’s cooperation for granted but failed to provide the moral support it needed. From the analysis above, it may also be noted that while different authors have offered different explanations for the decision making, one aspect on which they all agree is that there was a lack of coherence and a high level of risk in the decisions taken by both leaders. The reasons for this lack of coherence have been explained differently by different authors. As detailed in the report above, one explanation offered was the prospect theory, but the basic premise of this theory was that losses were likely in any instance, with any of the alternative possibilities that were considered. As a result, the leaders were willing to countenance a higher level of risk than they would have normally. According to another theory, the willingness to countenance the high level of risk arose because it was a natural consequence of the movement along a decision tree. But the definitive conclusion that must be made on the Cuban missile crisis after taking all the discourse into account is that the deconstruction of this discourse could indeed be very beneficial and significant in shedding light on motivations of primary players in a conflict and the manner in which contextual factors may play a role, to a minor or major extent. Bibliography Andersen, Paul A. (1983) “Decision making by objection and the Cuban missile crisis”, Administrative Science Quarterly, 28(2): 201-222 Allison, Graham. (1971) “Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis” (1st edn), Little Brown Belkin, Aaron and Blight, James G. (1991) “Triangular mutual security: why the Cuban missile crisis matters in a world beyond the Cold War”, Political Psychology, 12(4):727-745. Buzan, Barry. (1983) “People, States and Fears: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post-Cold War Era”, New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Derrida, Jacques. (1976) “Of grammatology”, Translated by G.C.Spivak, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins. Freedman, Lawrence.(2000) “Kennedy’s wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam”, Oxford University Press Garthoff, Raymond, L. (1989) “Reflections on the Cuban missile crisis”, The Brookings Institution. Haas, Mark L. (2001) “Prospect Theory and the Cuban Missile crisis”, International Studies Quarterly, 45, 241-270. Hilsman, Roger. (1996) “The Cuban missile crisis: the struggle over policy”, Praeger Publishers Lebow, Richard Ness and Stein, Janice Gross. (1994) “We all lost the cold war”, Princeton University Press. Marfleet, Gregory B. (2000) “The operational code of John F Kennedy during the Cuban missile crisis: A comparison of public and private rhetoric”, Political Psychology, 21(3): 545-558. Rich, David Z. (1999) “Review”, The Journal of Politics, 61(1): 286-288 Sorenson, Theodore C. (1997) “From the eye of the storm: the key moments of the Cuban missile crisis – as seen by a man who was in the thick of it”, Washington Monthly, Volume 29. Stern, Sheldon M. (2000) “Source material: the 1997 published transcripts of the JFK Cuban missile crisis tapes too good to be true?”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Volume 30. Weldes, Jutta. (1999) “Constructing national interests: the United States and the Cuban missile crisis”, University of Minnesota Press. Read More