Cuban Missile Crisis

The Cuban Missile Crisis

The Cuban Missile Crisis also known as the "October Crisis" was a 13 day long confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States regarding the Soviet ballistic missile deployment in Cuba. It began on October 16th and ended on October 28th 1962. At this point, Cold War was closest to turning into a nuclear war. This was a Soviet response to America placing Jupiter ballistic missiles in Turkey and Italy against the Soviet Union. After this, when Cuba requested Khrushchev to place nuclear missiles in Cuba and he agreed. The construction for the missile launch facilities started the summer of 1962. Placing Soviet missiles in Cuba was advantageous for the Soviet Union because at that time they had medium range missiles unlike the United States which had long-range missiles and by putting the missiles in Cuba, the Soviets would be able to hit America more easily.  The news got to the United States when a U-2 spy plane brought photographs as proof of missile facilities in Cuba. Although the United States had several different options like an air strike to knock out the missiles, an invasion of Cuba, diplomatic approach, the United States established a military blockade to prevent further missiles from entering Cuba. They even said that they will not send any weapons to Cuba for defense and suggested that all weapons may be removed from Cuba and returned to Soviet Union. On the morning of October 27, a U-2 plane was shot down by  the Soviet Union and when Kennedy was asked to do something, he refused because he said taking revenge could lead to a nuclear war. After the long period of negotiations ended,  United States and Soviet Union reached an agreement that the Soviet Union will remove their missiles from Cuba and in exchange the United States would remove their's from Italy and Turkey that were placed their against Soviet Union. However, Castro did not like or approve this agreement and said that this was a disgraceful agreement, but if this had continued any longer it could possibly lead to a nuclear war which would not only take more lives, but also ruin the future.