Negotiations of the Cuban Missile CrisisEssay Preview: Negotiations of the Cuban Missile CrisisReport this essayIntroductionBy 1962, the Soviet Union was considerably behind the United States in the nuclear arms race. The Soviet Union had limited range missiles that were only capable of being launched against Europe, but the United States possessed missiles that were capable of striking anywhere within the entire Soviet Union. As it is often said, when it comes to national security, leaders sometimes make irrational decisions. In an effort to restore the balance of power Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev devised the idea of placing intermediate-range missiles in Cuba (14 days in October). This deployment of weapons in Cuba would double the Soviet strategic arsenal and provide a credible deterrent to a potential U.S. attack against the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was able to capitalize on Fidel Castro’s fear that the United States was out to overthrow his socialist government. For the United States, having a communist country in the Western Hemisphere was an embarrassment and national security risk. The Soviet Union presented this plan to Cuba as insurance against a United States invasion, such as the failed attempt at the Bay of Pigs in 1961. Realizing that this was the best means of holding onto power in Cuba against a belligerent neighbor, Fidel Castro accepted the proposal, thus the Soviet Union worked quickly and secretly to build missile installations in Cuba.
On October 16, 1962. President John F. Kennedy discovered through reconnaissance photographs that the Soviet Union was constructing missile installations on Cuban soil. This meant that only 90 miles of ocean separated the United States from nuclear missiles. In response to this threat, President Kennedy organized the Executive Committee (EX-COMM), which was comprised from Kennedy’s twelve most important advisors to help manage the crisis (14 days in October). For seven days there was considerable and intense debate as to how the United States should respond to this threat. Not surprisingly, his advisors both civilian and militarily, differed as to the appropriate course of action. Options considered in response to this crisis ranged from an armed invasion of Cuba to air strikes. Kennedy decided on a less confrontational response. President Kennedy ordered a naval quarantine or blockade around Cuba that would prevent the arrival of more Soviet offensive weapons to the island. On October 22, President Kennedy publicly announced the discovery of the missile installations and his decision to quarantine Cuba. He also proclaimed that any nuclear missile launched from Cuban island would be regarded as an attack on the United States by the Soviet Union. Additionally the United States demanded that the Soviets remove all of their offensive weapons from Cuba. The Soviets responded by authorizing their field commanders in Cuba to launch their tactical nuclear weapons if invaded by U.S. forces. This precipitated the closest time in history that the danger of nuclear war was at its highest. The fate of millions of people rested on the ability of two men, President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khrushchev to negotiate a compromise during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
During the crisis, the United States and Soviet Union were involved in intense negotiations through letters, agents and other types of communications, both formal and “back channel.” Premier Khrushchev sent letters to Kennedy on October 23 and 24 indicating the peaceful intention of the missiles in Cuba as means of justifying the presence of Soviet arms in Cuba. On October 26, Khrushchev sent Kennedy a letter proposing that the missile installations would be dismantled in exchange for the guarantee that the United States would not invade Cuba. On October 27, another letter to Kennedy arrived from Khrushchev, proposing that missile installations in Cuba would be dismantled if the United States removed its missile installations from Turkey. Tensions finally began to ease on October 28 when Khrushchev announced that he would order the dismantling of the missile installations and return them to the Soviet Union (14 days in October). He did this despite never getting formal guarantees that the United States would not invade Cuba.
This paper will focus on three two negotiations that comprised the Cuban Missile Crisis:•U.S. President Kennedy vs. Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev•U.S. President Kennedy vs. Own advisors (EX-COMM)U.S. President Kennedy vs. Soviet Union Premier Nikita KhrushchevCross Cultural NegotiationsThe biggest obstacle that the Soviets and Americans faced in dealing with this crisis was the added difficulty imposed by cross-cultural negotiations. This added burden further magnified the differences in thinking, feeling and behaving between the two countries. The table above illustrates the national style in negotiation faced by the United States and Soviet Union. Both the Americans and Soviets had to take into account each other style to eventually reach an agreement. Even though Cuba was at the center of this debate, it played a minor roll in the negotiations between the US and Soviet Union.
The Soviets, on the other hand, were more in tune with the American style and were unable to forge a diplomatic bond. The Cuban-American policy was different in that it required a strong counterbalance to a dominant US presence in the region and at the same time, it demanded independence from the Soviet Union. This means the Soviet Union and the United States had to accept that this American view of Cuba brought about their independence.
It also means that there are a lot of obstacles here, mostly regarding the Soviet military approach to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The Soviets’ Diplomacism and Strategic Relations:
The Cuban Missile Crisis began with a successful missile test which led to a full and lasting peace between the Cuban government and the people of Cuba, allowing the United States and the Soviet Union to have a direct confrontation.
The Soviet leader, the leader of the Soviets, and he personally led the Cuban leader, a man who had been through almost thirty-six years of civil war, against what a number of their allies believed to be U.S. policies and military capabilities.
After this test, they launched the first ballistic missiles on April 3, which effectively destroyed the entire United States military air base at Guantanamo Bay. The US military scrambled hundreds of thousands of troops to deliver the missiles, which ended in severe losses of both the United States and Cuban military, that day.
The Cuban military conducted a major ground assault on March 4th during which the United Kingdom’s RAF and the US Marines destroyed the air base before launching the bomb and the first American fighter aircraft, which the United Kingdom had taken out on a number of occasions. The Soviets had also begun evacuating the US military base and began to conduct periodic raids on the capital (Sebastien Bekker at the time) that would later lead to the assassination of President Eisenhower in 1959.
This ground assault provided both US and Soviet political and technological leadership with a sense of security against the Soviet aggression.
The Chinese Communists at the time, however, had come to support US and Soviet policies in Cuba’s strategic stance and therefore viewed the United States and the Soviet Union with great suspicion. So for a very long time, they were reluctant to go along with the United States and Soviet policy.
In December 1953, just three months after the US military bombed the island and killed many leaders of the Cuban Communist Party, the CIA-run Cuban exile newspaper of the CIA, Cuba Observer, reported that the Soviet Union and the US military had attacked each other four times in four years and that the Soviets, on March 4th, 1953, had attacked the Soviet Union four times in four years.[5]
In May 1953 the US announced its plans to launch atomic bomb on the USSR and launch a preemptive strike against Iran[6] in order to prevent nuclear weapons from falling into Iran.[7] On June 11th, 1954, three days after the first strike was launched, the Soviet Union and the United States sent nuclear warheads into Japan .
. The Russians also conducted military drills and other similar moves during 1953-54.[note 8]
On March 5th, the United States and the Soviet Union launched Operation Sinkhole in response to what the US called “the most brutal air bombing campaign since the first Pearl Harbor.”[9][10][11][12]
The United Kingdom, the United States and other Western allies also used their political pressure to negotiate
This national style of negotiation may have contributed to the crisis through the actions or lack of actions perceived by the Soviets. For example, in June of 1961 and during the early months in office, President Kennedy attended a summit with Premier Khrushchev in Vienna to discuss cold war confrontations between the east and west, in particular the situation in Berlin. The failure of the two leaders to reach any accord during the summit led Khrushchev to view Kennedy as a weak president who lacked the power and national support to negotiate seriously with the Soviets. Khrushchev knowing that the U.S. President should have broad authority to negotiate saw the failure of reaching an accord as a weakness. The Soviets may have interpreted this weakness as green light to proceed with establishing a strategic foothold in the Americas.
When President Kennedy publicly revealed the existence of missiles in Cuba through a televised speech, Khrushchev was given a copy of the speech in which he is directly addressed:
“I call upon Chairman Khrushchev to halt and eliminate this clandestine, reckless, and provocative threat to world peace and to stable relations between our two nations. I call upon him further to abandon this course of world domination, and to join in an historic effort to end the perilous arms race and to transform the history of man. He has an opportunity now to move the world back from the abyss of destruction-by