Oct. 22, 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Brink of War

[The Straight Story]

Oct. 22, 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Brink of War

1962: President Kennedy goes on television and informs the world that the Soviet Union has placed missile installations in Cuba, only 90 miles from the American mainland.

If the world, and especially the American public, was shocked by the revelation, the Kennedy administration was not. The president had known about the installations since at least Oct. 1 and received final confirmation on Oct. 16, when a U.S. U-2 spy plane returned high-altitude photographs clearly showing the presence of at least 15 Soviet surface-to-air missile launchers.

There were also unconfirmed reports of SS-3 and SS-4 missiles on an airfield outside of Havana, which, if true, put most of the eastern seaboard and southern United States within range of Soviet nuclear warheads. Russian military personnel and technicians were also known to be on the island.

So there was the real threat of nuclear holocaust. But there was also the audacity of the Russian move, which completely disregarded the Monroe Doctrine with its political justification for American hegemony in the Western Hemisphere.

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007/10/dayintech_1022

[The Straight Story]

1. self kick (nt)

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

2. I remember it well. We were literally locked in our barracks.

We were scheduled for TransPac to Japan. Our planes had been junked. All of the other squadrons were deployed to other, safer, bases.

Just to make sure that we wouldn't decide to get away from ground-zero on our own, they padlocked our barracks and marched us everywhere.

So, we were kinda relieved when Kennedy and Krushchev called off the pissing contest.