What is the biggest bet in
human history?
The Cuban Missile Crisis. It was a bet on a planet in the solar system. In fact, the only thing Khrushchev and Kennedy can count on in the
gambling game is the other side-hoping that the other side is still a calm and rational person.
1 Sunday, 28 October 1962.
On that day, people all over the world had never been so eager to hear a radio station broadcast.
It was Radio Moscow, broadcasting a reply from Khrushchev, the supreme leader of the Soviet Union, to President Kennedy of the United States: I very much understand the concerns of you and the American people about what you call an offensive weapon, which is indeed a terrible weapon.
You and I both know what kind of weapon this is.
In order to eliminate this conflict, which endangers the cause of peace, as soon as possible, and in order to guarantee the people of all countries who yearn for peace, the Soviet Government, in addition to the previous order to stop the construction of weapons at the construction site, has issued a new order to dismantle what you call offensive weapons and to pack them up and ship them back to the Soviet Union.
At that moment, many people in the world did not know that mankind — yes, all mankind — had finally escaped a disaster. The
story begins in 1961. On April 17,
1961, more than 1,500 Cuban exiles in the United States, trained and armed by the CIA, landed at the Bay of Pigs (Bah Bahía de Cochinos) on the southwestern coast of Cuba in an attempt to overthrow the Cuban government led by Castro.
This was known as the “Bay of Pigs Incident.”. The end of the
“Bay of Pigs Incident” proved only one thing: the Americans found a group of “pig-like teammates”-just 72 hours, the 1,500 mercenaries were defeated by the Cuban government forces.
Ninety people were killed and more than 1,000 were taken prisoner. Although the “Bay of Pigs Incident” was small in scale when Castro was
young, the consequences were very great.
First, the Kennedy administration lost face.
Although Kennedy has always refused to admit that the United States is behind the scenes, this is a “secret known to the whole world,” and Kennedy has left an impression of “ignorance, cowardice, and timidity.”.
Secondly, Cuba, which used to have good relations with the United States, began to turn around.
In the past, relations between Cuba and the United States were quite good. Castro, as prime minister, visited the United States and was warmly welcomed by President Eisenhower.
Cuba knew nothing about socialism and communism, but after the “Bay of Pigs Incident”, Cuba quickly turned to the Soviet Union, the biggest competitor of the United States.
Therefore, without the “Bay of Pigs Incident,” it would have been very difficult to have the “Cuban Missile Crisis,” which later made the whole world soul-stirring.
Cuba’s geographical location is too important for the United States.
If Latin America is the backyard of the United States, Cuba, which is close to the United States, is the least reassuring thorn in the backyard.
Seeing Cuba fall into its arms, the Soviet Union felt that the opportunity had come.
At that time, the Soviet Union had the most powerful army in the world, but the United States had the most powerful navy and air force in the world.
In terms of nuclear weapons, the land-based intercontinental missiles possessed by the Soviet Union were only equivalent to those possessed by the United States — of course, the nuclear weapons possessed by both sides at that time were enough to blow up the earth.
In 1961, the United States deployed missile bases in Italy and Turkey, together with missile bases in the Federal Republic of Germany and a number of bomber bases, all the industrial centers of the Soviet Union were within the scope of the United States’ nuclear strike.
It can be said that as long as the United States is happy, it is time to have a cup of tea to destroy the Soviet Union.
Against this background, the Soviet Union has been looking for opportunities to reverse its disadvantage. It was
at this time that the Americans whipped Cuba into the arms of the Soviets.
How to take advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity?
Khrushchev had decided that Kennedy was a “coward” through the “Bay of Pigs Incident,” so he made an extremely bold decision: to deploy about 60 medium-range nuclear missiles in Cuba, turning the destruction of the United States into a matter of drinking vodka. How easy is it
to deploy nuclear missiles under the eyes of the United States?
So the Soviet Union chose to cheat.
In all public appearances, the Soviet Union strongly denied that Cuba possessed any offensive weapons.
Khrushchev himself wrote a letter to Kennedy promising not to provoke any incident before the US congressional elections in November 1962.
In fact, in July, the Soviet Union transferred the goods to Cuba to Soviet ships, disassembled dozens of missiles and dozens of aircraft, and shipped them to Cuba in containers.
Not only that, about 3500 military technicians also arrived in Cuba with the ship. How powerful were the nuclear missiles the
Soviet Union shipped to Cuba?
Each nuclear warhead is at least 20 times more powerful than atomic bomb dropped by the United States on Hiroshima, Japan.
However, after all, fire cannot be wrapped up in paper. On October 14,
1962, a cloudless Sunday morning, two American U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft took a large number of photographs over the western part of Cuba.
The next day, a large number of experts in the United States enlarged each photo and recognized the missile launching pad, the building where the ballistic missile was launched, and a medium-range ballistic missile in the photo.
On October 16, the debriefing was placed on Kennedy’s desk.
Kennedy was surprised and angry! He knew he couldn’t trust the Soviets, but he never thought that the Soviets would really dare to deploy a nuclear missile force that could destroy the United States every minute under the eyes of the Americans! Kennedy immediately called an emergency meeting of the National Security Council.
At the meeting, everyone agreed that the Soviet missile deployment must not be accepted, but there was no consensus on how to remove the Soviet missiles to avoid triggering a “third world war.”.
Kennedy somewhat favored a no-warning strike on the Cuban missile base, while his brother, Robert Kennedy, advocated another invasion of Cuba.
Finally, Secretary of Defense McNamara made a suggestion: Can we blockade Cuba first?
This suggestion led Kennedy to the final decision: diplomacy first, force later. The first round of the battle between the
Soviet Union and the United States began.
Kennedy met with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko in the Oval Office of the White House.
Kennedy Meets Gromyko (third from left) Gromyko never mentioned the Soviet Union’s deployment of missiles in Cuba during the conversation of more than two hours. Strangely, Kennedy did not mention it either, but kept stressing that the United States could never tolerate the Soviet Union’s deployment of offensive weapons in Cuba. At the time of the
conversation, the photographic evidence taken by the U2 high-altitude reconnaissance plane was in Kennedy’s right hand drawer. Historians
later failed to understand why Kennedy, who had already met Gromyko, did not question him to his face?
The only explanation may be that Kennedy wanted to give the other side a chance, a chance to confess voluntarily.
Alas! This isn’t a relationship! Based on Kennedy’s attitude, Gromyko also made a wrong judgment and reported it to the Kremlin: The situation is satisfactory! There will be no reaction from the United States! The first round ended without any problems, and the second round began. At noon
on October 22, U.S. officials at the United Nations sent an urgent telegram to Dobrynin, the Soviet ambassador to the United States, demanding that he arrive in Washington at 6 p.m. to meet with U.S. Secretary of State Lax.
Dobrynin felt at once that the situation was not good. At 6
p.m., the Soviet ambassador met the American Secretary of State.
Lax told Dobrynin that President Kennedy would deliver a televised speech to the whole United States in an hour, and handed him the text of the president’s televised speech, along with a letter from Kennedy to Khrushchev.
Dobrynin hurried back to the embassy to report to Moscow.
The Kremlin was in a muddle-wasn’t Kennedy a wimp?
Is it for real?
At 7 p.m., Kennedy’s nationally televised address began as scheduled.
In a televised address, Kennedy announced to the United States – and to the world – that the Soviet Union had deployed nuclear missiles in Cuba, a situation that the United States could not tolerate.
Kennedy said he would impose a “quarantine” on Cuba.
The reason for using the word “quarantine” instead of “blockade” was that the Kennedy administration believed that the “blockade” still had a clear meaning of war, and that the “quarantine” only required all ships carrying weapons into Cuba to turn around and leave. After the
New York Times report and the televised speech, Kennedy immediately announced that the United States had entered a three-level state of combat readiness: 183 B-47 bombers carrying nuclear bombs were evacuated to 33 civilian and military airports in the United States; 66 B-52 bombers carrying nuclear bombs were launched on standby; Twenty-two interceptors carrying air-to-air missiles are on standby over the Florida coast. All
this is to ensure that the United States will be able to carry out “nuclear retaliation” at the first time after a nuclear attack.
October 23, the third round.
Kennedy signed the “quarantine order.” The statement of the Soviet government came: We will continue to use weapons to aid Cuba in accordance with the agreement, resolutely reject the interception of the United States, and if the United States takes action, the Soviet Union “will fight back the most fiercely.”! Meanwhile, another secret Soviet-American line of communication was in high gear: Kennedy’s brother, Robert Kennedy, was in private contact with Soviet Ambassador Dobrynin. Kennedy
Jr. asked: What are the Soviet ships going to do after the ban comes into effect? “Business as usual,
” Dobrynin replied. Kennedy
Jr. Warns: US Warships Will Really Fire. “That is war,
” Dobrynin replied.
October 24, the fourth round.
A big bet on the fate of the whole earth has begun.
US combat readiness has been upgraded to Level II: 1,436 US bombers and 145 intercontinental ballistic missiles have been put on alert; 250,000 US troops have been assembled in Florida, the largest US landing force since World War II; and US bases around the world have been put on alert.
Meanwhile, 183 American ships, including two cruisers and 118 destroyers, formed an arc from Florida to Puerto Rico, blockading Cuban waters under the escort of 68 air squadrons and eight aircraft carriers. On the morning of the
24th, 18 cargo ships of the Soviet Union joined six Soviet submarines at the periphery of the “isolation circle” of the United States and began to approach the “isolation circle.” Then, they anchored outside the “isolation circle.”.
American planes flew over Soviet cargo ships, and the eyes of the world were focused on these Soviet cargo ships.
After a tense and suffocating standoff, several Soviet cargo ships began to turn around and return. Rusk,
then US Secretary of State, said to Kennedy, “It’s like two people staring, and one of them blinks.”.
On October 25, the fifth round. What
US Secretary of State Rusk did not expect was that on that day, a Soviet cargo ship still broke into the “isolation zone.”.
The cargo ship, the Bucharest, did not fly the Soviet flag, but it was undoubtedly a Soviet ship.
When the “Bucharest” approached the “isolation circle,” everyone’s hearts were in their throats: three nautical miles, two nautical miles, one nautical mile, into the “isolation circle.” But at that moment, the American warships did not fire.
Everyone’s heart was put down again.
However, the US warship still intercepted the Bucharest and announced that it would inspect the cargo in the cabin.
But what is interesting is that the US troops did not board the cargo ship, but left after hearing the captain’s promise that there would be no weapons.
Later, it was analyzed that Kennedy wanted to give the Soviet Union a goodwill signal-I didn’t really want to make it big.
In this round, the Americans took a step back.
October 26, the sixth round.
This time, the battlefield moved to the United Nations.
At the General Assembly of the United Nations, Stevenson, the US representative to the United Nations, showed the enlarged photos taken by the U2 plane to the representatives of all countries in the world, and then aggressively and openly questioned Zorin, the Soviet representative: “Sir, I just want to ask you a simple question: Do you admit that the Soviet Union has deployed medium-range ballistic missiles in Cuba?”?
Yes, or no?
Zuo Lin was silent, pretending to wait for the translation in the headset. “No need to wait for the translation,”
Stevenson continued! You just answer me, yes or no?
Zuo Lin simply took off his glasses and laughed awkwardly, and then laughter broke out in the meeting hall.
Stevenson laughed himself. The atmosphere
at that time seemed quite friendly.
On October 27, the seventh round, the situation changed sharply.
That day was known as “Black Saturday”-if we look back, that day may be the closest day to human extinction.
That morning, the Soviet B-59 submarine was diving in Cuban waters when it was suddenly attacked by the US destroyer “Bueller.”.
There was no evidence that the destroyer Buehler had received high-level authorization to begin attacking the Soviet submarine, and what they did not know was that the Soviet submarine was carrying a torpedo with a nuclear warhead. After the
depth charges were dropped, the B-59 submarine was thrown around by the air waves, and the Soviet sailors in the submarine were in a panic. At that time, they had only one thought-the war had begun! So the first thing the sailors thought of was to fire a torpedo with a nuclear warhead at the destroyer Buehler.
According to the regulations on Soviet submarines at that time, nuclear torpedoes could be launched with the unanimous consent of the three officers.
If that torpedo is fired, a nuclear war will inevitably break out.
However, later declassified data showed that one of the three Soviets at the time said “NO.”. As
one crisis passes, another follows.
On the morning that the B-59 submarine nearly released its nuclear torpedo, an American U2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft was shot down by a missile fired by a ground air defense unit over Cuba, killing the pilot instantly. It is
worth mentioning that the pilot who was killed in action was Major Anderson, who had discovered the missiles deployed by the Soviet Union in Cuba.
On that day, God seemed to be playing a joke on human beings-a fuse here had just been extinguished, and a fuse there had been ignited again! The plane was shot down and the pilot died, which is already an act of war.
At that time, the American people immediately began to loot the food and water in the supermarket, and in the conference room at the top of the White House, there was already a quarrel: the US military advocated an immediate counterattack, first bombarding the Cuban base with strategic bombers and missiles. The U2 high-altitude reconnaissance plane that
was shot down, but Kennedy thought for a long time and said painfully, “I don’t care about what to do in the first step, but when the two sides escalate to the fourth and fifth steps, I am afraid that there is no human to do the sixth step.”.
Kennedy decided to gamble that the missile attack had not been authorized by the Kremlin.
As a result, the US government let out the rumor that the missile unit that shot down the U2 plane was the Cuban army (actually operated by the Soviets). The
Soviet government quickly took the ball and said that the Cuban missile forces had done it, because the missile attack was indeed an accident. Another
fuse has been extinguished.
At the same time, it was also on that day that Kennedy wrote his first letter to Khrushchev, a letter in reply.
The first letter refers to the long letter sent by Khrushchev to Kennedy on October 26.
In the letter, Khrushchev admitted that missiles had been deployed in Cuba, but that they were “only defensive.”.
At the same time, he told Kennedy not to let the situation get out of hand. “As long as the United States makes a promise not to invade Cuba and does not allow others to invade Cuba, the Soviet Union will withdraw its missiles.”.
But on October 27, Khrushchev sent another letter to Kennedy, saying that the Soviet Union would not withdraw Cuban missiles unless the United States withdrew the missiles deployed in Turkey. The
two letters, with their inconsistent demands, have revealed that the Kremlin has also fallen into chaos.
In the end, Kennedy decided to reply only to Khrushchev’s first letter: He was willing to accept Khrushchev’s proposal that as long as the Soviet Union withdrew its missiles, the United States would lift the “quarantine” and guarantee that it would not invade Cuba, nor would it allow others to invade.
October 28, the last round.
In the staring contest of who blinks first, Khrushchev finally closes his eyes.
So there is the radio broadcast at the beginning of this article.
Later, under the full supervision of the United States Army, the Soviet Union dismantled all the missiles deployed in Cuba and shipped them back home. Four months after the end of the
“Cuban Missile Crisis,” the United States quietly dismantled the missiles deployed in Turkey. This was a secret agreement reached between Khrushchev and Kennedy. The United States only did, but never said.
In this crisis, the United States won face, and the Soviet Union actually did not lose.
And the whole human race has finally escaped a nuclear war that can make us extinct. The
steamed bun said that two strong men, each carrying a bomb, were in a room full of people.
One shouted, “What are you looking at?”?
“The other replied,” What are you doing?
“One continued to shout,” Would you like to see it again?
The one with round eyes said, “Just try!” This was my impression of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Fortunately, in the end, neither of these two men pulled the fuse of the bomb. At most, they muttered in their stomachs, “Next time I won’t kill you!” From this point of view, I am personally grateful to Khrushchev and Kennedy at that time.
In fact, at that time, the heads of these two countries were under tremendous pressure at home-you know, launching nuclear weapons was just a matter of pressing a button, and many people were anxious to see the world in disorder.
But both of them have resisted the pressure.
In this gamble with a planet in the solar system, the only thing Khrushchev and Kennedy can really count on is the other side-hoping that the other side is still a calm and rational person who can consider the well-being of all mankind.
In 1963, Kennedy made a speech saying that the United States and the Soviet Union had a common humanitarian spirit and practical interest in avoiding nuclear annihilation.
In the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Washington and Moscow did one quick thing.
Is it mutual blame and abuse?
No, it’s the immediate establishment of a top leadership hotline. There are interests, disputes and even wars between
countries, but when it comes to the future and destiny of mankind as a whole, the leaders of most countries are still clear-headed.
I hope human beings can keep this sober forever.
Amitabha.
. Focus on not getting lost ~
