Why was the Cuban Missile Crisis significant?
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The Cuban Missile Crisis refers to the tense confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States regarding the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. The period of greatest danger started on October 16, 1962, when U.S. reconnaissance was shown to U.S. President John F. Kennedy which revealed evidence for Soviet nuclear missile installations on the island, and lasted for 13 days until October 28, 1962, when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev announced that the installations would be dismantled. The Cuban Missile Crisis is regarded as the one moment when the Cold War came closest to escalating into a nuclear war. Russians refer to the event as the "Caribbean Crisis," while Cubans refer to it as the "October Crisis."\n\nContents [hide]\n1 U.S. nuclear advantage \n2 U.S. missile sites in Turkey \n3 Missile deployment \n4 The U-2 flights \n5 U.S. response \n6 Aftermath \n7 See also \n8 Further reading on the Cuban missile crisis (Non-fiction) \n9 Further reading on related topics (Non-fiction) \n10 External links \n \n\n\n[edit]\nU.S. nuclear advantage\nVarious estimates indicate that the U.S. had a decided advantage over the Soviet Union in the period leading up to the Cuban Missile Crisis. In Chapter 6 of The Demilitarized Society: Disarmament and Conversion, Seymour Melman describes how "the attempt to emplace medium and intermediate-range missiles in Cuba made solid sense for the Soviets. For their leaders it was a necessary response to a desperate military situation into which the Soviets had been cornered by a series of remarkable American successes with military materiel and military intelligence." For example, by the close of 1962 the United States had a dramatic advantage in nuclear weapons with "more than 300 land-based intercontinental missiles and a fleet of Polaris missile submarines." The Soviet Union for its part had only four to six land-based ICBMs, according to a White House estimate in 1962, and "about 100 short-range V-1 type missiles that could be launched from surface submarines" (Melman, 1988: 118-119).\n\n...also points to a dramatic U.S. military advantage. He writes: "Few in Washington seriously believed that a few dozen ballistic missiles in Cuba could change the essential fact of the strategic balance of power: the Soviet Union was hopelessly outgunned…By the fall of 1962, America’s arsenal contained 3,000 nuclear warheads and nearly 300 missile launchers—far more than the Soviet Union’s 250 warheads (including those in Cuba) and estimated 24 to 44 missile launchers" (Hersh, 1997: 343).\n\nThe military advantage in nuclear arms was compounded by a U.S. breakthrough in espionage. Before his arrest on the first day of the Cuban missile crisis, Colonel Oleg Penkovsky had served as intelligence agent for the Americans and British. He was also a colonel in Soviet Intelligence. Melman notes that "the proceedings of his trial in April 1963 revealed that he had delivered 5,000 frames of film of Soviet military-technical information, apart from many hours of talk with western agents during several trips to western Europe". Melman argues that top officers in the Soviet Union concluded "that the US then possessed decisive advantage in arms and intelligence, and that the USSR no longer wielded a credible nuclear deterrent" (Melman, 1988: 119).\n\n[edit]\nU.S. missile sites in Turkey\nIn 1961, the U.S. started deploying 15 Jupiter IRBM (intermediate-range ballistic missiles) nuclear missiles near İzmir, Turkey, which directly threatened cities in the western sections of the Soviet Union. These missiles were regarded by President Kennedy as being of questionable strategic value; a nuclear submarine was capable of providing the same cover with both stealth and superior firepower.\n\nSoviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev had publicly expressed his anger at the Turkish deployment, and regarded the missiles as a personal affr
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You don't "point" a missile at something.  It's all computer coded.  In a symbolic gesture, both the US and the Soviet Union "pointed" their missiles away.  In reality, they just removed the coordinates from the computer's primary target list.  It takes about 1/2 second to put it back in, which is part of the launch sequence anyway.  It's sort of like moving someone's number from SpeedDial 1 to SpeedDial 2 in your phone.  Doesn't make a big difference.
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In November 1983, a NATO manoeuvre code-named Able Archer 83, which simulated a NATO nuclear release, caused panic in the Kremlin. Soviet leadership, led by ailing General Secretary Yuri Andropov became concerned that US President Ronald Reagan may have been intending to launch a genuine first strike. In response, Soviet nuclear forces were readied and air units in Eastern Germany and Poland were placed on alert. Though at the time written off by US intelligence as a propaganda effort, many historians now believe Soviet fear of a NATO first strike was genuine.
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You may wish to learn who President John F. Kennedy was before deciding to be so smug about the question of "Why do we care?"\n\nShort Answer, we care because the three most egregious breakdowns in security on U.S. Soil (in order they happened), Pearl Harbor, The assasination of President Kennedy and September 11th.
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The Cold War was the protracted geopolitical, ideological, and economic struggle that emerged after World War II between the global superpowers of the Soviet Union and the United States, supported by their military alliance partners. It lasted from about 1947 to the period leading to the dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991.\n\nThe global contest was popularly termed The Cold War because direct hostilities never occurred between the United States and the Soviet Union. Instead, the "war" took the form of an arms race involving nuclear and conventional weapons, networks of military alliances, economic warfare and trade embargos, propaganda, espionage and proxy wars, especially those involving superpower support for opposing sides within civil wars. The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was the most important direct confrontation, together with a series of confrontations over the Berlin Blockade and the Berlin Wall. The major civil wars polarized along Cold War lines were the Greek Civil War, Korean War, Vietnam War and the Soviet-Afghan War, along with more peripheral conflicts in Angola, El Salvador, and Nicaragua.\n\nThe greatest fear during the Cold War was the risk it would escalate into a full nuclear exchange with hundreds of millions killed. Both sides developed a deterrence policy that prevented problems from escalating beyond limited localities. Nuclear weapons were never used in the Cold War\n\nDuring the Cold War, we had bomb drills in school~it was scary.  We were suppose to sit in the hall with our heads between our knees ~ "duck and cover" ~in case Russia attacked~~\nhttp://www.ilstu.edu/~mlhaerl/drill.jpg\nhttp://www.hkhinc.com/newmexico/albuquerque/doomsday/takecover.jpg\nhttp://students.westport.k12.ct.us/us/duckandcover.jpg
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Because it was NOT a plane but a missile which hit the Pentagon.\nFlight 77 did not even exist
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Cuba stopped invading other countries when the USSR ran out of money.  Since they are no longer a threat to anybody but themselves, there's no point invading them.
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Threatening to kick their butts if they didn't move thier missles from Cuba was one way.  Building our military was another by U.S. nuclear advantage.  U.S. missile sites in Turkey helped as well.
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Cuba's leader, Fidel Castro, came to power in 1959 and immediately instituted a communist program of sweeping economic and social changes. Castro allied his government with the Soviet Union and seized and nationalized billions of dollars of American property. U.S. relations with Cuba have been strained ever since. A trade embargo against Cuba that was imposed in 1960 is still in place today. \n\nTwelve years after the breakup of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, Cuba continues to command the attention of U.S. policymakers. Although Russia and the former eastern bloc countries have undergone widespread democratic and free-market economic reform, Cuba remains one of the only communist dictatorships in the world. Removing Castro from power and implementing reform in Cuba are top U.S. foreign policy priorities, but lawmakers disagree on the best course of action.
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I'm no expert, but most of the Cuban people seem to like American culture enough to push consensus to accept Democracy. There may be figures in the military that want to take the reigns like Castro did, so that may be a potential source of conflict. But if the US really wants to impose it's will, they can really pressure a new guy in different, more direct ways. Especially since Russia doesn't have their back anymore.
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Neither of the previous posters have a clue what they are talking about.  Here is the right answer.  The United States decided on a blockade of all in-coming Soviet vessels.  When Khruschev saw that Kennedy would not back down he agreed to dismantle aggressive Russian missiles and the entire world took a collective sigh of relief.
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first , for complaints.... go to...\n\nhttp://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/01/13/cuba9848.htm\n\nthen\nhttp://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y06/jun06/20e5.htm\n\nfor more info on this here .....\n\nEXCERPT FROM THE NET>>>SOURCE HAS BEEN GIVEN\n\n\nThe term "terrorism," in practice, means the terrorism that THEY carry out against US. And the U.S. is not alone in this practice - it is probably close to universal. Cuba is certainly not alone in being treated this way. There is very rich literature documenting the practice generally.... Even the orders of the World Court calling on the U.S. to terminate its "unlawful use of force" (i.e., international terrorism, or maybe even aggression) against Nicaragua, and the supporting Security Council resolution (vetoed by the US), are unknown [in the U.S.], and if brought up, dismissed as proof that the Court is "anti-American" and irrelevant. The Cuban case is unusual because it is so clear, certainly since JFK ordered his staff to launch "the terrors of the earth" against Cuba....\n--Noam Chomsky, September, 2002\n\nTo understand the politics of Cuba, it is necessary to understand the role of the US in Latin America and elsewhere. By examining the history of the US aggression and intervention, we can see clearly the motives that have driven its foreign policy and what it is capable of given the motive and opportunity. It will then be easy to see why the Cuban people must take what seem to us to be extraordinary measures to counter this threat. For them, it is truly a matter of life and death. Recent developments -- shifts in popular opinion in the US, etc. -- are the basis for some optimism that Cuba/US relations may soon improve. Cubans must, however, exercise extreme caution if they are not to meet a fate similar to that of the former USSR, Yugoslavia and others. As William Blum states in the introduction to his recent essay, US Aggression and Intervention, in The Guardian (CPA), \n\nThe engine of American foreign policy has been fueled not by a devotion to any kind of morality, but by the necessity to serve other imperatives: \n\nto make the world safe for American corporations; \nto enhance the financial statements of defence contractors at home who have contributed generously to members of Congress; \nto prevent the rise of any society that might serve as a successful example of an alternative to the capitalist model; \nto extend political and economic hegemony over as wide an area as possible, as befits a 'great power'. \n\nit will come as no surprise to readers that some international organizations, do not see Cuba as democracy. Following is a rebuttal of a typical criticism of the Cuban electoral based on an excerpt (in italics) from a report on human rights in Cuba by a commission of the Organization of American States (OAS). The section entitled "Elections for the National Assembly of People's Power and the Provincial Assemblies" begins:\n\nThe American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man establishes the right to vote and to participate in government at Article XX, in the following terms. \nArticle XX. Every person having legal capacity is entitled to participate in the government of his country, directly or through his representatives, and to take part in popular elections, which shall be by secret ballot, and shall be honest, periodic and free.\n\n38. Political rights, as considered by the Declaration, have two clearly distinguishable aspects: the right to directly exercise power, i.e., to participate in government; and the right to elect those who are to exercise it, i.e., the right to vote. This presupposes a broad conception of representative democracy, based on popular sovereignty, in which the functions by which power is exercised are performed by persons chosen in free and fair elections.\n\nThis is the case in Cuba. In addition to having the right to vote, every Cuban of voting age has an equal opportu
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Cold War is called the conflict that existed between the USA and the USSR after the end of WWII. The world was divided in two sectors: the west, occidental, "christian", democratic, etc, with USA and allies; and the East, communist, etc. with the USSR and its puppets, under the power of the USSR. It was a situation of contained confrontation, like to forces pushing in opposite directions without a clear winner. Sometimes the tension provoked some very risky situations, such as the Missiles Crisis in Cuba, or persecutions, such as the famous Mc Carthy, black lists in the USA. IN the USSR, everything coming from the west was a threat. In the west, anything coming from the East was communist. With the end of the USSR--in the beginning of the 90's--and its communist satellites, the Cold War reached an end, fortunately, without a nuclear war. I suggest you not only consult a good book of Political History, but to watch a great and famous black and white movie of Stanley Kubrick (I dont remember exactly the name) for a satiric view of the Cold War.
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Probably most of them, but it was the first time a soviet president backed down from the US and gave us a huge advantage psychologically.\n\nI don't think it reduced tensions, but at least Kennedy had a TV broadcast where he showed the world photographs taken form a U2of Soviet missles being set up in Cuba and on Ships.\n\nEven though almost 40 years later, Bush couldn't show us any evidence of anything. He damn sure had no photographs.
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The country was Turkey.  This information was not made public at the time and was a 'under-the-table' agreement between Kennedy and Khrushchev.
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Hair breadth from utter destruction- too many close calls\n\nOn October 27, 1962, a Soviet submarine officer named Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov reportedly refused to comply with the launch of a nuclear warhead while apparently under attack by a U.S. warship near Cuba.\n\nSeptember 26th, 1983 - Colonel Stanislav Petrov disobeys protocols and fails to launch Soviet Missiles after his early warning system indicated 5 missiles launched by the US at the Soviet Union.\n\nJanuary 25, 1995 - A peaceful scientific rocket is launched off the coast of Norway. To the east, in Russia, radar operators mistake the launch for a nuclear attack by the West. A deadly process -- nearly on auto-pilot -- is triggered. Within minutes President Yeltsin has been alerted of the attack. For the first time in history, the Russian nuclear briefcase is activated.\n\nI believe they're a necessary evil, especially in this age of rogue states and leaders.  The nearness to calamities, however, from false alarms makes them scary, and these are only the enemies false alarms, i wonder how many US false positives there have been since 1950.
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Sites of conflict weren't limited to Cuba and Afghanistan--there were ideological conflicts throughout the world at the time. Many countries in South America, Asia, etc. Though the US and USSR didn't ever really have direct contact, the cold war was very real though many people at the time didn't want to recognize that it actually was a war. \n\nThe USSR was actively promoting Communism throughout the world to extend their reach. Luckily Reagan had the insight to know that just because they weren't attacking us--the spread of Communism would be just as good as if they were attacking us. Reagan countered the USSR's pursuits and won. I think the USSR would still exist today if Reagan hadn't actively countered them and given the US "peace through strength". Because he refused to play Russia's game, they were forced into trying to keep up with the US's military and nuclear buildup which eventually lead them to an economic crisis--forcing them to snap out of their ploys of world domination.