1. Cuban Missile Crisis
By Philip Brenner

3. CIA Briefing Map
Meeting of
the ExComm
October 16, 1962

4. U-2 Photo of Missile Site, October 14, 1962

5. Missile Warhead

6. ExComm Deliberation During the Crisis

8. Letter from Nikita Khrushchev to John F. Kennedy, October 26, 1962

9. Black Saturday – Second Letter

10. Black Saturday
Low-level reconnaissance of Cuban anti-aircraft sites

11. U.S. Lessons Crises can be managed Steel Will (“Eyeball to Eyeball”)
─ Secrecy
─ Small group with open discussion
─ Exclude and misinform Congress and public
Steel Will (“Eyeball to Eyeball”)
─ Toughness
─ Resolve
Superior Strength
─ Build up Military
─ Exercise Coercive Diplomacy

12. Problems with US Lessons - First Cut
Crises cannot be managed
Flexibility, not steel will, saved us
Force or threat of force precipitated the crisis, made it more dangerous

13. US Misconstrues Soviet Motives
Summit in Vienna Austria, June 1961
Berlin Wall Erected, August 1961

14. Jan. 3, 1961

16. Bay of Pigs
The next day, 1,500 U.S. trained Cuban exiles landed on Cuba with weapons supplied by the United States.

17. Richard Goodwin
Meets Ché Guevara
● ● ●
● ● ●

18. Memorandum from Gen. Lansdale to Special Group (Augmented) -- Pg 1
Operation Mongoose
Memorandum from Gen. Lansdale to Special Group (Augmented) -- Pg 1

19. Gen. Lansdale Memorandum (Continued) -- Pg 2

21. Operation Anadyr
In July 1962 the Soviet Union began to send ballistic missiles, other weapons and soldiers to Cuba. The build-up troubles US military planners, even as they conclude
that ballistic
missiles are
not being
installed.

22. New York Times October 23, 1961
. . .

23. Soviet Union responds by exploding a 50-megaton hydrogen bomb in the atmosphere, Oct 30, 1961
White House Statement

24. Problems with US Lessons - Second Cut
Crisis management Groupthink and exclusion of information
Steel will inflexibility and no negotiations; force becomes only alternative
Coercive diplomacy military build-up; ignores factors such as patriotism

25. Soviet Lessons Crises cannot be managed Crises must be prevented
Improve communications with the other superpower
Achieve parity (equal military force) with US

27. President Kennedy’s
American University Speech
June 10, 1963

28. Cuban Lessons Neither superpower can be trusted
Cuba must defend itself with asymmetric warfare
Support revolution in Third World
Strengthen military forces
Intensify internal security

29. Castro’s Five Demands
Cessation of the US economic embargo and US pressure on other countries to cut commercial links to Cuba;
End US subversive activities against Cuba, including the “organization of invasions by mercenaries” and “infiltration of spies and saboteurs”
Cease “piratical attacks” from bases in the
United States and Puerto Rico
End violations of Cuban airspace
US withdrawal from Guantanamo Naval Base

30. Anastas Mikoyan Arrives in Cuba

31. IL-28 Bomber (Bulgarian model in Cuba)

32. How Castro Remembered Mikoyan’s Visit
-- From: James Blight and Philip Brenner, Sad and Luminous Days

33. OSPAAL: Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin America

34. Cuban Missile Caribbean October
Crisis