Day 5 Being diplomatic is often a study in the art of subtlety. Now, subtle is a word with many subtle meanings, though - a diplomat would probably like the definitions that tend towards clever, ingenious, and cunning. On Saturday October 20th, 1962, two master diplomats on opposing sides, US President John F Kennedy and Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, will use another definition of the word: so delicate, or so precise as to be difficult to analyze or describe.
I’m Indy Neidell; this is TimeGhost with the Cuban Missile Crisis Yesterday on the 19th, the first soviet nuclear warheads were made ready for deployment on Cuba. At the same time, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff presented the President with their preferred plans for a military solution to the crisis. Kennedy left the meeting with the impression that he had made clear that he wanted to explore diplomacy and maybe a blockade - the chiefs understood him differently.
Kennedy is now in Ohio campaigning for Democratic candidates for the upcoming midterm elections. Despite the crisis, he will go ahead with his regular schedule to not raise public alarm. The campaign speeches he holds focus on everything except foreign affairs and the looming nuclear crisis.
Meanwhile Gromyko, who is still in the States, cables Moscow his conclusions from meetings with Kennedy and Secretary of State Rusk two days ago. Gromyko has spent many years in the US, speaks fluent English, and has a degree in American Economics. Nonetheless, he is a firm and passionate communist.
He’s also a hard-assed negotiator who listens aptiently, but stands his ground without budging an inch or displaying emotion. He has a photographic memory and a razor sharp mind. In short, he understands his adversary, he is experienced, and he is smart enough to read the tea leaves.
He reports that in his meetings with Kennedy and Rusk he made a point of protesting the embargo on Cuba, which he calls a blockade and piracy. He has gotten concessions on Laos and steered the conversation to Berlin to keep Kennedy focused on that conflict instead of Cuba. During those meetings, no one mentions the missiles outright - instead they use the euphemism “events in July.
” Gromyko is adamant that an invasion of Cuba is not in the cards. He writes that Kennedy replies: “As President I am trying to restrain those people in the US who are favoring invasion to Cuba. ” Referring to the “Events in July”, he notes the President’s words: “I repeat, a very dangerous situation arose regarding this issue and I don't know what can be the outcome.
” One would assume that he understood the point, especially since he ends his report by noting that the Americans are deeply perturbed. “By Rusk's behavior, it was possible to observe how painfully the American leaders are suffering the fact that the Soviet Union decisively has stood on the side of Cuba, and that the Cubans are conducting themselves bravely and confidently. Kennedy managed to hide his feelings better.
But he too, when he spoke about Cuba, formulated his ideas with emphasis, slowly, obviously weighing every word. It is characteristic that Rusk, during our entire conversation with Kennedy, sat absolutely silently, and red "like a crab. " In the conversation with him later he couldn't hide his feelings very well.
“ No matter what Gromyko personally thinks, in Moscow the rest of the Soviets believe that the trick has worked. Their assessment is that the Americans are now deterred from hostile actions against Cuba. They are right about Kennedy being both against an invasion of Cuba and opposed to a nuclear war.
In fact, Kennedy is extremely aware of the grave responsibility weighing on his shoulders. Some time before the crisis he read the book “The Guns of October” by Barbara Tuchman, about the beginnings of World War One. During the whole crisis, he will keep a copy of the book on his desk.
He tells his brother Robert in private that he does so to remind himself of his fear that someone might one day write a book called “The Missiles of October” because of him. But the Russians are wrong about the Americans being deterred - instead they’ve given those in favor of an invasion fuel for their fire - Bobby Kennedy was even part of that group at the beginning of the crisis. And remember, the President had met the Joint Chiefs and walked away with the impression that they had understood his message of restraint.
Remember too that they had chosen to understand his message differently from what he thought. Anyway, this morning, the 34th President of the United States is about to change his mind - from his statement of being ready to do nothing at all about the missiles on Cuba, he will now move to side more with the hawks advising a forceful response. The day starts off fairly normally at the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago with the usual briefings, breakfast, and preparations for the campaign events of the day.
All of this is interrupted when Robert Kennedy calls at 10AM to tell his brother that the EXCOMM members are now urgently asking to meet the President and are ready to decide on a response. EXCOMM is the group dealing with the crisis. More intelligence has become available and the situation is worse than they thought.
The CIA has a new assessment of the total strength of Soviet forces on Cuba, though they still hugely underestimate the number of troops there as between six and 8,000, instead of the actual 45,000. But they have discovered all 40 of the Mig 21 fighter and Il-28 mid-range strategic bombers. They have also ‘discovered’ 15 Komar class speedboats armed with two tactical nuclear missiles each, which is three more boats than the actual 12 that are there.
And most of the SAM sites and almost all of the missile sites are also now known. Moreover, today for the first time there is mention of possible tactical nuclear Frog missiles in their report - but they note this as unsubstantiated rumor. They still don’t know where the strategic nuclear warheads are stored, though, they’re not even sure that they’re on the island yet.
So they have not noticed that the first ones are in fact ready to be locked and loaded since yesterday. Even if they underestimate their opponents strength, the US now knows that it will face a substantial Soviet force armed with tactical nuclear weapons if they invade Cuba, but remarkably, the CIA still thinks that the Soviets would probably not go to war with the US if they did invade. Instead, they argue that the USSR will stay out of it and choose to heat up conflicts in other locations as a response.
They come up with some fairly vague reasons for this thinking. One of them is the argument that there’s no public and official military alliance between Cuba and the Soviet Union, making a war on Cuba involving the Soviet Union technically illegal. They fail to furnish any argument to show the legality of the US waging war on Cuba, though, which will prove significant later in the day.
Be that as it may, there is alarm that the Soviets might get even stronger if action is not initiated immediately. JFK agrees with RFK- that’s Bobby- and EXCOMM’s assessment, and will return to Washington immediately. In order not to alarm the public, he and his doctor concoct a story about a sudden bout of the flu.
Press statements are drawn up and sent out within minutes, there’s even an improvised photo op as the President leaves the hotel doing his best to look ill. By 1:30, he’s back in Washington and on his way to the 505th Meeting of the National Security Council. As it’s an official National Security Council Meeting it’s not recorded.
The meeting will last for five hours and the discussions will get heated, even uncivil. It opens with a briefing on the situation. The official minutes note Kennedy’s reaction; “There is something to destroy in Cuba now and, if it is destroyed, a strategic missile capability would be difficult to restore.
” Defense Secretary McNamara acknowledges that they have not been able to agree on one course of action to recommend, so they present the President with two alternatives. The Blockade Track, led by McNamara, and the Bundy Plan, or the Airstrike Route, led by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Taylor and National Security Advisor Bundy. Three remarkable things emerge from the record of the meeting.
1. Kennedy expresses his opposition to an invasion of Cuba while still explicitly directing the Joint Chiefs to begin the plans for such an invasion. CIA director McCone writes in his notes tomorrow that an invasion of Cuba was agreed upon when all other actions had run their course.
2. It’s clear that the participants are anticipating a war that could go much further than Cuba and could become a nuclear confrontation. They discuss limiting this risk by dismantling warheads in Turkey and Italy so that they don’t fire these off, even if they are attacked by the Soviets.
They decide to reconsider their opposition to French nuclear armament and help France with its nuclear development. Bobby Kennedy even proposes giving nuclear arms to West Germany, or at least threatening the Soviets that they will do so. 3.
Legality, or the appearance of legality, is a major concern that helps decide the course of action. In the end, the Bundy Plan is rejected partly because the US would look like the bad guy through a sudden, unannounced attack – Bobby Kennedy calls it “The Pearl Harbor Effect. ” Even wording becomes an issue so that when they choose the Blockade Track, they decide to call it quarantine, as blockade would imply an act of war.
Only one member of the meeting speaks in opposition of decisive action. It’s once again the US Ambassador to the UN, Adlai Stevenson. He suggests negotiating a trade with the Soviets.
Offer to withdraw missiles from Turkey and Italy, give up foreign military bases, and offer closing the Guantanamo military base on Cuba. Everyone jumps on him one after another. Even Kennedy is noted as ‘forcefully rejecting’ the Guantanamo idea.
Security Advisor and Stevenson’s friend George Ball, who was there, will say that members "intemperately upbraided Stevenson. . .
[and were] outraged and shrill. " Stevenson himself remarks "I know that most of those fellows will consider me a coward for the rest of my life for what I said today, but perhaps we need a coward in the room when we are talking about nuclear war. ” Finally, the blockade or “quarantine” is agreed on, to begin Monday, and preparations go ahead for how to inform US lawmakers, foreign allies, and the general public.
The current military exercise on Vieques to take out the imaginary dictator Ortsac- Castro spelled backward- is immediately suspended and the forces involved are held in readiness for a possible invasion. According to men who are on the ships involved in the exercise, to their shock they are now informed over the ship’s loudspeakers that they will be redirected towards Cuba. In US army, navy, and air force bases around the world hundreds of thousands of men and women are made ready for what their commander in chief believes could be a Third World War that might erupt as soon as this coming Monday.
See you tomorrow on day six, when the preparations for quarantine and war continue. If you’re just joining us you can watch the first prelude to the crisis episode here. You can also support as at tg.
tv or patreon. com, so we can continue to bring you awesome stuff like this in future. Don’t forget to subscribe.
Good night and good luck.
