The U.S. and the Soviet Union
"And let them not forget in the Pentagon that as the latest tests have shown, we have rockets capable of landing on a particular square at a distance of 13,000 km. This is a warning to all those who would like to settle international issues by force instead of reason."
-Nikita Khrushchev,1960
-Nikita Khrushchev,1960
-Relations between the U.S. and the Soviet Union remained tense throughout the Cold War, beginning in 1947
-As tensions heightened and the Soviet Union became more fixated on Cuba, Khrushchev decided to place missiles in Cuba
"The fate of Cuba and the maintenance of Soviet prestige in that part of the world preoccupied me...we had to think up some way of confronting America with more than words. We had to establish a tangible and effective deterrent to American interference in the Caribbean...the logical answer was missiles," Khrushchev
-the tensions surrounding the Bay of Pigs indicated new, more hostile sense of the real threat of each nation compared to the firm competition that had existed previously, during the arms race
-In response to the Soviet threat, the U.S. increased its reconnaissance technology
-As tensions heightened and the Soviet Union became more fixated on Cuba, Khrushchev decided to place missiles in Cuba
"The fate of Cuba and the maintenance of Soviet prestige in that part of the world preoccupied me...we had to think up some way of confronting America with more than words. We had to establish a tangible and effective deterrent to American interference in the Caribbean...the logical answer was missiles," Khrushchev
-the tensions surrounding the Bay of Pigs indicated new, more hostile sense of the real threat of each nation compared to the firm competition that had existed previously, during the arms race
-In response to the Soviet threat, the U.S. increased its reconnaissance technology
John F. Kennedy, U.S. President from 1961-1963
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Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953-1964
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