The Cuban missle Crisis was the closest the world ever came to a NUCLEAR war. In 1962 the Soviet Union was far behind the US in the arms race. The Soviet missles were only powerful enough to be fired at Europe but the United States bombs could be fired and hit the entire Soviet Union. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev got the idea that the Soviet Union could set up missile bases in Cuba and that could bring some potential harm to the US in an attck of the Soviet.
Fidel Castro the Prime Minister of Cuba agreed to Khrushchev proposal becasue he was afraid of a second attack from the US after the failed Bay of Pigs attack. In 1962 US spy planes flew over the Cuba and revealed the Soviet missle installations. President Kennedy was then informed of the events and called together the EX-COM a group of his twelve best advisors to handle the crisis. After seven days of debate, President Kennedy informed the public of his findings. He told them of his plans to quarantine the island to avoid the sending of anymore Soviet offfensive weapons.
This was the hottest moment in the cold war becasue Kennedy said if any missles were launched from Cuba it would be an attack against US by the Soviet. To Combat the Crisis Kennedy demanded and instant removal of the weapons. He ordered low level renaissance misons every 2 hours. Kennedy pulled back the quaratine and raised military to DEFCON 2 or Defence Condition 2. The US were urged not to invade Cuba in return for removing Soviet missles based there by Khrushchev in an impassionate letter. EX-COM received a second letter pn the 25th after a U-2 spy plane was shot dwn over Cuba. The letter demanded that the US remove missles in Turkey and in return the Soviet would remove from Cuba.
On October 28 Khrushchev agreed to dismantle the bombs in Cuba in ship them back to the Soviet only with assurance that the US would not invade Cuba under any cirumstances at all.
