National Strategy essays

National Strategy essays The Cuban Missile Crisis is considered to be one of the most important crises of the Cold War. This assumption was made in the light of some questions which arose following the end of the crisis. 1.One fallacy of the crisis was the actual reason for which the missiles were deployed on the Cuban territory. It was first though that the move was motivated by the desire of the Russians to reset the nuclear equilibrium. However, recent evidence pointed out that, although this was the main reason, there were others as well. In this sense, in Khrushchevs memoir's, he stated that the actions were motivated also by the desire to keep the balance of power and to show the American side the power of the Russian nuclear arsenal (Scott and Smith, 1994). Another misperception of the crisis is related to the establishment of the quarantine which was motivated in the beginning by the need to actually completely deter the soviet threat. However, it was later interpreted as being just a deterrent action, and by no means a final action that would put an end to the crisis (Scott and Smith, 1994) 2. One misperception of the crisis was the belief that the Russians would even engage in nuclear war against the US, as stated by the hawks present in the Executive Committee. However, subsequent evidence proved that in fact the Russian side tried to use this action as a means to increase their negotiation position in relation with the US (Lebow, 1983). Another misperception was the shot down of the U-2. In the beginning it was thought that the decision to shoot it belonged to the Soviets (Allison, 1987). Despite this assumption, the US did not retaliate. It was later discovered that in fact the U-2 was shot down at the initiative of the Cuban side, and not through a Russian order. Should the US view this action as a Russian retaliation, it would have completely compromised the negotiations. 3. Such misperceptions were imminent in that time of ...