How Did Kennedy Solve The Cuban Missile Crisis

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, better known as JFK, served as the extremely memorable 35th president of the United States. Born May 29, 1917, in Brookline Massachusetts Kennedy would soon rise in the political landscape to eventually succeed Lyndon B. Johnson. From the Vietnam War to the civil rights movements, Kennedy’s presidency was in no way a cakewalk and included one of the closest times America has come to Nuclear War. This, of course, is the Cuban Missile Crisis, a problem with very few adequate solutions that didn’t involve two world powers firing earth shattering missiles at each other, but Kennedy managed to solve this dilemma even if his tactics were somewhat controversial. After the mostly worldwide celebrations in 1942 as one
The Soviet Union’s nuclear bombs were extremely inferior to America’s and while America’s could reach them from Turkey the Soviet Union's only hope was to place bombs in the nearest communist country to the United States, this being Cuba. The Soviet Union’s leader, Nikita Khrushchev, saw the opportunity to make a deal with Cuban leader, Fidel Castro, in order to keep America off their back by placing nuclear bomb construction sites in Cuba. The Cuban Missile crisis was partially sparked because of the failed Bay of Pigs invasion by America in order to overthrow the communist Castro who saw the placement of nuclear bombs as a form of protection against more American invasions. Luckily, during a surveillance fly over America found these sights and the Cuban Missile crisis began. Kennedy decided to alert the American people to a blockade surrounding Cuba’s nuclear bomb construction sites, effectively cutting them off from USSR supplies. The Soviet Union did not slow down their supply ships and instead continued them on their course for Cuba. Khrushchev sent a letter to Kennedy to come to an ultimatum, if he removed missiles from Cuba, Kennedy would have to remove America’s missiles from Turkey. Kennedy was not particularly opposed to this agreement but he refused to give into Khrushchev’s demands in the public’s eye so he did so in secret. As documented
The Cuban missile crisis is one of the closest points America has ever come to Nuclear war, and even though our current president is trying to bring us closer by insulting world powers, Kennedy managed to come to agreements with America’s biggest threat and settle an extremely hostile situation. Even though it put us at bad standings with England for not consulting them and some of America saw it as a loss by coming to agreements with the communist USSR, Kennedy took these risks and carried through by doing whatever he could to keep that blockade strong in Cuba. Without Kennedy’s actions and cunning there is no saying whether America would even be here right now and not a smoldering pile of ash. Maybe we can take some notes from Kennedy’s book and look at certain American problems in a new light. The loss of a few small assets in the American arsenal is a small price to pay when you’re gambling the life of millions of people. Kennedy knew that the loss of a small thing is not comparable to the loss of even one human