for the older chaps on here....cuban missile event....

[not on facebook]

was you lot ever fully aware of the Whole situation and how Close
it came to the big bang.

what was it 13 or 14 days in totall and was you really  worried or was
the News dripped feed to you as not to cause panic

i would have shat me seen tbh

[BillyStubbsTears]

I'm too young, but my mum says she watched her dad go off to Cadeby pit every day during the height of the crisis thinking she'd not live to see him come back.

And it wasn't being melodramatic. One of the most chilling bits of text I ever read was in a book on the Cuban missile crisis. It mentioned a conference in the 90s, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when old heads from either side got together to share experiences, with the aim being to learn what the other side was thinking during the Cold War.

Bob McNamara, the US Secretary of State for Defense in the Cuban crisis gave a speech where he said that he left a meeting with Kennedy on the Saturday evening at the very height of the crisis and went outside to watch the sunset. He was convinced at that moment that he'd never see another sunset.

One of the ex-Soviet guys stood up in the audience and asked McNamara what time that was. The American said about 6pm Washington time. The Soviet guy went white and started shaking. Close to tears, he said, "My God! At exactly the same time, I was on the phone in the Kremlin, speaking to my wife, telling her to get the kids and drive as far away from Moscow as she could, as quickly as she could. Because the Politburo was convinced that the Americans were about to launch a first strike.

THAT is how close it came!

[not on facebook]

thanks for that BST

had you Down as one that would add some meat  to this thread

[idler]

I remember walking down from Balby aged 14 with my two older brothers and one of their mates. The general consensus was that it wouldn't happen. Luckily they were right while as a 14 year old I didn't look as deeply as them. I wonder what would have happened had Kruschev not been challenged though.

[BillyStubbsTears]

If Khrushchev hadn't been challenged, the Soviets would have had nuclear missiles within a couple of minutes flight time from Southern USA.

That would have balanced up the fact that the USA had for several years had nuclear-tipped Jupiter missiles in Northern Turkey, a few minutes flight time away from southern USSR.

It would have been a balance and both sides would have lived with it.

As it was, part of the deal to persuade the Soviets to turn back their ships and not land the missiles in Cuba, involved America quietly decommissioning the Jupiter missiles a few months later. The West spun this story that "We just went eyeball to eyeball and the other guy blinked." That was b*llocks. Both sides were shitting bricks. Both sides had stumbled into something they couldn't control. Both sides grabbed at a mutual climb down.

[graingrover]

I was in Aberystwyth at Uni .. it already felt the world had come to an end anyway!

[not on facebook]

If Khrushchev hadn't been challenged, the Soviets would have had nuclear missiles within a couple of minutes flight time from Southern USA.

That would have balanced up the fact that the USA had for several years had nuclear-tipped Jupiter missiles in Northern Turkey, a few minutes flight time away from southern USSR.

It would have been a balance and both sides would have lived with it.

As it was, part of the deal to persuade the Soviets to turn back their ships and not land the missiles in Cuba, involved America quietly decommissioning the Jupiter missiles a few months later. The West spun this story that "We just went eyeball to eyeball and the other guy blinked." That was b*llocks. Both sides were shitting bricks. Both sides had stumbled into something they couldn't control. Both sides grabbed at a mutual climb down.

what i cant get me head round is that uncle sam was all up in arms about cccp building nuke launching sites in cuba,hence to say the reds would have been With
range of all of usa apart from Seattle.

but at the same time yanks had missiles based and set up in turkey that could
strike the cccp.

surely cccp had more than enough to be pissed off With the yanks on that basis.

the more i look into uncle sams culture and way of life past and especially
present today i turn against them

[BillyStubbsTears]

Oslo

My earlier comment about how America would have had to live with it if the Soviets had got missiles based in Cuba was a bit too simplistic. To understand the Crisis, you've got to understand America's long-term foreign policy AND Kennedy's psychology. Then you see that it would have been fatal for any politician to "live with it".

The USA has had a policy for nearly 200 years that The Americas are their back yard. The Monroe Doctrine back about 1820 basically warned Europe off meddling in politics or military action anywhere in North, Central or South America.

By the late 50s, America was THE superpower. It had far more (and more sophisticated) nuclear weapons than Russia, and it had the ability to put them right on Russia's border and say "Yeah? What the f**k are YOU gonna do about it?" We tell ourselves a story that The West was countering Soviet aggression, but look at it from the other side and American aggression was FAR scarier to the Soviets.

And then there was a spontaneous communist revolution in Cuba. Suddenly America had a mosquito in its back yard. Which they couldn't accept. So Kennedy sent an invasion force in. And they had their asses whupped by the Cubans.

Massive embarrassment for a young President. America suddenly unable to control a bunch of rum-soaked degenerates.

Then Kennedy and Khrushchev had a summit in Vienna. And by Kennedy's own admission, Khrushchev  hammered him. The Soviet leader bullied and blustered and wrapped JFK round his little finger.

Khrushchev went home thinking Kennedy was a no mark, a soft touch, a gutless pretty boy. Kennedy went home knowing he had to stand up to Khrushchev next time or be humiliated.

That set the scene for the Crisis. Khrushchev reckoned he could get missiles in and change the balance of power - make America less aggressive and more frightened of the consequences. He also thought that when push came to shove, JFK would shite it and back down.

Khrushchev called it wrong. Kennedy stood firm. But only because he was political dead meat it he didn't. It was Kennedy's previous weakness, then sudden flip into resolute strength that made the Crisis so dangerous. Khrushchev overplayed his hand. Kennedy chose to hold his nerve and see him. Fortunately for the world, there there back channels of communication that sorted out the Cuba-Turkey deal and have both men a way out without looking humiliated.

[Dagenham Rover]

I was in Aberystwyth at Uni .. it already felt the world had come to an end anyway!

That was too much beer 

[RobTheRover]

I was in Aberystwyth at Uni .. it already felt the world had come to an end anyway!

That was too much beer 

A lad I used to work with went to Aberystwyth Uni.  After a heavy drinking session in the student union bar and a discussion about John Rambo leaping into the trees and surviving in First Blood, he launched himself off the union building roof into an adjacent tree.  Hitting every branch on the way down I think he broke several ribs.

Not quite the Cuban Missile Crisis......

[BillyStubbsTears]

A mate of mine had a nervous breakdown in an examination at Loughborough University. He was on a mezzanine level in the sports hall. Half way through the exam, he climbed onto the balcony, shouted, "I'm an orange and citrus fruit don't do exams", jumped off, landed on some poor bas**rd below, breaking that lad's arm, stood up unhurt and ran off out of the exam hall.

[RobTheRover]

Cider has a lot to answer for.