History

• The Cuban Missile Crisis


  1959-62
• Cuba is a small island 90 miles off the Florida (USA) coast
• For most of the 20th century, Americans owned most of the businesses and banks in Cuba
• Cuba exported its main crops sugar and tobacco to the USA
• Batista


  The Cuban leader up until 1959
• When Castro took over

  He wished to reduce the influence of the USA on Cuba's industries and ensure Cuba's independence from other countries
• Castro turned to the USSR for assistance


  As relations with the USA began to decline
• In 1960 the USSR and Cuba agreed to trade oil and sugar for machinery
• The USA banned all trade with Cuba and refused loans and economic aid when Castro turned to the USSR
• In 1961 Castro announced Cuba had become Communist
• Bay of Pigs


  An invasion of Cuba by anti-Castro Cuban exiles, supported by the CIA, that was a disaster for the USA
• Kennedy approved the Bay of Pigs invasion but it was a disaster
• Most of the rebel anti-Castro Cuban exiles were captured or killed
• The Bay of Pigs disaster


  Made Kennedy look inexperienced and turned Castro into a hero
• In May 1962, Khrushchev agreed to supply weapons to Castro to protect Cuba from US invasion
• The USSR sent guns, patrol boats, tanks, jet fighters and bombers, making Cuba the best equipped army in Latin America
• Khrushchev was worried about US/NATO missiles
• In August 1962, equipment arrived in Cuba to establish nuclear missile bases
• On 14th October 1962, a US spy plane captured images of the missiles in Cuba
• The missiles in Cuba could reach most American cities (80 million American population)
• Throughout the crisis, Excomm (including Robert Kennedy) advised President Kennedy