Cuban Missle Crisis Essay -- essays research papers

Cuban Missile Crisis Nikita Khrushchev and the Cuban Missile Crisis The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was the closest the world ever came to full-scale nuclear war. When the Soviet Union placed offensive nuclear missiles in Cuba, President Kennedy interpreted the act as one of hostility that would not be tolerated. However, the situation was blown way out or proportion by the president, American media, and ultimately the citizens of the United States. The Soviet Premier, Nikita Khrushchev, was reacting to the Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba, US Missile installations along the Turkey/Soviet border, and the clear anti-Communist policy of the United States. Khrushchev was born in Kalinovka in southwestern Russia. He was raised in a poor family whose income depended solely on the coal mining job of his father. In 1918 he joined the Bolsheviks and attended a Communist school the following year. He moved to Moscow in 1929 and began working for the Communist government. He gained much praise and advanced quickly. B y 1939, he was a member of the Politburo. He became Secretary of the of the Central Committee in 1951. After Stalin died in 1953, the USSR went through two more premiers before Khrushchev came to power in 1958. As Premier, Khrushchev publicly condemned the terror filled reign of Stalin. Stalin continually pushed for domination. Several Eastern European countries united with the USSR under Stalin’s reign and millions of innocent people were slain. Stalin also restricted Soviet citizens personal liberties to previously unheard of measures. Khrushchev was a completely different ruler. He acridly criticized Stalin’s crimes against humanity and began a rapid process known as destalinization. This entailed destroying statues, pictures, or images of Stalin and renaming most things previously named for Stalin. Khrushchev also restored many of the personal liberties that Stalin had taken away. He let political prisoners free, restored much freedom of thought, and restored freed om of the press. He increased production in factories and placed a strong emphasis on the Soviet space program. Although he had little pity for small, weak Europe and Asian countries, he worked to avoid war with Western nations. He even called for a â€Å"peaceful coexistence† with the United States. Khrushchev, despite being communist, was concerned for the welfare of his country and did no... ...ve the missiles if the US missiles were also removed. This created intense public opposition to the Soviet leader as he was made out to be much more militant than he actually was. He was simply fighting fire with fire, but the government and media prevented the public from having the truth. It looks almost like a blatant attempt to manipulate the American public by over-dramatizing a situation for which US government was predominately responsible. Kennedy threatened invasion and he would have had support of the entire nation if he had proceeded with this plan. Khrushchev obviously didn’t want war as he eventually agreed to remove the missiles and allow the US to have a nuclear advantage. Why would Khrushchev agree to remove the missiles without any US promise to remove their missiles or not to invade Cuba? The answer is obvious. Khrushchev did not want war with the United States. He was a vast improvement over Stalin as a Premier and had restored much freedom to his countr y. He wasn’t a mad killer like Stalin and simply wanted to protect the citizens of his country, unlike Stalin had. The US government, however, wanted the media and public to think otherwise. They succeeded.