In the following months, Kennedy was criticized for his muted reaction to the Berlin Wall’s construction. But, in reality, there was little he could do about it. The Wall – which had been built primarily to seal off the border between East and West, thereby stemming the flow of refugees pouring out of the Eastern Bloc – did not affect the rights of the Allied nations or interfere with their access to their enclaves in West Berlin.
Khrushchev, encouraged by his success, resolved in the summer of 1962 to implement secret plans to build a nuclear base on Cuba. In all, Khrushchev hoped to install forty medium- and intermediate-range missiles on the islands, which could travel up to 2,100 miles – bringing the weapons within reach of New York and Washington DC.
But these plans did not remain secret. On 14 October, an American U-2 reconnaissance aircraft spotted and photographed the activities in Cuba. After a series of crisis meetings with his advisers, Kennedy ordered the deployment of a convoy of ships tasked with forming a ring around the Cuban islands, thereby denying the Soviets any further access to the country. The naval blockade, or ‘quarantine’ as it was called, was successful – the Soviet ships were stalled and Khrushchev’s plans lay in ruins.
Meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Security Council during the Cuban Missile Crisis
In the ensuing stand-off between the two superpowers, it seemed that the world was on the very brink of nuclear catastrophe. Tensions between the White House and the Kremlin reached crisis point. After the drubbing he received in Vienna, Kennedy was determined not to flinch this time, while Khrushchev was equally reluctant to back down.
However, all-out war was avoided when an agreement was reached on 28 October. In exchange for US assurances that it would not invade Cuba, Khrushchev promised to dismantle the nuclear base. In a separate and secret agreement, Kennedy also promised to withdraw US missiles, which had previously been installed in Turkey.
Kennedy’s actions during the thirteen-day crisis were lauded throughout the globe – he had successfully seen off the biggest nuclear threat the world had ever seen, without the loss of a single life. In the words of Dean Rusk, the US Secretary of State: ‘We’re eyeball to eyeball and […] the other fellow just blinked.’