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by aphextron
1836 days ago
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I really wonder just how much of the perceived "danger" the world was in during the cold war came down to the paranoid delusions of these hot headed, rough and violent men who had just fought the most destructive conflict in world history. It took Kennedy to talk the joint chiefs off the ledge during the Cuban missile crisis, and thankfully for America's hard seperation of military power in the hands of civilians he was there to do so. I'm not sure a more martially led nation would have done so. Looking back and reading the facts, it seems utterly absurd to think that the entire situation wasn't just one big bluff on the part of Fidel. But you had guys like Lemay who missed the action of war, spent all day fantasizing of it, and would take any opportunity given to escalate things. |
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There was much misreading of enemy intention. The US people had aerial photographs of the missile installations in Cuba, and noticed that they were laid out just like other USSR installations in colder climates. This was taken to mean that the USSR wanted the US to recognize them. That was more of a direct threat than putting them in secretly.
In the 1990s, some of the high-level participants from both sides had a get-together.[1] This subject came up. The Russian officer who'd been in charge of the base construction said "Oh, no, we just did it that way because that was what it said to do in the field manual".
Of course. They had a prefab missile base and assembly instructions.
[1] https://robertmcnamara.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Rabe-1...