58 years ago today......

[Raydog]

Oct. 27,1962. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev secretly offers to remove Soviet missile bases in Cuba if the U.S. removes its missile bases in Turkey, thus averting the very real possibility of a nuclear confrontation with the United States.

Those of you who are old enough to remember the Cuban Missile Crisis will never forget how close humanity came to the abyss of an unparalleled disaster.
My momma kept me home from school during the worst of it. If bad came to worst we would face it together. Robins AFB was considered to be a prime target.

 

[Dodge man]

“DUCK AND COVER” most of you want remember this saying... had a turtle in it.

 

[DinkyDau]

I remember the drills at school and having to get under my desk..

 

[TheGman]

We should have never let Cuba fall to the commies in the first place.

 

[DinkyDau]

Russians had a nuclear base there and so the Bay of Pigs was something else....

 

[BillsCamino]

I remember the drills at school and having to get under my desk..

Yeah...same here. As if a desk would stop a nuke.

 

[DinkyDau]

Yeah...same here. As if a desk would stop a nuke.

Indeed

 

[BillsCamino]

We lived near Niagara Falls...perfect target. Produced power for most of the East coast.

 

[Freshly Minted Georgian!]

There was a documentary about McNamara some years ago, worth watching if you get the chance. For those that don't understand the gravity of the crisis here is a bit of the content.

It wasn't until January, 1992, in a meeting chaired by Castro in Havana, Cuba, that I learned 162 nuclear warheads, including 90 tactical warheads, were on the island at the time of this critical moment of the crisis. I couldn't believe what I was hearing, and Castro got very angry with me because I said, "Mr. President, let's stop this meeting. This is totally new to me, I'm not sure I got the translation right."

"Mr. President, I have three questions to you. Number one: did you know the nuclear warheads were there? Number two: if you did, would you have recommended to Khrushchev in the face of an U.S. attack that he use them? Number three: if he had used them, what would have happened to Cuba?"

He said, "Number one, I knew they were there. Number two, I would not have recommended to Khrushchev, I did recommend to Khrushchev that they be used. Number three, 'What would have happened to Cuba?' It would have been totally destroyed." That's how close we were.

EM: And he was willing to accept that?

Yes, and he went on to say: "Mr. McNamara, if you and President Kennedy had been in a similar situation, that's what you would have done." I said, "Mr. President, I hope to God we would not have done it. Pull the temple down on our heads? My God!"

 

[Raydog]

We (as in the entire world) all also owe a great debt to a Soviet submarine officer named Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov for keeping his head during this "development". You (and Almost Everyone You Know) Owe Your Life to This Man.