October 28 - The Cuban Missile Crisis Ends

This Day in History: 28 October 2020

 

28 October 1962

 

58 years ago, today, the Cuban Missile Crisis came to an end when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed to remove Russian missiles from Cuba, in exchange for an American promise to respect Cuba's territorial sovereignty. This agreement ended nearly two weeks of tension between the United States and the Soviet Union that was close to provoking a nuclear conflict. The crisis was initiated in response to the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961, and the discovery of American missiles in Italy and Turkey, when Khrushchev placed nuclear missiles in Cuba to prevent a future invasion. A naval blockade was ordered by President Kennedy to prevent further missiles from entering Cuba in retaliation.

 

The consequences of the crisis varied. Relations between the communist nations of Cuba and the Soviet Union were insecure for some time after Khrushchev removed the missiles, as Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader, accused him of deserting the Cuban revolution. European allies of the United States were also angered, but not due to the American stance, but because Kennedy's administration kept them virtually in the dark about ongoing negotiations that may have led to a devastating nuclear war. Inside the Soviet Union, hard-liners were disgusted by Khrushchev's withdrawal of weapons. He was removed from power two years later.

 

Want to find out more about the Cuban Missile Crisis? Click here for more information, or here for an animated video about the crisis.

Made in the USSR

Here is a fascinating article from the Guardian examining the state of design in the Communist USSR. This brings up a stereotype of drab, slightly comical consumer goods like the Zaporozhets car shown above compared to their glamorous Western (particularly American) counterparts. Richard Nixon emphasized this in 1959 when he asked Nikita Khruschev, "Would it not be better to compete in the relative merit of washing machines than in the strength of rockets?" This prickly exchange became known as the "Kitchen Debate". However, although there were many Soviet designs which were clearly knock-offs of their western counterparts, others were genuine classics, such as the Lomo camera and avos shopping bag, with their most impressive features being their simplicity and durability in comparison to the throwaway culture of the west.


You can read more about Soviet design in Michael Idov's book "Made in Russia: Unsung Icons of Soviet Design" - this is perhaps a subject A2 students can explore further within their extended essay.

PS: If you liked the Zaporozhets, there is much more of this sort of thing at oldrussiancars.com