h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Deary me. I can't think where my head was yesterday. I'm sure I can do better than indescribably stupid move by russians. Let's see...

"Ans so, pushed to the edge by the cold war power politics need to maintain the soviet superpower status, in the teeth of the immediate threat of losing Latin Am to the overweening enemy, up against the seemingly insurmountable task of matching Am weaponry aggression, with his border bristleing with Am warheads, Krushchov took a desperate gamble. Win big, lose big."

There you go, much better. Got a bit of a David v Goliath thang going on there. As for the backing down bit...

"And then, having weathered the bllody Stalinist years earning himself the title of 'the butcher of the Ukraine', even Krushchov found himself unable to stomach the thought of triggering WW3"

I'm sure, moreover that we could make a case for saying that after years of fancy footwork at the top of the comunist machine, Krushchov sacrificed his political career (nay, risked his life, given what had happened in the past to government dissenters in the USSR) over the issue. Well, perhaps not this one issue, but certainly he was removed from office soonish afterwards, so I daresay it was a contributing factor.

This is something, we could go on to say, that Kennerdy conspicuously declined to do, preferring to DECEIVE 'we the people' as to his true intentions and indeed his actions, a cover up which lasted well after the incident had blown over. Indeed, after being elected on a 'tough on Foreign Policy' ticket, surely we can suggest that during the crisis he comprehensively broke his covenant with the people, thus trampling all over democracy?

Still wanna keep that last paragraph?

actually I didn't mena to leave the last paragraph in there... I was going to take out the first and last paragraphs (I did the first but forgot the last) and it is a bit baised because I have never been to Russia to hear their side of the story, the closest I have been was when I went to a lecture by Sergi K (K's son). He's an interesting fellow to say the least!

Thanks for all the comments, I'll try to get most of them incorporated soon.

Solnushka, I'd have to say that you seem to know everything there is to know about the crisis, I'd be interested to read a counter-point to my entry The reason I think that America came out ontop was because K lost almost all support in his country after the crisis whereas Kennedy is still thought of as one of the best Presidents of recent history. Also, one of the main factors in the Am reaction to the placement of missiles in Cuba was that it was outside of Russia, somthing that had never been done before and that we didn't want this to become a habit.

Oh, well I am perfectly prepared to say that the USA and Kennedy came out on top. The question is was trhis a good thing? Necessarily? And I confess I did have a reaction to the '..couldn't have done better' bit.

Hindsight, of course would tend towards this view, from both winning the power game point of view, and the avoidance of (nuclear) war, but in regard to the second point, it was a very close run thing. I do appreciate that Kennedy had a lot to do with keeping both countries out of a war (Krushchov had more ), but there are a few ways he could have done more.

And to be perfectly frank I wouldn't have expected that in the atmoshphere of the time, the location of the island and the point you have just made about the precedent this would set (though again, I hope I have suggested a rather reasonable reason for this action) that the Am government would decide that the course of action that would be best for Am would be to sit back and do nothing. Or even have a more reasonable reaction (well alright, no more than 100 warheads. Though Stevenson suggested after the fact that this was one possible reaction, had the USA not been caught on the hop, given that there were rational non agressive reasons behind the move).

Neither, really, would I have expected Kennedy to have thrown away his political career over such an unclearcut issue (which he probably would have done by taking a softer line, especially once he had started drawing lines in the sand in public), especially as we can see that he didn't have to. Even Krushchov didn't do that quite, though I think we are agreed that it was a contributing factor in his eventual fall. But it was so close, and at the time the Am side were not hopeful that their methods would work, that it is possible to say that the USA could have taken a vastly more conciliatory line in the interests of saving the world from disaster. This, of course, assumes that they realised that the Russian move was not aggressive. I daresay that the deception part of the the action was not very reassuring on this point.

I'd have loved to have heard Sergei talk. Kruschov was a really fascinating man, it seems to me. Thanks for replying so nicely. I was afraid I might have overegged the pudding there a bit.

"one of the main factors in the Am reaction to the placement of missiles in Cuba was that it was outside of Russia, somthing that had never been done before and that we didn't want this to become a habit."
Surely one of the main features of this conflict was that fact that America reacted so hypocritically, pointing the finger at the CCCP when they themselves had already stationed missiles in Turkey.

I tought the general introduction on Castro in this article was way out of line too. And it's use of the word communist to imply something bad is just shocking...

THis is awaful, if your going to write something like this you can't be so wholly partisan, look at the Che article - writen by an anti communist researcher, but fairly ballanced overall, (even if he does miss out most of Che's achievements).

First off i'd like to say that i think we could do with seperate entries for Castro, the Cold War and the Bay of Pigs, which can then be referenced to this article.

I've not got time now to comment on the whole thing of back myself up with references, but i will doin a couple of weeks when i get back from work.


>>First, to understand the Cuban Missile Crisis, one must understand Castro himself.<<

And also the cold war / Mcarthyism / CIA involvements throughout central america / and the history of the young Cuban republic's development.

Cuba, at this point, was by no means a one man band, yes it's important to understand the nations leader, but also to understand some of the other figures in the government.


>>He was a revolutionary from the beginning<<
For what ends? Political? What was his ideology.


>>joining attempts at over-throwing many different countries<<
Which countries?


>>a stupid and suicidal attack<<
"stupid" is a bit judgemental isn't it - it wasn't as stupid as the Alamo was it, but i'm sure no-one would want it described as such.


>>All were killed or captured except for him and nine others.<<
The official figure is twelve (very biblical) but i'm sure the real figure is around 20.


>>had written about many anti-communist ideals such as<<
Really clunky grammar, and "written about" doesn't mean he supported these ideas, perhaps "had taken anti-comunist stances, or "had challenged communist theories" would be better.

>>"nationalism [of industries] is, at best, a cumbersome instrument. It does not seem to make the state any stronger, yet it enfeebles private enterprise."<<
Reference?

>>He set up collective farms instead of redistributing the land as he had said<<
Collective farms are a method of redistributing land.

>>It appears that the only reason that he turned Communist was that he needed to have a way of holding onto his power, but I'm getting ahead of myself. <<
this is such a bigoted phrase, we can't have this in the guide surely.

>>In June of 1960, the Cubans expropriated British and American oil refineries<<
Cuban oil refinaries which had been expropriated by British and American companies under the Batista regime.

>>and American kept working on isolating Cuba.<<
And continues to do so, despite the fact that the blockade contravenes international law, and in defiance of many UN resolutions.

>>The first thing he did<<
In line with the established CIA policy

>>Alliance for Progress was not as successful as it could have been in making reforms.<< Because it's main purpose all along was to give policy backing to US terrorist activity in Central America

>>It was however, extremely effective in stopping Communism<< Which was it's ultimate goal.


The entry also seems to be overly concerned with the reltions between the superpowers, and the outcomes and results in the US and cccp, what about cuba, what about Castro and Guevara's standing? What about the results for the people whose country was involved here.

My parents lived in a house on the airfield at Handley Page, makers of the Victor bomber, a known first-strike target, during the Bay of Pigs crisis. My mother wouldn't move out of earshot of the radio, but apparently my dad was (typically) more fatalistic and just carried on as before.