The Cuban Missile Crisis: Thirteen Days in October 1962
Follow the discovery of Soviet missiles, the naval quarantine, secret negotiations, and the decisions of October 1962. Consider American, Soviet, and Cuban perspectives and the risks created by incomplete information.
Connections9
Anatoly Dobrynin: people, places, and context for the episode.
Anatoly Fyodorovich Dobrynin was a Soviet statesman, diplomat, and politician. He was the Soviet ambassador to the United States for more than two decades, from 1962 to 1986.
PGM-19 Jupiter: people, places, and context for the episode.
The PGM-19 Jupiter was the first nuclear armed, medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) of the United States Air Force (USAF). It was a liquid-propellant rocket using RP-1 fuel and LOX oxidizer, with a single Rocketdyne LR79-NA rocket engine producing 150,000 lbf (670 kN) of thrust.
Soviet submarine B-59: people, places, and context for the episode.
Soviet submarine B-59 was a Project 641 or Foxtrot-class diesel-electric submarine of the Soviet Navy. B-59 was stationed near Cuba during the 13-day Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 and was pursued and harassed by United States Navy vessels.
Vasily Arkhipov: people, places, and context for the episode.
Vasily Aleksandrovich Arkhipov, also transliterated as Vasili Arkhipov, was a vice admiral in the Soviet Navy. He is best remembered for preventing nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
Lockheed U-2: people, places, and context for the episode.
The Lockheed U-2, nicknamed the "Dragon Lady", is an American single-engine, high–altitude reconnaissance aircraft operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) since the 1950s.
EXCOMM: people, places, and context for the episode.
The Executive Committee of the National Security Council was a body of United States government officials that convened to advise President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
Fidel Castro: people, places, and context for the episode.
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was a Cuban communist revolutionary and politician who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2011.
Nikita Khrushchev: people, places, and context for the episode.
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Chairman of the Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964.
John F. Kennedy: people, places, and context for the episode.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the youngest person elected president, at 43 years, and the first Catholic president.