Cuban Missile Crisis Essay

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The Cuban Missile Crisis

The origins of the Cuban Missile Crisis can be found in 1959, when Fidel Castro's supporters finally overthrew Batista's military dictatorship, which had been in power since 1953. Within a year Castro had introduced reforms, such as nationalisation (state ownership) of various companies, and of land, which was redistributed to the peasants. He also brought communists into the government and relations with the USA steadily worsened.

Why did America oppose Castro?

1 Batista was a corrupt dictator, but he had been careful to stay friendly with America and, up until 1959, most of Cuba's trade in sugar and cigars was with America.

2 Though Castro was not officially known to be a communist in 1959, the Americans suspected this from the start. His policies, such as nationalisation, seemed to confirm their fears and what made it worse was the fact that some of the companies, and land, taken over by Castro's government, belonged to American citizens.

3 As a result Eisenhower refused to meet Castro, when he visited America in 1959, and he refused loans and economic aid. When Castro turned to the USSR for help, the USA banned all trade with Cuba. Such tough tactics only made Cuba more dependent upon the Soviets. By 1962, 80% of Cuba's trade was with countries in the Soviet bloc, and Soviet arms and troops had also arrived.

4 As Castro drew closer to the USSR, American hostility hardened into determination to overthrow him. Castro now openly paraded his communist sympathies, and the American government would not tolerate a communist country within their sphere of influence. Cuba was only 90 miles from the American coast and America had consistently warned European countries against interference in the American continent. The countries of Central America, and the Caribbean especially, were seen as `America's backyard'. In view of America's opposition to communism across the globe since 1945, the existence and proximity of a pro-Soviet communist government in Cuba was

bound to endanger and annoy.

The Bay of Pigs, April 1961

Eisenhower approved a CIA covert operation against Castro before he left office, and Kennedy inherited the plan for an invasion force of 1500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles to land and encourage a general uprising to overthrow Castro. Kennedy made some important, and disastrous, changes to the original plan. The landing was now to take place in the Bay of Pigs, where there had been virtually no reconnaissance (photographs of coral reefs were mistaken for seaweed), and he refused to authorise a second US air strike, should it be requested.

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The result, in April 1961, was a disaster which reflected badly upon the Americans, and Kennedy in particular, and boosted Castro's reputation in equal measure. In the Bay of Pigs some landing craft were wrecked by the coral reefs; the initial CIA air strike failed to destroy all the Cuban planes; contrary to intelligence reports the local population did not flock to support the invasion; those troops not killed in the assault were quickly rounded up by the 20,000 strong Cuban army.

After the Bay of Pigs fiasco Castro relied on the Soviets more than ever. US covert operations continued ...

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