Why was Khrushchev removed from power in 1964?

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Lee Bettis 10n                Dr White

Why was Khrushchev removed from power in 1964?

         In 1964, Khrushchev was forced out of parliament by his colleagues. This happened because he lost the confidence of powerful interests in Communism. In my opinion, I think this happened due to 5 reasons. I will explain my theory below.

        Firstly, and arguably most importantly, the Cuban missile crisis. In 1962, Fidel Castro was the leader of Cuba. Nikita Khrushchev agreed to buy the sugar from Cuba; in fact this was the same sugar America was refusing to buy. But, this was in return for a big favour; Russia could base their nuclear missiles on Cuban soil. Castro agreed. Khrushchev was picking a blatant fight with Kennedy, just for the purpose of winning. He wanted Russia to have a diplomatic success. He thought he could win it because Kennedy was "inexperienced" and "young". Also Kennedy was proven to be inept. This was proven in the "Bay of Pigs" affair in 1961. In the Bay of Pigs affair, the left-wing Castro took over all of the sugar plantations, which  irritated the Americans. The Americans tried to push Batista back into power but it didn't work, so the Americans stopped buying Cuba's sugar, this was bad news for Cuba because America was its main buyer. That is when Khrushchev came in with his "offer", Russia would buy Cuba's sugar, but Cuba's price to pay was working with Russia in political affairs and basing the missiles on Cuban mainland for the embarrassment of America. America found out about this, and quickly came back by making a "quarantine zone". This means around Cuba there was a massive circumference where American ships waited for Russian merchant ships. If the Russian merchant ships tried to enter this "quarantine zone" they would be sunk to the bottom of the ocean. Khrushchev had to turn the ships back. This humiliated and embarrassed Soviet Russia. This was a massive flaw for Russia. It was a very important factor for the downfall of Khrushchev.

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        Secondly, the Sino-Soviet split. In the early 1960's, there was an obvious rift between the Soviet Union and Communist China. There was an evident personality clash between Khrushchev and the Chinese leader Mao Tse-Tung. Khrushchev wanted “peaceful co-existence” with America. Tse-Tung wanted the opposite, he took the view that the world should be Communist and they should overthrow the leaders and make Communism supreme. Khrushchev was rumored – in this clash - to have called Tse-Tung “a worn out old boot”. This is typical of Khrushchev. There were also border clashes. In account of the split, Russia had a ...

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