Lessons Learned from the Cuban Missile Crisis
With Jefferson Morley
washingtonpost.com World Editor
Monday, Oct. 14 , 2002; 11 a.m. ET

Cuban President Fidel Castro and former Soviet and U.S. officials are at a weekend conference to observe the 40th anniversary of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. The crisis is "often called the world's closest brush with nuclear war." In a recent speech, President Bush made his arguments for a preemptive attack against Iraq by citing Kennedy's address of the October 1962 nuclear missile crisis in Cuba.

Many critics, such as several Kennedy administration figures, have argued that Kennedy never endorsed a first-strike policy.

"Sen. Kennedy, in a Sept. 27 speech at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, maintained that his brother's actions 40 years ago were anything but Bush-like." Read the full Outlook article What's Cuba Got to Do With It? A Precedent That Proves Neither Side's Point (Post, Oct. 13).

washingtonpost.com world editor Jefferson Morley was online LIVE from Havana, Cuba on Monday, Oct. 14, at 11 a.m. ET to talk about the 40th annniversary of the cuban missile crisis.

The transcript follows below.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

Jefferson Morley: I am here in Havana, having attended three days of meetings between former U.S., Cuban and Russian officials about the events of October 1962. While there were no earthshaking new revelations from this conference, there were a wealth of new details sharpening our understanding of what happened when the world came close to nuclear war. As many participants at the conference noted, this history is quite relevant to the situation between the United States and Iraq.

Washington D.C.: This conference sounds like an amazing and timely event, especially considering the current political situation in Iraq? What organization sponsored the conference?

Jefferson Morley: The conference was sponsored by the National Security Archive, a non-profit organization based at George Washington University, and the Watson Institute at Brown University. Attendees included a remarkable cross section of personalities, ranging from former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to Cuban president Fidel Castro to Russian generals and retired CIA analysts.

Harrisburg, Pa.: One of the most important elements of the Cuban missile crisis was the importance of diplomacy and understanding to what messages to reply, which to ignore, and the ability to allow both sides an out without ruining each other's reputations. Would you please tell us about the diplomatic channels that existed during the Cuban missile crisis and how they operated?

Jefferson Morley: President Kennedy used a wide variety of channels, public and private, to respond to the presence of nuclear missiles in Cuba. These included vigorous use of the United Nations and the Organization of American States to enlist their support and public support in countries overseas. Via his brother Bobby, the President also send private messages to Soviet diplomats in Washington.

Washington, D.C.: How do the Cubans view their position in the crisis? Were they pawns or victims?

Jefferson Morley: This was one of the purposes of the conference: to explore the Cuban role in what is often seen as simply a confrontation between the U.S. and Soviet Union. The Cuban speakers at the conference emphasized that they accepted the Soviet´s offer to place missiles in Cuba to deter what they viewed as an imminent U.S. attack in the second half of 1962. While President Kennedy´s former aides at the conference said JFK had no intention of launching such an invasion, the Pentagon had completed invasion plans. So the Cubans say the installation of the missiles was just and purely defensive and that they felt betrayed when the USSR agreed to withdraw them. So perhaps it would be fair to say that the Cubans felt they were victims of U.S. bullying and Soviet weakness. They did not feel they were anybody´s pawn.

Vancouver Island, Canada: Did the Russians get what they wanted, the USA not attacking Cuba and ousting Fidel? - Dave

Jefferson Morley: This was certainly the spin that the Soviets attempted to put on their actions. Facing imminent U.S. attack on the missile bases in Cuba, Krushchev agreed to withdraw them in exchange for a pledge for President Kennedy that the U.S. would not invade Cuba. Having obtained the pledge, Krushchev said the missiles would go. Castro did not trust the United States and was furious. But I think there is some justice to Krushchev´s position. After the missile crisis it was very difficult for the Kennedy White House to whip up public sentiment for invading Cuba and ousting Fidel.

Riverdale Park, Md.: Hello Mr Morley,

The Soviets placed missiles on Cuba, in part, as a response to US missiles in Turkey. Reasonably, the Soviets regarded the the siting of missiles so close to their borders as a provocation.

Why is the key piece of info missing from so many accounts of the Cuban missile crisis?

Jefferson Morley: Your facts are correct. In 1962, the U.S. had nuclear missiles as close to the Soviet Union as Cuba is to the United States. This fact is not omitted from many serious account of the missile crisis but it may be under emphasized. It was not so much the missiles that the U.S. regarded as the threat as the fact that the Soviet Union had introduced them surrpetitiously in a way that U.S. policymakers felt was an attempt to ¨change the rules of the game¨ and gain the upper hand in the superpower rivalry.

Boston, Mass.: What were you doing 40 years ago?

Jefferson Morley: I was in kindegarten in St. Louis Missouri, vaguely aware that my parents and teachers were very worried about something.

Mt. Lebanon, Pa.: I watched the program on the Cuban Missile Crisis yesterday on C-SPAN. They aired the actual discussions around the table; someone must have taped it. Following the tape they went to a presentation by Ted Sorenson and Robert McNamara, recorded earlier this month. I was impressed by the cool-headed assement given by Vice President Johnson -give up the Jupiters in Turkey, they're obsolete anyway] & the Air Force general in charge of a possible attack on Cuba -we can't guarantee we'll take out all of the Russian missiles] in counter to the egg-head arguments of the Harvard bunch -g leads to h leads to i leads to j and then nuclear annihilation results]. I wished the public would have known anything about these discussions at the time especially given my family was living on a SAC base in southwestern Oklahoma with missile silos AND B-52s. How come the public was kept in the dark these many years about the actual handwringing and telephone calls to the Kremlin at the time? I can't conceive of that kind of wall of silence nowadays. Thanks much. HLB

Jefferson Morley: Its not that we haven´t known many of these key deliberations during the missile crisis. We have but, for national security reasons, the U.S. government did not make available all of the tape recordings and memoranda of key meetings. Incidentally, the arguments of LBJ and Air Force Gen. Sweeney were not in response to the "egg-head arguments of the Harvard bunch." The proponents of preemptive action in Cuba were primarily Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Maxwell Taylor, Gen. Curtis LeMay, and former Secretary of State Dean Acheson. It is indeed hard to conceive of the kind of secrecy that enveloped U.S. policymakers during the first week of the crisis. But I would also not underestimate the extent to which the public today does NOT know about the nature of the deliberations at the top of the U.S. government about Iraq.

Los Angeles, Calif.: I'm hardly an expert on the Cuban Missile Crisis (I'm 33) - but I do believe there are some similarities and differences between the crisis with Iraq.

As far as similarities, America was faced with a significant threat by way of Cuba having nuclear missiles on it's territory just as there is a significant threat should Iraq acquire nuclear weapons.

However, despite the danger of war between the U.S. and Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis, this danger was also countered by deterrence. The Soviets knew that war with the U.S. could lead to a full exchange of nuclear weapons and the total destruction of Russia. This, maybe more than anything else, helped resolve the Cuban Missile Crisis.

On the other hand, deterrence isn't viable with Iraq as
a. Saddam Hussein isn't necessarily concerned about the fate of Iraq in the event of his demise.
b. Iraq could acquire a nuclear weapon and pass it on to some terrorist organization.
Unfortunately, America might only become aware of this after it detonates in an American city.

As a broader issue, I hardly desire a rush to war, but I'm not sure what else needs to be said about Iraq to convince the media and Bush's detractors to see Iraq as a threat and it's acquisition of nuclear weapons as something this nation cannot allow. If Bush said "I'm going to toss a coin - heads and Iraq isn't trying to build nuclear weapons so we all can sleep easy. Tails and Iraq builds a nuclear bomb and we can't control what it does with it." Are those odds enough to go to war? I don't know any sane person who would say it isn't.

Jefferson Morley: This was a major topic of discussion in the hallways outside the conference. As your careful comparison indicates, there are indeed important similarities and differences between the two crises. I noted several more in my Outlook piece yesterday.

You focus on the key question, the nature of the threat today, and, of course, the Cuban missile crisis tells us nothing about that. What the former Kennedy aides at the conference took issue with President Bush over was his approach. They argued that JFK´s approach of turning down military options and pursuing diplomacy, even in the face of a more clearly established threat, was different from Bush´s more hawkish course so far. The Cuban participants, naturally, were even more vehement in opposing current U.S. policy.

Washington, D.C.: How can the Cuban Missile Crisis really be a guide to the Iraq crisis (and the doctrine of preemption) without an equal countervailing force to U.S. strength like the Soviet Union? Is it really an apt comparison? It seems like such a stretch.

Jefferson Morley: As I noted in my piece, the lack of a comparable superpower today makes the situation very different. But the many similarities still make the comparison useful, I think. The essential question, then as now, is: how should the U.S. government responde when its senior civilian policymakers perceive an existential threat to the American homeland? Is pre-emptive war necessary_ The Cuban missile crisis is really the only other time that America has had to confront those questions. So its useful to look back, bearing in mind the many differences.

Washington, D.C.: Would the Kennedy team have been able to have the necessary, candid discussions during the crisis if it was not secretive? Can the Bush team now have the very necessary discussions about war with Iraq out in the open? Is secrecy sometimes necessary for good policy, candid discussion and well reasoned and executable plans?

Jefferson Morley: Very good questions and very relevant questions. The Kennedy team deliberated in private for six days (from Oct. 16 to Oct. 21) before deciding on an initial course of action. Only in the last 24 hours of that period did word leak that the U.S. government was in the throes of decision-making of extraordinary weight. All the participants in those discussions agree that their course of action changed drastically. If publicity had demanded a decision in the first days after the missiles were discovered, the Kennedy administration probably would have launched airstrikes on Cuba that would have soon led to an invasion. We now know that such an attack was much more likely to have caused a nuclear war than U.S. officials knew at the time.

West Sussex, UK: The Cuban missile crisis, and the war in Vietnam have had a tempering effect on US foreign policy. Do you see the current diplomatic preamble vis a vis the US and Irag as more sophisticated in pursuing US aims than that at the time of the Cuban missile crisis, given the realities of attempting to influence such a man as Saddam Hussein?

Jefferson Morley: No, I don´t think the current diplomatic approach is more sophisticated. I think it is quite comparable and this is no accident. Secretary of State Colin Powell is a keen student of the missile crisis. I think President Bush´s effective speech at the U.N. on Sept. 12 and the use of photographs of Iraq nuclear facilities are evidence that the administration has absorbed some of the lessons of Oct. 1962.

Washington, D.C.: How close was this country to nuclear war back then? And is there a danger of nuclear war if we invade Iraq?

Jefferson Morley: The United States was probably less than 36 hours away from launching an attack on Cuba which, we now know, would probably have resulted in some kind of nuclear war. U.S. intelligence has not detected any comparable danger from Iraq´s nuclear weapons program which is thought to be anywhere from a few months to a few years away from being capable of producing a nuclear weapon. In the current situation, the danger facing any possible U.S. invasion of Iraq is the use of chemical and/or biological weapons. The CIA is on record as saying that a U.S. attack on Iraq to overthrow Saddam Hussein would increase the risks of Iraq using such weapons.

Århus, Denmark: In your opinion, what has been the most interesting fact to surface from the conference?

Jefferson Morley: The most interesting and new story to come out of the conference was the story recounted by Post correspondent Kevin Sullivan in his report on the conference. He tells the story very well. I will forward the link so you can read it.

washingtonpost.com: 40 Years After Missile Crisis, Players Swap Stories in Cuba (Post, Oct. 13)

Jefferson Morley: It is worth emphasizing that this story shows just how truly dangerous and out of control the situation was in 1962.

Jefferson Morley: Our time is up. Thanks for all the questions. Adios from La Habana.

washingtonpost.com:

That wraps up today's show. Thanks to everyone who joined the discussion.

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