Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis

In 1959, Fidel Castro overthrew the Cuban government and became President. The U.S disliked Castro for multiple reasons, mainly because he turned the Cuban Government communist and was seeking to spread communism. The U.S felt the need to intervene, that’s when they launched the Bay of Pigs Invasion. The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an attack on Cuba organized by the U.S government and the CIA. The plan was to invade Cuba and trigger an anti-communist revolution. The plan fell apart almost immediately. The landing site had sharp coral reef and swampy terrain, making it difficult to unload supplies and move onto the beaches. In addition, the Cuban government already knew of the plan from civilian gossip. Cuban officers fired at invaders as they came ashore. Almost 100 people died and the rest captured, it was an embarrassing defeat for the U.S.

Shortly after the Bay of Pigs Invasion, U.S spy plane photos confirmed that Cuba was establishing ballistic missiles. In the eyes of Cuba, they were just trying to protect themselves. From the Americans point of view, it did not look good. We placed an economic embargo on them, as well as a naval blockade to stop trade. Finally, the U.S received a note from Cuba saying they would take their missiles of the island if we promised never to invade Cuba again. This event was later known as the Cuban Missile Crisis, what could’ve been an all out nuclear war.

The relationship that Cuba had with Russia prompted us to launch the Bay of Pigs Invasion. The U.S and Russia weren’t allies and didn’t really get along well and now with Castro in charge, U.S felt they should do something. In addition, because our relationship wasn’t great with Russia, that frightened the U.S even more when their Allie, Cuba, had ballistic missiles I’m their country. We knew we had to do something about that before it got to out of hand and caused a nuclear war. With them being close to Russia, the U.S didn’t want Russia influencing their decision on how and when to use the missiles. The situation was taken care of in time and nobody was hurt.

Kennedy had a pretty big role in handling these events. I think he did a great job in handling the Cuban Missile Crisis. He managed to make Cuba remove their missiles and he didn’t let a nuclear war start, which was a success. Nobody got hurt, which was another success. It was a win win for the U.S, all we had to do was promise we were not going to invade Cuba again( which I don’t think we would’ve done either way). I do think he could’ve handled the bay of pigs invasion better. he could’ve waited longer to get a feel for the situation, maybe try to wait it out before he attacked. The invasion resulted in hundreds of deaths that could’ve been prevented. They could have made a better plan instead of rushing it, or just went about the situation in a different way. Overall though, I think he did a pretty good job in handling these situations.

Cite this page