Russian Invasions, Threats, and Nuclear Warheads: 1962 to 2022

Soviet military leader and Minister of Defense from 1957 to 1967 Rodion Malinovsky was born in Odessa in 1898. He fought in Stalingrad and commanded the armies that expelled the Germans from Ukraine. In the same year, Stalin awarded him the rank of marshal. His political commissar in Stalingrad was Nikita Khrushchev.

In 1962, Khrushchev was in charge of the Soviet Union, and Malinovsky was its defense minister. One sunny May morning of the same year, the Soviet leader confided to the minister his plan: Why don’t we put a hedgehog in Uncle Sam’s underpants? asked Nikita Khrushchev.

Despite the opposition he faced in the Politburo, Khrushchev carried out his plan: the USSR sent nuclear-tipped missiles to Cuba, installed ladders to launch them, and transferred about 50,000 soldiers from its army to the island. The Cuban government, led by Fidel Castro, who initiated rapprochement with Moscow through Raul Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara in 1960, rejoiced. Any threat of invasion from the United States now had to be countered by a huge response capability.

On October 14, 1962, a US Air Force aircraft gave the Kennedy administration photographic evidence showing part of the hedgehog. Two days later, the president convened his executive committee and discussed how to respond.

Blockade of the island of Cuba

A military response was chosen: bombardment, which doubted whether it should be surgical or massive. Part of the presidential cabinet was frightened and forced to lower the tone of the response. A blockade of the island was chosen, which was called a “quarantine”, with the intention that it would not be seen as an act of war, as it was.

On the 22nd, the Soviets received the news. A complex elaboration of the answer began. In the meantime, US military forces began maneuvers in Florida that could be preparations for an invasion and were put on maximum immediate alert, which would mean the outbreak of nuclear war.

Khrushchev’s “bluff” against the USA

It seems that Khrushchev did not realize the risk of his sharp bet until he faced the risk of American missiles flying towards Moscow. Prior to that, he skillfully handled the nuclear challenge as a “bluff” against the Americans. He realized late that he had gone too far and that he really could provoke a nuclear war with all its catastrophic consequences.

Both sides looked at the abyss of a war that would cause great damage to itself, but neither the fear nor the dizziness of the moment could guarantee that this would not happen. Rather, it gave the impression that it was almost certain to happen.

Then intricate distance negotiations began, culminating in an agreement on the 28th: ​​the USSR would withdraw its missiles from Cuba in exchange for a US commitment not to invade the island and, without public disclosure, the dismantling of American missiles in Turkey. .

Two years later, in October 1964, the Politburo removed Khrushchev from office. Among the harsh accusations leveled against him, mostly related to domestic politics, were some related to the Cuban crisis: his irresponsible and adventurous stance caused a very dangerous crisis with unforeseen consequences and managed to weaken Soviet influence in America.

Parallel with the current situation

The parallels with the current situation in Ukraine are numerous and interesting, but the opposite view prevails. The invader is now Russia, the external deterrent, NATO.

Ukraine’s rapprochement with the West is a growing trend that has been established by the facts since the country’s independence in 1991. Russian influence, on the other hand, has never been negligible, but it is decreasing. The Kremlin’s attitude, initially tolerant, became increasingly suspicious and hostile towards the West by the end of the first decade of the century. The return of Vladimir Putin to the presidency in 2012 meant that this hostility increased. Official Russian nationalism has become more strident and anti-Western, or, as Putin would put it, anti-Anglo-Saxon.

In 2014, Russia decided to cross the red line: on the sly, through those “green men” without identification marks, which everyone identified as Russian troops, it violated the borders that it promised to observe in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum. The West reacted with stronger sanctions. Very shy. The action of force, disguised as “no war,” marked the beginning of a silent confrontation that has lasted for eight years.

On February 22, 2022, a new “special military action”, a real invasion of Ukraine after threatening military exercises, left the world in a dilemma of how to respond to the challenge.

Russian military effectiveness questioned

The response has been Ukraine’s intense military resistance, backed by the West, which has shown that Russian military effectiveness is partly bluffing. Russia may lose the war. Faced with such a scenario, their dilemma is to resort to nuclear force again, this time to sustain aggression.

He went much further than in Cuba. Nobody installed nuclear missiles in Ukraine; on the contrary, they were withdrawn in exchange for the obligation to respect its borders, which Russia violated. The country was invaded, forcibly stripped of sovereignty over part of its territory, with the threat of razing it to the ground if it did not agree.

It has long ceased to be a threat. This is more reminiscent of Castro’s insane insistence in 1962 to use nuclear weapons against the US military as soon as possible. Khrushchev did not allow this, focused on reaching an agreement, avoided war, and, deposed, died in his bed. Malinovsky died while serving as defense minister. Kennedy was assassinated a year after the missile crisis.

Pablo Perez Lopez, professor of modern history. Scientific Director of the Institute of Culture and Society of the University of Navarra

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original.

We recommend METADATA, RPP’s technology podcast. News, analytics, reviews, recommendations and everything you need to know about the tech world.