The Cuban Missile Crisis: Reading the Lessons Correctly

Abstract

lessons of the Cuban missile crisis occupy a central place both in United States foreign policy and in international relations theory. For policymakers, the crisis confirmed a number of tenets about the utility of power in a nuclear world and the ways in which relations with the Soviet Union should best bc managed. Theoreticians have thoroughly examined the case for generalizations about crisis decision-making, bargaining theory, and the role of nuclear weapons in foreign policy. How valid are these lessons? In recent years, a burgeoning revisionist literature has challenged the prevalent view that the crisis represented a necessary and successful response to a Soviet challenge of vital American interests. 1 John F. Kennedy has been charged with overreacting to the discovery of Soviet missiles in Cuba and even with provoking a confrontation with Moscow for domestic political reasons. Unfortunately, most of this literature is highly polemical and thus of little analytical value. There are some important exceptions, among them an article by James A. Nathan, The Missile Crisis: His Finest Hour Now, which raises some interesting questions about the policy implications of the crisis.2 Nathan's article