Missile Crisis Research Articles

Armageddon and the stock market: US, Canadian and Mexican market responses to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

The threat of nuclear annihilation has never been higher than in 1962, when US President Kennedy and Soviet Premier Khruschev engaged in brinkmanship over the placement of Soviet missiles in Cuba during October 16−28. Although the resolution of the crisis was followed by a sustained recovery in the US, Canadian and Mexican stock markets, the stock market impact of the crisis itself, at first glance, seems relatively limited. Notwithstanding the fact that empirical analysis of 1962 US market data reveal a significant break on October 23, 1962, which is the day after President Kennedy’s television address about the Cuban Missile Crisis, the drop on this day was smaller than prior one day declines seen in the earlier part of the year. When we focus on the 1 % left tail of the distribution of stock returns, that is, just the very largest and least probable negative returns, a different story emerges, however. US uncertainty is now seen to have a significant negative impact on returns across each of the US, Canadian and Mexican markets. Moreover, the size of the negative response to the rise in uncertainty is comparable in all three cases notwithstanding the fact the pre-crisis Mexican stock market trajectory had been very different from that seen in the United States and Canada.

Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War

Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War

Lessons of the Cold War

Lessons of the Cold War

Editor's Note

Editor's Note

Jeżow – Beria – Sierow a sprawa Polaków. Na szczytach totalitarnej władzy

Nikolai Ivanovich Yezhov was Minister (People’s Commissar) of the Interior (NKVD USSR) from 1936 to 1938. In these years falls the period of the so-called Great Terror. Using the hands of Yezhov, Stalin carried out the genocide of his own citizens. Poles – citizens of the USSR – suffered the most. Yezhov was shot. In his place there came Lavrentiy Beria (December 1938). Beria was the second person after Stalin for 15 years. His right hand man was a NKVD General – Serov. From the beginning of World War II until the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, State Security General Ivan Alexandrovich Serov was an active participant in all of the most important events of those years. He was the only person in the Soviet Union to be the head of both the “civilian” Committee of State Security (KGB) and the military Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU). In particular, Serov was responsible for the criminal pacification of Poland after 1944. The author of the article used mainly two priceless documents: The secrets of general Serov’s briefcase. Journals of the first Chairman of KGB. 1939–1963 (Polish: Tajemnice walizki generała Sierowa. Dzienniki pierwszego szefa KGB. 1939–1963). The Polish version was published in 2019. The second document are the memories of Beria’s son – Sergo Beria: Beria, mon pḕre. Au coeur du porvoir stalinien (Polish: Beria mój ojciec. W sercu stalinowskiej władzy, the Polish version was published in 2000). Moreover, the author used: P. Sudoplatov, Special Tasks: The Memoirs of an Unwanted Witness – A Soviet Spymaster (Polish: Wspomnienia niewygodnego świadka, the Polish version was published in 1999).

The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War

The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War

Hovering Clouds of Arsenals across the Globe: Taking into Account Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty

Nuclear politics is always a tricky business at international level. To understand the nuclear politics is not easy for the teachers, students, researchers and scholars of nuclear politics and global affairs. Arms Control doesn’t means to control or reduce the arsenals, it is sometimes to build arsenals to influence the opponent as two superpowers expanded their nuclear arsenals and raised the slogan of arms control. In this sense, the world witnessed hovering clouds of arsenals across the globe during the cold war era when USSR and USA plunged into conflict in Korean Peninsula, Cuban Missile Crisis and in European vicinity. Although numbers of agreements have been signed by powerful states to avoid nuclear tussles and they remained successful but the race between USSR and USA stimulated other countries to build nuclear arsenals. The bitter reality is that some countries achieved nuclear technology some trying to get like Iran. However, except nuclear issues there are several issues in global politics because now the world has become multipolar and more interestingly China is the emerging global power and influencing the states across the globe. On the other hand, number of treaties have lost their worth or been withdrawn such like INF Treaty and NEW START Treaty is going to expire in February 2026. The question is that what world leading powers learnt from history in sense ofnuclear tussles? Because INF has been terminated and New START is also going to be expired. What would be next? What will be the consequences of the termination of INF at first hand and New START Treaty if it would be terminated? This research attempts to find out these main questions through descriptive analytical research Methodology.

The Cuban Missile Crisis after Sixty Years

The sixtieth anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis is an appropriate time to review the events—arguably the closest the world has come to nuclear war—from the perspective of 2022. Growing tensions between Moscow and Washington and increasing Cuba emphasis in US domestic politics preceded the confrontation. Analysts differ on motives for placing long-range missiles in Cuba; Soviet officials consistently emphasized the defense of the island. We know now that nuclear war was even closer than realized at the time. This article is a revision of one that appeared in the Winter 2013 issue.

“A Special Form of Making Foreign Policy by the Threat of War to Imperialists”. A Case Study of Military-Political Activity of Central Committee Presidium under N.S. Khrushchev, 1953–1964. Part 2

The results of Khrushchev's foreign policy can be considered, albeit not in everything and even more modest than planned, on the whole quite successful. To resolve the 2nd Berlin crisis (1958–1963), Khrushchev in 1960 reduced the Soviet ground forces by a third, thereby trying to encourage the United States to reduce its military presence in Europe. However, at the Paris Summit of the heads of the 4 powers (1960), due to the active opposition of France and Germany, he failed to push through an agreement on West Berlin on Soviet terms. Mao Zedong, who himself dreamed of leadership among socialist countries after Stalin's death, took advantage of the convenient situation to start a conflict with Moscow. In such an environment, Khrushchev escalated the Berlin crisis by threatening to conclude a peace treaty with the GDR and block Western powers' access to West Berlin (at the same time he conducts command and staff exercises “Storm”, 5–15.10.1961, together with the armies of the ATS countries). He hoped that the United States would not dare to start a war because of West Berlin, and this, in turn, would help to break off Western European states from NATO, showing them that the United States is not a reliable defender for them. His plan partially succeeded: in 1966, France will withdraw from NATO. In order to divert the attention and forces of the United States from West Berlin, the USSR has been actively creating distracting situations around the world since 1961. One of these situations was the Caribbean crisis, which almost led to a nuclear war (1962) and was a heavy defeat for the USSR, which had to fulfill all the conditions of the United States, but in return received Kennedy's promise to remove missile bases from Turkey. It will be possible to remove them only in 1963 in exchange for Turkey's support in its war with Greece over Cyprus. From Iran, due to the harsh Anglo-American pressure on the Shah, the USSR was able to achieve only an obligation not to deploy foreign missiles on its territory, but not to withdraw from the Baghdad Pact, nevertheless, the latter's activities were paralyzed. Under Brezhnev, despite the rejection of Khrushchev's tactics of nuclear bluff, the main directions and strategic goals of foreign policy remained the same as under Khrushchev: ensuring security on the western and southern borders of the USSR by splitting the opposing military blocs and establishing ties with Western European countries, especially France, improving relations with Turkey, Iran and Pakistan, linking them economically. The program of naval construction and the permanent presence of the Soviet Navy in all oceans, begun in 1959, continued.

The Caribbean Crisis the Other Way Round

The Caribbean Crisis the Other Way Round

Introduction : Total Cinema: Film and Design

The movie screen is up in flames and the audience flees in panic, thinking an atomic bomb has just been dropped. The director rubs his hands: film and the outside world have blended into one—at least in Joe Dante’s Matinee (1993), set in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. May this be the “myth of total cinema” described by André Bazin in 1946, according to which the art of film was never really driven by its accidental technological history but by a desire to grasp reality in its entirety, to reconstruct “a perfect illusion of the outside world in sound, color, and relief”? Dante’s larger than life director pays homage to B-movie showman William Castle, who shied away from little when it came to engagement, be it narrative, visual, or somatic. Castle appeared on screen offering the audience a (faux) choice between alternative endings, used 3D illusionism, and installed “buzzers” in the seats and skeletons flying over the auditorium—not unlike Eisenstein’s Proletkult theatre which included tightrope-walkers over the viewers’ heads and firecrackers under their bottoms. Is it possible to unite the effects of agitprop theatre, the illusion of agency in American trash films and the immersive formats of our time into a single conceptual framework? And if it is, would that be cinema? Film theorist Andrew Dudley already claimed in 1997 that “[t]he century of cinema offered a fragile period of détente during which the logosphere of the nineteenth century with its grand novels and histories has slowly given way—under the pressure of technology, of the ascendance of the image, and of unfathomable world crises—to the videosphere we are now entering.”

Armageddon and the Stock Market: US, Canadian and Mexican Market Responses to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

Armageddon and the Stock Market: US, Canadian and Mexican Market Responses to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis

The Failed Detente of the 1960s: the lessons of the Caribbean crisis and the Logic of the Cold War

The Failed Detente of the 1960s: the lessons of the Caribbean crisis and the Logic of the Cold War

‘A General Insurrection in the Countries with Slaves’: The US Civil War and the Origins of an Atlantic Revolution, 1861–1866

Abstract This article reveals how the beginning of US Reconstruction precipitated a revolutionary crisis in Cuba and Brazil, the last two slave societies in the Atlantic World. Throughout the US Civil War, slave-owners in Cuba and Brazil faced the immense challenge of containing black revolutionary currents across the Atlantic. Despite their intensive policing of black transnational networks, many slaves in Cuba and Brazil learned of the Civil War and became convinced that it heralded their emancipation. In response, they walked off plantations, fled to maroon communities, and organized and launched revolts. Although the scale of this insurrectionary violence never reached the same heights as in the Confederacy, the beginning of Reconstruction transformed the political implications of slave rebellion across the hemisphere. The fall of the Confederacy forced slave-owners in Cuba and Brazil to confront the possibility of their violent destruction at the same moment that the apparent radicalization of Republican politics stirred fears of US support for an international slave insurrection. It was in this context that many white elites in both nations became convinced of the necessity for a gradual abolition measure, which they hoped would ensure subaltern loyalty at a moment when revolutionary violence threatened the future of slavery.

Роль ядерного оружия в мировой политике: история и современность

The article examines the role of nuclear weapons not only as a military force of states, but also as a political factor in world politics. In the historical context, the author considers the use of nuclear weapons by the United States, which used nuclear weapons against Japan as an instrument of influence on its opponents, primarily the USSR. The article reveals the importance of nuclear weapons in the functioning of the Yalta-Potsdam system of international relations that developed after the end of World War II, especially during the Caribbean crisis of 1962 as the most acute phase of the crisis in relations between the two superpowers. The article focuses on new approaches to the role of nuclear weapons in world politics after the collapse of the USSR, analyzes the modern strategy of Russia's nuclear deterrence that is set out in the Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of Nuclear Deterrence of June 2, 2020.

Application of secret diplomacy in international practice

Problem setting. Secret diplomacy, in various forms, has remained a key method of international relations and the development of relations between states. For example, the fate of the Caribbean Crisis was decided by secret diplomacy between the United States and the Soviet Union. However, despite the extremely large influence of secret diplomacy on the development of international relations, it is necessary to note a rather small level of study of secret diplomacy as a phenomenon. Analysis of recent researches and publications. In the scientific literature, the theoretical aspects of secret diplomacy have been the subject of scientific research by such scholars as Cornelia Biolu, Anthony Venis-V. John, Pika SM, Kostyuk DA, Pron TM, but a significant number of extremely important documents for understanding the problem remains in closed access. That is why the lack of scientific literature, which would describe secret diplomacy in the theoretical aspect, significantly complicates the study and study of secret diplomacy in general. Target of research. The aim of the paper is to carry out a critical review of the definition of secret diplomacy, to analyze the types of secret diplomacy and to consider features of their functioning in international relations, as well as to identify the disadvantages and advantages of secret diplomacy. Article’s main body. The article provides a general analysis of the definition of the concept of "secret diplomacy" in international practice. The opinions of leading scientists are given. Examples from history are analyzed. The paper analyzes in detail the types of secret diplomacy, and also considers the features of their functioning in international relations. In addition, the main advantages and disadvantages of secret diplomacy were formulated, as well as the prospect of its further application in practice. Conclusions. Secret diplomacy is the activity of the government to implement the foreign, international policy of the state, which is conducted in secret from society, other states and third parties in order to facilitate negotiations, establish relations and obtain various benefits. The methods of secret diplomacy have been used since ancient times and continue to be key not only in relations between states, but also in resolving international conflicts, despite the fact that the phenomenon has a number of disadvantages in addition to its advantages. There are several types of secret diplomacy, each of which differs from the others not only in its purposes for which it is used, but also in its components.

The Cold War in the Programs and Activities of the Left-wing Political Parties and Trade Unions in Canada (1956-1962)

The aim of the article is to show the ideological transformation of the left part of the Canadian political spectrum from the post-stalinist shifts till the Cuban missile crisis. The presented material can be used in further studies of the Cold war from the ideological approach. The results of the study can contribute to the better understanding of the Cold War history in Canada, regarding the global confrontation as a conflict of not only the superpowers but also the ideas. The article is also a case study of political parties, making an account of factors which caused organizational instability and changes in their ideological orientation. The main results: it has been found that there was a significant right-wing ideological shift in the Canadian Labour movement and Social Democrats as well. On the other hand, our study shows how the Communists were able to keep their ideological background stable and overcome the organizational weakness of 1956-59, even if the price was paid in losing some people the among their ranks. 
 The article shows a wide range of factors that influenced that drift. Concise conclusions: It is shown that overall the Canadian left were weakened during this period. The most powerful leftist party, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, has shown a denounce of some Marxist theses in the 1956 conference, and that led it to further centrist transformation, united with the labour movement in this drift. The Cold war influenced this shift in many cases, as the Left program documents consistently show the distancing from the communist regimes which are claimed as totalitarian. The Communist Party of Canada was left as a one, and reasonably weak, pro-soviet power, remaining somewhat orthodox in its doctrinal ideological beliefs. Their activities were crippled as well due to societal opposal to them as a rival Cold war side. Originality and scientific novelty of the current article are based on the fact that, for the first time, the attempt has been made to give an account of program changes of the Canadian Left while considering the factors which led to them (or their absence). For the first time there has been made a comparison of those changes which gives us possibility to characterize Canadian political climate during the subsequent period.

Red lines: Enforcement, declaration, and ambiguity in the Cuban Missile Crisis

ABSTRACT Using declassified materials to examine the eleven red lines of the Cuban Missile Crisis, this study qualifies and amends two popular beliefs about them: failing to punish violations damages credibility and deterrence requires declaring unambiguous red lines. I argue, first, that violations of red lines create fleeting ‘windows of credibility’ wherein violators fear retaliation. If declarers move quickly, they can convert non-enforcement into a bargaining chip, exchanging it for concessions while avoiding escalation. Second, rather than wholly embrace clarity or ambiguity, declarers frequently optimize by combining clear demands with ambiguity about the consequences of crossing those lines.

1962 Küba Krizi: Amerikan Arşivleri Üzerinden Bir Okuma

Bu çalışmanın amacı Soğuk Savaş’ın en önemli nükleer krizlerinden birisi olan 1962 Küba Krizi’nin Amerikan arşiv belgeleri üzerinden bir okumasının yapılmasıdır. Arşiv belgeleri özellikle kriz süresince Amerikan karar alma mekanizmasının en tepesinde yer alan Başkan Kennedy’nin milli güvenlikle ilgili kurumların koordineli çalışmasının sağlanmasındaki etkisini ortaya koyması bakımından önemlidir. Nitekim bu çerçevede Kennedy’nin kriz süresince günde birkaç defa toplanan ve milli güvenlikle ilgili kurumların temsilcilerinin görüşlerini serbestçe ifade ettikleri bir platform olarak Milli Güvenlik Konseyi İcra Kurulu (The Executive Committee of the National Security Council/ ExComm) ön plana çıkmaktadır. ExComm toplantılarına ait tutanaklar ve diğer arşiv belgeleri kriz sürecinin yönetilmesindeki mekanik yapının anlaşılmasında önemli bir nokta olarak karşımıza çıkmaktadır. Bu anlamda çalışma, nükleer savaşın eşiğindeki Amerika’nın milli güvenliğe bağlı olarak dış politika karar alma sürecinde liderlik yapısının yeri nedir ve liderlik yapısı hangi saikler üzerinden hareket etmiştir sorusuna cevap vermektedir. Bu çerçevede çalışmanın ilk bölümünde kuramsal değerlendirme yer almaktadır. İkinci bölümde krize giden yolda hangi parametrelerin etkisi olduğu ele alınmıştır. Üçüncü bölümde Küba Krizi’nin gelişimi detaylı olarak kronolojik safhalarıyla ele alınırken Amerikan karar alıcıların krizin gelişimine dair düşünceleri arşiv belgeleri üzerinden incelenmiştir. Bu noktada ABD Dışişleri Bakanlığı’nın Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) belgeleri ve gizlilik dereceleri kaldırılmış CIA belgeleriyle desteklenerek detaylandırılmıştır. Son bölümde krizin sona ermesiyle ortaya çıkan uluslararası ortam açıklanmıştır.

Cuba: The July 11, 2021, Protests

Cuba: The July 11, 2021, Protests