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(Sunday, October 28, 1962, 9:00 a.m. EST/5:00 p.m. Moscow Standard Time; the thirteenth and final day of the Cuban missile crisis, part of the Cold War) — Radio Moscow announced today that the Soviet Union had accepted a proposed solution to end the Cuban Missile Crisis, releasing the text of a letter from Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev affirming that the missiles will be removed in exchange for a non-invasion pledge from the United States.
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The U.S. also secretly agreed to remove Jupiter missiles that had been placed in Turkey near its border with the U.S.S.R.
President John F. Kennedy called Khrushchev’s letter “an important and constructive contribution to peace.”
On Saturday, Oct. 27, 1962, after much deliberation between the Soviet Union and Kennedy’s cabinet, Kennedy secretly agreed to remove all missiles set in Turkey and possibly southern Italy, the former on the border of the Soviet Union, in exchange for Khrushchev removing all missiles in Cuba.
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There is some dispute as to whether removing the missiles from Italy was part of the secret agreement. Khrushchev wrote in his memoirs that it was, and when the crisis had ended McNamara gave the order to dismantle the missiles in both Italy and Turkey.
At this point, Khrushchev knew things the U.S. did not. First, the Oct. 27, 1962, shooting down of a U-2 spy plane by a Soviet missile violated direct orders from Moscow, and Cuban anti-aircraft fire against other U.S. reconnaissance aircraft also violated direct orders from Khrushchev to Castro.
Second, the Soviets already had 162 nuclear warheads on Cuba that the U.S. did not then believe were there.
Third, the Soviets and Cubans on the island would almost certainly have responded to an invasion by using those nuclear weapons, even though Castro believed that every human in Cuba would likely die as a result. Khrushchev also knew but may not have considered the fact that he had submarines armed with nuclear weapons that the U.S. Navy may not have known about.
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Khrushchev knew he was losing control. President Kennedy had been told in early 1961 that a nuclear war would likely kill a third of humanity, with most or all of those deaths concentrated in the U.S., the U.S.S.R., Europe and China; Khrushchev may well have received similar reports from his military.
With this background, when Khrushchev heard Kennedy’s threats to attack and invade Cuba relayed by Attorney General Robert Kennedy to Soviet Ambassador Dobrynin, he immediately drafted his acceptance of Kennedy’s latest terms from his dacha without involving the Politburo, as he had previously, and had them immediately broadcast over Radio Moscow, which he believed the U.S. would hear.
In that broadcast at 9:00 a.m. EST, on Oct. 28, Khrushchev stated that “the Soviet government, in addition to previously issued instructions on the cessation of further work at the building sites for the weapons, has issued a new order on the dismantling of the weapons which you describe as ‘offensive’ and their crating and return to the Soviet Union.”
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At 10:00 a.m., EST on Oct. 28, Kennedy first learned of Khrushchev’s solution to the crisis with the U.S. removing the 15 Jupiters in Turkey and the Soviets would remove the rockets from Cuba. Khrushchev had made the offer in a public statement for the world to hear.
Despite almost solid opposition from his senior advisers, Kennedy quickly embraced the Soviet offer.
“This is a pretty good play of his,” Kennedy said, according to a tape recording that he made secretly of the Cabinet Room meeting.
Kennedy had deployed the Jupiters in March of the year, causing a stream of angry outbursts from Khrushchev.
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“Most people will think this is a rather even trade and we ought to take advantage of it,” Kennedy said. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was the first to endorse the missile swap but others continued to oppose the offer. Finally, Kennedy ended the debate.
“We can’t very well invade Cuba with all its toil and blood,” Kennedy said, “when we could have gotten them out by making a deal on the same missiles on Turkey. If that’s part of the record, then you don’t have a very good war.”
Kennedy immediately responded to Khrushchev’s letter, issuing a statement calling it “an important and constructive contribution to peace”. He continued this with a formal letter:
“I consider my letter to you of October twenty-seventh and your reply of today as firm undertakings on the part of both our governments which should be promptly carried out… The U.S. will make a statement in the framework of the Security Council in reference to Cuba as follows: it will declare that the United States of America will respect the inviolability of Cuban borders, its sovereignty, that it take the pledge not to interfere in internal affairs, not to intrude themselves and not to permit our territory to be used as a bridgehead for the invasion of Cuba, and will restrain those who would plan to carry an aggression against Cuba, either from US territory or from the territory of other countries neighboring to Cuba.”
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The U.S. continued the blockade; in the following days, aerial reconnaissance proved that the Soviets were making progress in removing the missile systems. The 42 missiles and their support equipment were loaded onto eight Soviet ships.
On Nov. 2, 1962, Kennedy addressed the U.S. via radio and television broadcasts regarding the dismantlement process of the Soviet R-12 missile bases located in the Caribbean region. The ships would leave Cuba on November 5 to 9. The U.S. made a final visual check as each of the ships passed the blockade line.
Further diplomatic efforts were required to remove the Soviet Il-28 bombers, and they were loaded on three Soviet ships on December 5 and 6. Concurrent with the Soviet commitment to the Il-28s, the U.S. government announced the end of the blockade from 6:45 p.m. EST on Nov. 20, 1962.
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At the time when the Kennedy administration thought that the Cuban Missile Crisis was resolved, nuclear tactical rockets stayed in Cuba since they were not part of the Kennedy-Khrushchev understanding and the Americans did not know about them.
The Soviets changed their minds, fearing possible future Cuban militant steps, and on November 22, 1962, Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union Anastas Mikoyan told Castro that the rockets with the nuclear warheads were being removed as well.
In his negotiations with Dobrynin, Robert Kennedy informally proposed that the Jupiter missiles in Turkey would be removed “within a short time after this crisis was over.” Under an operation code-named Operation Pot Pie, the removal of the Jupiters from Italy and Turkey began on Apr. 1, 1963, and was completed by Apr 24, 1963.
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The initial plans were to recycle the missiles for use in other programs, but NASA and the USAF were not interested in retaining the missile hardware. The missile bodies were destroyed on site, and warheads, guidance packages, and launching equipment worth $14 million were returned to the United States.
Because the withdrawal of the Jupiter missiles from NATO bases in Italy and Turkey was not made public at the time, Khrushchev appeared to have lost the conflict and become weakened. The perception was that Kennedy had won the contest between the superpowers and that Khrushchev had been humiliated. Both Kennedy and Khrushchev took every step to avoid full conflict despite pressures from their respective governments.
