Impact of the Cuban Missile Crisis!!! [Archive]

Sentinel

24th July 2008, 07:30

If you by 'impact' mean it's impact on the world political scene, that was quite an impact indeed. It has been said that the world was never closer to a World War III and a global nuclear holocaust, than during the Cuban crisis and especially during the conflict about nuclear missiles. This was one of the most important conflicts of the Cold War, even though it ended in a draw.

What happened was that the Cuban revolutionary leaders, brothers Fidel and Raul Castro and Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, finally set their revolution firmly in on the socialist path. The property of US owned companies was quickly nationalised to the tunes of the Internationale, the radical and open communist Che Guevara was made finance minister, and an open cooperation with the Warsaw Pact countries was initiated. In other words, they went against the interests of their superpower neighbour, the United States of America.

The US government was very displeased with Cuba transforming into what they regarded as a Socialist bloc bridgehead a few miles off the Floridan coast. These foremost representants -- and self appointed defenders -- of global capitalism also couldn't take the risk of facing the potential consequences of socialist revolution spreading in Latin America. The southwestern hemisphere was since a while back politically and economically speaking effectively under US suzerainty, and by Washington considered to be within it's 'sphere of interest'.

The US put an economic blockade, an embargo, on Cuba and thus shut them out of a great deal of trade. The USSR answered by agreeing to buy Cuban sugar, which is the island's main export product, to considerably high prices and providing Cuba with various kinds of assistance.

The US then funded a Gusano (anti-Castro exile cuban) mercenary company which attempted a counter-revolution by military means, by landing at Playa Giron. The cuban revolutionary forces under Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Jose Ramon Fernandez and others repelled the attack and took the invading counter revolutionaries prisoners, later to be traded against medicines and other vital supplies with the US. Che Guevara ironically told the US: 'Thanks for Playa Giron. Before the invasion, the revolution was weak. Now it's stronger than ever.'

Now the tensions were quite high, and the threat of the US was imminent on Cuba. This resulted in the Cubans starting negotiations with the USSR regarding military cooperation. They wanted to be assured of the support of the Red Army in case of a US invasion, and the USSR saw the strategic importance of a military base on the western hemisphere, so close to the US east coast. The USSR stationed ballistic nuclear missiles and other offensive equipment, and a considerable force of infantry on Cuba.

This resulted in an extremely heated top level correspondence between Washington and Moscow, which can be read at Marxists.org: Khrushchev history archive (http://marxists.org/archive/khrushchev/index.htm). Indeed, this was a moment when the world held it's breath -- a conflict between the superpowers could have resulted in the extinction of mankind due to a nuclear apocalypse.

The results?

Some Cold War disarmament, and the end to open US attempts to overhtrow the Cuban Revolution. The Warsaw Pact agreed to remove the missiles from Cuba -- in exchange of the NATO in turn removing theirs in Turkey, and promising not to invade Cuba.

The conflict between socialism and capitalism in Latin America didn't end though, but still goes on today. Ernesto Che Guevara went underground and started a period of socialist guerrilla warfare in Latin America. The achievements of the Cuban revolution continue in many aspects, the country having grown to have exceptional living standards, education levels and life expectancy for the region.

Despite failing to develop further on the path towards communism due to it's isolated position and capitalist aggression, as well as party bureaucracy typical to the Leninist model hindering the development of direct democracy, Cuba continues in many ways to be an example to follow for socialists around the world.