May 20 to 21, 1962: The Kremlin Casts Its Nuclear Dice

Twentieth in a Series Chronicling the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962

When we left Nikita Khrushchev on May 14 (), he had just arrived in Bulgaria on a week-long state visit.  

May 20: Persuading the Presidium

Khrushchev left Bulgaria for Moscow on May 20. In the course of his flight home, Khrushchev reportedly discussed his proposal to establish Soviet missile bases in Cuba with Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko.

Back in Moscow, Khrushchev spent the rest of the 20th pushing his Cuban nuclear solution with key members of the Presidium, the supreme Soviet ruling body.

May 21: Persuading the Defense Council

Exactly fifty years ago May 21, the discussion of the Cuban nuclear solution moved into the Soviet Defense Council (chaired by Khrushchev). Two policy objectives appeared to dominate the discussion: a) the desire to protect Cuba from a United States invasion; and b) an equally important desire to force the United States to listen—finally!—to Soviet demands. Soviet missiles in the Caribbean would wipe the arrogant sneers off the Americans’ faces! Now they would know how Khrushchev felt with those hated Jupiters aimed at him from Turkey!

According to General S. P. Ivanov of the General Staff, “This meeting went on a long time,” with Deputy Premier Mikoyan apparently the member most opposed to the missile deployment. Mikoyan thought that Khrushchev’s main assumptions were deeply flawed: a) that the USSR could conceal the missile deployment from the United States until after the Nov. 6 elections; and b) that, if the deployment was carried out successfully, the United States would accept the missiles’ presence as a fait accompli, just as the USSR had had to accept NATO’s missiles targeted on the USSR.

The Presidium “Agrees”

At the end of a long May 21, a majority of the Presidium wound up approving Khrushchev’s nuclear proposal. The only snag occurred when the secretaries from the Central Committee refused to sign the hastily composed agreement, claiming that this matter was out of their competence. After what Fursenko and Naftali call a “personal meeting” with Khrushchev, they signed, “allowing the decision to have been approved ‘unanimously.’ ”

The “Irrigation Experts” Head for Cuba

In keeping with his decision to carry out the missile deployment in strict secrecy, Khrushchev decided to dispatch a delegation of irrigation and land reclamation “experts” Cuba had earlier requested for help with agricultural problems. These irrigation experts would provide the necessary “cover” to the real mission, which would be carried out by Ambassador-designate Alekseev, Marshall Sergei Biryuzov, commander of the Soviet Rocket Forces, and General Ivanov of the General Staff.

Their job: to persuade Castro to accept the Soviet proposal to establish missile bases on Cuban soil.

To maintain secrecy, the military members would travel under false identities to disguise themselves and their true mission.

Next: The Soviet Military Takes Over

The next post will describe how the Soviet military proposed to implement Khrushchev’s nuclear solution to the Cuban problem.

Email the author at phufstader@sbcglobal.net or ask questions and post comments under this blog post.

Sources

For the events of 20 and 21 May I rely on Michael R. Beschloss, The Crisis Years: Kennedy and Khrushchev, 1960-1963. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1991, 385-390; and Aleksandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali, “One Hell of a Gamble.” Khrushchev, Castro and Kennedy, 1958-1964. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1997, 179-182.