Cuba Almost Became a Nuclear Power in 1962 - Foreign Policy

Cuba Almost Became a Nuclear Power in 1962

The scariest moment in history was even scarier than we thought.

BY SVETLANA SAVRANSKAYA | Foreign Policy, October 10, 2012

Cuba would have become the first nuclear power in Latin America 50 years ago, if not for the dynamics captured in this remarkable verbatim transcript -- published here for the first time -- of Fidel Castro's excruciating meeting with Soviet deputy prime minister Anastas Mikoyan, on November 22, 1962. The document comes from the personal archive of his son, the late Sergo Mikoyan, which was donated to theNational Security Archive and which appears for the first time in English this month in the new book, The Soviet Cuban Missile Crisis.

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Long after the world thought the Cuban Missile Crisis had ended, with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev's withdrawal of his medium-range nuclear missiles announced on October 28 -- and two days after President John F. Kennedy announced the lifting of the quarantine around Cuba -- the secret crisis still simmered. Unknown to the Americans, the Soviets had brought some 100 tactical nuclear weapons to Cuba -- 80 nuclear-armed front cruise missiles (FKRs), 12 nuclear warheads for dual-use Luna short-range rockets, and 6 nuclear bombs for IL-28 bombers. Even with the pullout of the strategic missiles, the tacticals would stay, and Soviet documentation reveals the intention of training the Cubans to use them.

But Fidel Castro was livid. Khrushchev had not consulted or even informed Castro about any deals with the Americans -- Fidel heard about the missile withdrawal from the radio. The Cuban leader refused to go along with any onsite inspections in Cuba, and raised further demands. The Soviets had their own Cuban crisis: They had to take back what the Americans called the "offensive weapons," get the U.S. to confirm its non-invasion pledge, and most importantly, keep Cuba as an ally. At the Soviet Presidium, everyone agreed only one man could achieve such a resolution: Anastas Mikoyan.

Mikoyan arrived in Cuba on November 2, 1962, and over 20 days of often-bitter conversations with Cuban leaders -- culminating in this tense meeting -- Mikoyan began to appreciate the danger tactical nuclear weapons posed if they were left on the island, especially in Cuban hands. On one day, Castro would refuse to see Mikoyan; on another, Fidel would order his anti-aircraft crews to shoot at the American surveillance planes.

The final straw apparently came on November 20, when Castro sent instructions to Cuba's representative at the United Nations, Carlos Lechuga, to mention "we have tactical nuclear weapons, which we should keep" -- partly as leverage in negotiations over inspections, also to establish the fact that the weapons were in Cuban possession. Extremely worried, Mikoyan cabled the Soviet Presidium that he now planned to inform the Cuban leader that all tactical nuclear weapons would be withdrawn from Cuba. Mikoyan had to break this unpleasant news to his hosts, and he had to do it in such a way that they would remain Soviet allies.

This four-hour conversation on November 22 provided the final blow to the Cuban revolutionaries, now that the Soviet Union was removing all the weapons for which Cuba had to suffer so much. Castro opened the conversation saying that he was in a bad mood because Kennedy stated in his speech that all nuclear weapons were removed from Cuba, but surely the tacticals were still on the island. Mikoyan confirmed that "the Soviet government has not given any promises regarding the removal of the tactical nuclear weapons. The Americans do not even have any information that they are in Cuba." But the Soviet government itself, said Mikoyan, not under U.S. pressure, has now decided to take them back.

Castro's mood only got worse. Now the tacticals were coming out. Already the Soviets had given in to American pressure on the IL-28 bombers (technically the bombers could reach Florida so they qualified as "offensive" and they were nuclear capable). Mikoyan tried to persuade Castro that "as far as Il-28s are concerned, you know yourself that they are outdated. Presently, it is best to use them as a target plane." Castro retorts: "And why did you send them to us then?"

Castro was very emotional and at times rough with Mikoyan -- he criticized the Soviet military for failing to camouflage the missiles, for not using their anti-aircraft launchers to shoot down U.S. U-2 spy planes, essentially allowing them to photograph the sites. He went back to the initial offer of missiles and stated that the Cubans did not want the missiles, they only accepted the weapons as part of "fulfilling their duty to the socialist camp." The Cubans were ready to die in a nuclear war and were hoping that the Soviet Union would be also willing "to do the same for us." But the Soviets did not treat the Cubans as a partner, they caved in under U.S. pressure, and did not even consult the Cubans about the withdrawal. Castro expressed the humiliation the Cubans felt: "What do you think we are? A zero on the left, a dirty rag. We tried to help the Soviet Union to get out of a difficult situation."

In desperation, Castro almost begged Mikoyan to leave the tactical warheads in Cuba, especially because the Americans were not aware of them and they were not part of the agreement between Kennedy and Khrushchev. Castro claimed that the situation now was even worse than it was before the crisis -- Cuba was defenseless, and the U.S. non-invasion assurances did not mean much for the Cubans. But Mikoyan rejected Castro's pleas and cited a (nonexistent) Soviet law proscribing the transfer of nuclear weapons to third countries. Castro had a suggestion: "So you have a law that prohibits transfer of tactical nuclear weapons to other countries? It's a pity. And when are you going to repeal that law?" Mikoyan was non-committal: "We will see. It is our right [to do so]."

This ended Cuba's hope to become a Latin American nuclear power.

Ironically, if the Cubans were a little more pliant, and a little less independent, if they were more willing to be Soviet pawns, they would have kept the tactical nuclear weapons on the island. But they showed themselves to be much more than just a parking lot for the Soviet missiles. Cuba was a major independent variable of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Mikoyan treated his Cuban hosts with great empathy and respect, while being highly critical of his own political and military leadership. He admired the genuine character of the Cuban revolution, he saw its appeal for Latin America. But he also saw the danger of the situation spiraling out of control probably better than other leaders in this tense triangle, and thus brought about the final resolution of the crisis.

The following transcript was prepared by a Soviet note-taker, with the Soviet ambassador to Cuba, Alexandr Alexeyev, translating for Mikoyan.

Mikoyan Castro Memcon 11 22 62.PDF

Svetlana Savranskaya is director of Russia programs at the National Security Archive, George Washington University. Her new book, with the late Sergo Mikoyan, is The Soviet Cuban Missile Crisis: Castro, Mikoyan, Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Missiles of November (Stanford CA/Washington DC: Stanford University Press/Wilson Center Press, 2012).

Foreign Policy parte para a Defesa: nova pagina sobre National Security

Introducing FP National Security

Here's what's inside our new channel.

BY SUSAN GLASSER | Foreign Policy, September 5, 2012

Foreign Policy's newest channel is our most ambitious yet, a robust new daily website within our website. Each day we'll feature an array of original reporting, insight, and analysis -- with the same sharp sensibility you're used to on the rest of ForeignPolicy.com, but with a deeper dive on all things national security, from nukes to spooks, cyberwar to the Pentagon's budget wars. We'll cover the ins and outs of how national security decisions are being made -- and, just as importantly, who is making them. And of course, we'll cover the global world of threats, from today's flash points to tomorrow's.

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We've lined up a distinguished group of writers and thinkers, reporters and bloggers for FP National Security -- from Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author Thomas E. Ricks, whose blog"The Best Defense" is already one of FP's most-viewed attractions, to experienced Pentagon correspondents to columnists like Lt. Gen. David Barno (ret.), who commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan, and John Arquilla, the military theorist who coined the term "cyberwar" back in the 1990s. And we're delighted to announce that the site is being edited by Peter Scoblic, a former deputy staff director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and executive editor of the New Republic.

Today's launch brings a host of new regular features, starting each morning with Situation Report, a morning email briefing by veteran national security writer Gordon Lubold, which you can subscribe to here.  Other new blogs include The E-Ring, exclusive reporting inside the Pentagon's power corridors, and Killer Apps, a blog obsessively dedicated to covering the unfolding world of cyberwar. We'll stock them full of exclusive news and interviews you can't get anywhere else -- and showcase them alongside the world's best thinkers and authors on security subjects.

Today's launch edition of FP National Security features just that: An exclusive interview with Gen. John Allen, commander of U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan, in which he breaks news about the future of the surge troops at just the moment when a political debate has broken out back in Washington about this "forgotten war." A host of scoops on "Killer Apps," like the secret smart phone for top government officials being developed by the National Security Agency.  A newly declassified CIA document, published for the first time on FP National Security, reveals a remarkable secret mea culpa from the agency for its Iraq failures. Nuclear expert Jeffrey Lewisweighs in with the little-known saga of the B61, the nuclear bomb that costs more than its weight in solid gold -- so why, Lewis asks, are we planning to spend $10 billion to build 400 more of these nukes we'll never use. Plus: debut columns from Barno and Arquilla; Dmitri Trenin from Moscow on the reborn Russian military -- and why it's not just Mitt Romney worrying about it; andAmy Zegart on the Navy SEAL's kill-and-tell memoir, and what it tells us about the U.S. government's classification complex.

Here's a quick guide to the who, the what, and the how to follow FP National Security:

You can go directly to the channel here. 

You can follow us on Twitter. And Facebook.

You can sign up for Situation Report, our morning email, here.

Features include:

• "The E-Ring: Inside the Pentagon's Power Corridors" a daily, reported blog similar to "The Cable" in its focus on who the senior policymakers are and how they actually make policy. Think of it as a watercooler blog for the military, a way to keep track of who's in, who's out, and what's going on around the building. "The E-Ring" will be written by Kevin Baron, who comes to FP from National Journal, where he covered the business of war, and Stars and Stripes. Baron is vice president of the Pentagon Press Association.

• "Killer Apps: National Security in a Cyberage" will be a daily, reported blog covering the intersection of information technology and conflict-from America's cyberwarriors at the NSA and other agencies, to the vulnerabilities of U.S. infrastructure, to efforts to contain the threat. It will be written by John Reed, who previously edited Military.com's publication Defense Tech and covered trends in military aviation and the defense industry around the world for Defense News and Inside the Air Force.

• "The Best Defense" is FP's prize-winning military blog written by Thomas E. Ricks, the former Pentagon reporter for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Postwho has published several critically acclaimed books, including Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq and The Gamble: General Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006-2008. Ricks, a contributing editor to FP and a member of two Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting teams, is also a senior fellow at the bipartisan Center for a New American Security. The Best Defense won the digital National Magazine Award for best blog in 2010.

Regular columnists include:

• John Arquilla, expert on the future of warfare who coined the term "cyberwar" who is currently professor and chairman of the Department of Defense Analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School
• Gordon Adams, a professor of international relations at the School of International Service, American University, and a Distinguished Fellow at the Stimson Center.
• Lt. Gen. David Barno (ret.), who served as the commander of American forces in Afghanistan in 2003, and is now a senior advisor and senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security
• Rosa Brooks, who most recently served as counselor to the undersecretary of defense for policy and is currently a law professor at Georgetown University
• Jeffrey Lewis, the director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and editor of the oft-cited blog, Arms Control Wonk
• Robert Haddick, managing editor of the Small Wars Journal
• Amy Zegart, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and expert on the U.S. intelligence community and national security agencies. Her recent books include Eyes on Spies: Congress and the U.S. Intelligence Community, and Flawed by Design, a history of the CIA and National Security Council.
• Micah Zenko, the Douglas Dillon fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Zenko is an expert on America's use of drones and the author of Between Threats and War: U.S. Discrete Military Operations in the Post-Cold War World.

We hope to bring you more insightful coverage and ambitious scoops like this every day. So, welcome -- and please let us know what you think!

--Susan Glasser

2058) Nuclear Weapons and National Security - Carnegie Endowment

Nuclear Weapons and National Security — A New Strategy
George Perkovich
Carnegie Endowment Q&A, April 07, 2010

The Obama administration released a new nuclear arms strategy on Tuesday. The Nuclear Posture Review narrows the use of nuclear weapons and says that the primary role of the U.S. nuclear posture is to deter an attack on the United States and prevent nuclear proliferation and terrorism.

In a video Q&A, George Perkovich analyzes U.S. strategy, nuclear deterrence, and national security. Perkovich contends that the new policy reflects the reality we live in today and gives momentum to President Obama’s long-term goal of living in a world without nuclear weapons.

* What is the Nuclear Posture Review and how important is it?
* What are the key elements of the new report?
* How significantly did President Obama alter U.S. nuclear strategy?
* Does the new policy limit America’s nuclear deterrent?
* How does the NPR relate to Obama’s goal of moving toward a world without nuclear weapons?
* Why is the strategy controversial?
* Are disarmament advocates going to be disappointed by the NPR?
* How does the NPR set the stage for the new START agreement, Global Nuclear Security Summit, and Non-proliferation Treaty Review Conference?
* Does the new strategy influence how the U.S. can contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

What is the Nuclear Posture Review and how important is it?

The Nuclear Posture Review is a document required by the U.S. Congress, where the Secretary of Defense sends to Congress the administration’s overall view of nuclear weapons—the role that nuclear weapons play in U.S. national security policy, what they want to communicate to allies that we try to reassure with these weapons, and how they communicate to potential adversaries of the United States what the deterrent strategy of the United States is.

From that document then come instructions which the military uses to actually design the targeting options for nuclear weapons and the planning of the U.S. nuclear force posture. The posture review also in a sense sets out the requirements for nuclear weapons, which then has implications in the budgets of the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and has implications for the size of the infrastructure necessary to produce and maintain U.S. nuclear weapons.

So it’s your kind of your basic operating system for nuclear weapons.

What are the key elements of the new report?

The new posture review departs from the one that the Bush administration did early in its term in several ways. One, the Obama one says that the primary objective or concern of U.S. nuclear posture is to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons to other states and to prevent the use of nuclear weapons by terrorists. This is interesting because past administrations have said these are very important things, but it’s not part of our nuclear policy and our nuclear posture.

The administration also says very clearly that the goal of the United States is ultimately to have a world without nuclear weapons and acknowledges we’re far from that possibility today, but that it is an objective and therefore that the United States will try to lead the world in reducing the role of nuclear weapons in everyone’s national security policy.

So, the United States would try to lead by example and, as much as possible, to reduce reliance on nuclear weapons in U.S. security, but also to then encourage and put pressure on others to do the same.

So those are two kind of interesting changes in priority, in a sense, of this posture.

How significantly did President Obama alter U.S. nuclear strategy?

Actually, the Bush administration got an unfair criticism. People around the world didn’t like the administration for a lot of reasons, and they basically interpreted the Bush administration’s strategy as somehow increasing the reliance by the United States on nuclear weapons and lowering the threshold that would decide whether the United States would use nuclear weapons. Neither of those was true.

The Bush administration also sought to reduce the role of nuclear weapons and I would argue that the Obama posture review extends what was already a process begun by the Bush administration and it extends it in ways reflecting the realities of the world.

The United States has greater conventional, non-nuclear military capabilities. It’s fought a couple of wars since the last posture review in Iraq and Afghanistan. These are major wars, cost more than a trillion dollars, and it’s obvious to everyone that we would never use nuclear weapons in these situations. They’re irrelevant, basically, and we have lots of other needs that need to be concentrated upon and fulfilled.

And so, this posture review reflects what the military understands, which is that it’s almost impossible to imagine a circumstance—other than a nuclear attack by a major state against the United States—where the United States would threaten to use nuclear weapons and so we ought to have a policy that reflects that reality.

Does the new policy limit America’s nuclear deterrent?

If you ask, how would the United States interpret it if a competitor makes declarations about its nuclear posture. Let’s say Russia for example. If the Russians came out and said, “Americans trust us, we won’t use nuclear weapons against you.”

Do you think the U.S. government, Congress, and the military are just going to take that at face value and say well the Russians said they won’t use nuclear weapons against us therefore let’s forget about the thousands of nuclear weapons that they have. No. You want to look at what their capabilities are, you want to look at scenarios—you want to be real.

Similarly, what the United States actually says in terms of whether or not it’s beating its chest and saying to the world out there, don’t you dare doing anything to us or we will nuke you. That they would take that seriously and as gospel is strange credulity. But similarly if we said to our potential adversaries, don't worry we’re past nuclear weapons. We still have a couple thousand of them, but don’t worry we’re nice guys. They won’t believe that either.

What they are looking at is what capabilities you have, the scenarios they can imagine of conflict, and the basic reality that if the United States was threatened in a fundamental way, it’s existence was threatened, an extreme threat or one of its allies like Japan was threatened that way, the other guy knows that if we have nuclear weapons and that’s the only thing we can use to defeat the other guy, that’s what we’re going to do.

So it doesn't matter so much what we say about it, it’s that capability and that context that will determine whether a state is deterred or not.

How does the NPR relate to Obama’s goal of moving toward a world without nuclear weapons?

This posture review states in many places that the goal of the United States is to move toward a world without nuclear weapons. It’s not unilateral, the United States is not going to get rid of its nuclear weapons alone. And it states clearly that as long as others have weapons, the United States will have to retain them and we will have to retain them in a safe and reliable manner.

But it does commit to this goal. It says if others want to work with us, we’re prepared to go there. It very specifically, for example, invites Russia and China—the two main potential competitors of the United States in a nuclear sphere—to further strategic dialogue, to further develop common understanding, so we can avoid any offensive nuclear competition, but actually move to reduce the role of these weapons in each of our cases. And to make sure that we have stable relations so that we don’t get into a crisis that could lead to a nuclear war or the threat of a nuclear war.

So that’s very important in the posture, that invitation to Russia and China to reduce the role of nuclear weapons.

Why is the strategy controversial?

I don’t think this is going to be controversial. There may be people on the far right who don’t like it, but in many cases they don’t understand reality, whether it was under the Bush administration or any previous administration. If you don’t understand the reality that, since 1945, we haven’t used nuclear weapons, no one has used nuclear weapons in anger, that every president has understood that this is a taboo that they don’t want to cross and that we don't make nuclear threats idly. You have to understand that and many people don’t.

You also have to understand that U.S. military doesn’t want to use nuclear weapons, doesn't feel that it would need to use nuclear weapons, and that we have enough conventional military capabilities to deter any rational actor from threatening us. The statements in this posture review don't really change all of that. There is some reassurance to adversaries, but it’s not the United States unilaterally giving up military power.

On the left, it will be criticized because they will argue that the President doesn’t go far enough to say that the only purpose for nuclear weapons is to deter the use of nuclear weapons by others.

So the posture review says, look we want to move to that point of saying the only way in which we would consider using nuclear weapons is to retaliate to a nuclear attack. But states may develop biological weapon capabilities in the future and so we may then face a massive threat that is non-nuclear and so we would reserve this option. And more importantly today, we have some allies that we care greatly about, including South Korea, who worry that they face an adversary, in this case North Korea, that could threaten them with massive artillery attacks because the distance between Seoul and North Korea is very slight.

And our ally South Korea might want us to still threaten North Korea with a nuclear response even though North Korea would be attacking South Korea conventionally. The U.S. military knows that we can defeat North Korea without nuclear weapons, but in order to reassure our ally South Korea we’re not saying quite that way. We’re leaving the options fuzzier because this is reassuring to our ally South Korea.

Are disarmament advocates going to be disappointed by the NPR?

Some of the disarmament advocates around the world might be disappointed because people wanted President Obama to have a posture and declare that the only purpose is deter the use of nuclear weapons by others.

It’s very important to realize that this is the best posture review that the president and his administration thought could get the 67 votes in the U.S. Senate needed to ratify the START treaty.

On the one hand, you could have a posture review which says lovely things opposed to nuclear weapons that the disarmament community would applaud, but would in turn reduce the chances you could actually get a real treaty to reduce nuclear weapons ratified in the Senate.

So the administration decided to have a posture review that is conceived in terms of what we need to do to get votes in the Senate to actually implement reductions that can lead toward the future that disarmament advocates might want, even if our language now may disappoint them.

How does the NPR set the stage for the new START agreement, Global Nuclear Security Summit, and Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference?

The NPR is very important—it’s a document that will guide U.S. policy for the next five years. The new START treaty which will be signed in Prague on April 8 and hopefully ratified this year was already informed by the Nuclear Posture Review.

When the nuclear posture review was being drafted, the negotiators of the START treaty and the Pentagon and the military got together and said, here’s the basic parameters of what we’re going to talk about in START, in the Nuclear Posture Review that you are doing do you have any problem with us reducing to these levels. And the answer was no, we can maintain deterrence, the security of the United States is ensured at the levels that we are talking about with START. So in a way the posture review came before the START treaty even though it’s being announced only two days before the signing of the treaty.

Politically what all this means is that the President’s agenda that he announced a year ago in Prague of reducing the role of nuclear weapons now has the posture review which does that, the START treaty coming several days later which demonstrates it, the nuclear security summit in Washington on April 12-13 with the heads of more than 40 countries showing a commitment to try to keep nuclear material from terrorists (that’s the focus of the nuclear security summit).

All of which is meant to give momentum and show the seriousness of the United States as the review conference happens in May in New York with all the states in the nonproliferation treaty. So the United States is trying to say look, let’s keep the bargain where all of the rest of the world agrees not to get nuclear weapons and to work with us to keep nuclear weapons from terrorists and other states, because we are keeping our side of the bargain. We are doing everything we can to reduce the role of nuclear weapons and reduce the number of nuclear weapons.

We’re demonstrating that in April, you respond in kind in May.

Does the new strategy influence how the U.S. can contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

The NPR is not directed against Iran in any way. If you ask the U.S. military, we don’t need nuclear weapons to fight or deter Iran from committing the kind of aggression that militaries prevent. And even if Iran had a handful of nuclear weapons, the United States for the next decade at least is going to have thousands of strategic nuclear weapons as well as hundreds of shorter range nuclear weapons.

There is no nuclear equation with Iran and the U.S. military knows that even if people in the public or Congress say we may need to nuke Iran. That is not the way the military thinks about it.

What the posture review can help do though is encourage other countries to work with us to isolate Iran diplomatically, politically, and economically. With an understanding the United States is trying to be progressive or constructive in the way the rest of the world thinks about nuclear weapons.

And therefore we strengthen our persuasiveness in getting the rest of the world to be constructive with us as we deal with the kind of threats that Iran poses.