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Chuck Loebbaka
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The world can now hear history in the making during one of the most important events of the cold war -- the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis -- on the World Wide Web.
Recordings made in the Oval Office 35 years ago -- President Kennedy's personal recollections, conversations with his advisers, and meetings with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and members of the President's executive committee -- can be heard on a Web site produced by Jerry Goldman, associate professor of political science at Northwestern University.
Goldman said, "This is the only audio source except for the John F. Kennedy Library where people can learn how President Kennedy and his advisers debated the crisis in secret, a secret that was kept for seven days before Kennedy went on television Oct. 22 to announce that the Soviet Union was building secret missile bases in Cuba, 90 miles off Florida."
The conversations, which discuss bombing the nuclear missile sites, a Naval quarantine of Cuba and the threat of nuclear war with Russia, can be accessed at http://oyez.nwu.edu/history-out-loud/jfk/cuban.
The Cuban Missile Crisis is the newest addition to Goldman's U.S History Out Loud site on the Web; other items on the site are audio material from Presidential libraries and other archives on Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Lyndon Baines Johnson and Bill Clinton, Winston Churchill and Secretary of State George Marshall. Goldman's work on U.S. History Out Loud and his other Web site, is intended to provide scholars, students and the general public with a living history of the major events and institutions that shape American political life.
Listening to the audio files requires RealAudio Player software, which is available from RealAudio http://www.real.com. The Cuban Missile Crisis tapes are unedited digital copies of materials released by the John F. Kennedy Library a year ago. The recordings were made using early technology (Dictabelt and similar devices). Microphones and their placement add some noise and distortion to the tapes.
"But the calm, careful deliberations by Kennedy and his advisers on how to prevent a war come through clearly in the days that the United States and Russia teetered on the brink of a nuclear holocaust," Goldman said.
"The recordings put listeners in the Oval Office as Kennedy wrestles with whether to launch air strikes against the missiles as advocated by some advisers or, as he finally decided, to implement a Naval blockade and demand that Russian Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev remove all the missile bases and their deadly contents," Goldman said.
As the crisis team discussed options in the Oval Office, the American people stocked up on food and supplies, bought guns for protection, practiced civil defense drills and waited to see which of the two superpowers, if either, would blink first in the standoff.
Most young adults and older people who followed the crisis in 1962 remember vividly the first real threat of nuclear annihilation. But young children have faint memories of that time. They and others born after 1962 have only books and an occasional television program to learn about the critical two weeks in American history.
For them and others, Goldman has included on the Web site an extensive narrative that is a history of the crisis, from the time a U2 plane photographed missile sites in Cuba (Oct. 15) to the day Khrushchev announces that the missiles are being dismantled (Oct. 29). The narrative adds texture and context to the voices on the audio segments -- the voices of the U.S. government and military officials who played key roles in the crisis planning.
Here are some of the voices of key players on Goldman's Web site, the men whose decisions affected the lives of millions and the Cold War between the two superpowers.
* President Kennedy, stating that an air strike would neutralize the missiles in Cuba, but would likely force the USSR to take Berlin (a hot spot in U.S.-Soviet relations) -- "which leaves me only one alternative which is to fire nuclear weapons - which is a hell of an alternative -- to begin a nuclear exchange."
* Robert Kennedy, telling his brother that he had no choice but to take action in response to the Soviet missiles in Cuba, says, "You would have been impeached. " The President responds, "That's what I think, I would have been impeached."
* Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara: Talking about possible American responses to Soviet ships moving toward the quarantine line and further negotiations at the UN, comments, "I don't think we have weakened the forceful position that will lead to removal of the missile sites by letting the Bucharest (a Soviet ship) through."
* National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy, commenting on the quarantine: "Nothing in your (the President's) speech requires you to stop any ship, even if it is found to contain offensive cargo we deem unacceptable. The way in which we define this is our business."
* Former ambassador to Moscow, Llewellyn Thompson, analyzing Khrushchev's Oct. 24 letter, suggests "Soviet preparation for resistance by force -- that is -- forcing us to take forceful action."
* CIA director John McCone, arguing vigorously that the U.S. should not drop the quarantine until these weapons, "pointed at our hearts," are removed.
* Vice President Lyndon Johnson, commenting on Russia's demands that the U.S. remove its missiles from Turkey, says, "If you're willing to give up your missiles in Turkey -- why don't you...make the trade there and save all the invasion, lives and everything else?"
Other voices heard in 11 different audio tapes on Goldman's Web site include Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman General Maxwell Taylor, Air Force Chief of Staff Curtis LeMay and Secretary of State Dean Rusk. While most of those who advised Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis have died in the last 35 years, the legacy of what they did at a turning point in history is now available in their own words at the U.S History Out Loud site on the Web.
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