Part one of term paper
The Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest the world ever came to nuclear war. The United States armed forces were at their highest state of readiness ever, and Soviet field commanders in Cuba were prepared to use battlefield nuclear weapons to defend the island if it was invaded. In 1962, the Soviet Union was desperately behind the United Stat ...

Part two of term paper
... and provide a real deterrent to a U.S. attack against the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, Fidel Castro was looking for a way to defend his island nation from an attack by the U.S. Ever since the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, Castro felt a second attack was inevitable. He approved of Khrushchev's plan to place missiles on the island. For the United States, the crisis began on October 15, 1962 when reconnaissance photographs revealed Soviet missiles under construction in Cuba. Kennedy organized t ...