Allied and Soviet Tanks stand facing each other during the Checkpoint Charlie Crisis.
Cold War in 1960’s
1960’s were a tensed period in Cold War history. Competition between USSR and USA was seen in space research, missile development, arms production, sports. It was a war between Socialism and Capitalism. The amount of nuclear arsenals increased. In case of a nuclear war, there was a possibility of an all-out war due to mutual assured destruction. During this period, USSR almost overtook USA in terms of weapons and armory. There was an atmosphere of suspicion everywhere as no one knew who could be a possible defector or a spy. Due to the strict military nature of USSR, even trespassing airspace was dealt severely. The Soviet Union often shot down even non-Soviet passenger plane trespassing into its airspace illegally. Protecting its airspace was a huge challenge to the Soviet Government. US frequently conducted reconnaissance missions by flying spy planes over the USSR and US pilots successfully escaped the missile fire of Soviet SAM’s(Surface-Air Missiles) and were able to return to their bases in Pakistan comfortably. India had good relations with the USSR. Taking advantage of the India-Pakistan rivalry in the Indian subcontinent, US developed good relations with Pakistan and also built many air bases to frequently fly spy planes over the Southern Central republics of USSR namely Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Krgyzhtan and Uzbekistan.
McNamara and Kennedy during the EXCOMM meeting.
Checkpoint Charlie Crisis
After the end of World War II in Europe, Nazi Germany was divided into four occupation zones per the Potsdam Agreement, each one controlled by the then Allied powers, Americans, British, French and the Soviets. Berlin was the seat of the Allied Control Council. It was also subdivided into four sectors despite the city lying deep inside the Soviet zone of occupation. Although the occupying powers originally intended to jointly govern Germany within its postwar borders, the advent of Cold War tensions caused the French, British and American zones to be formed into the Federal Republic of Germany (and West Berlin) in 1949, excluding the Soviet zone, which then formed the German Democratic Republic (East Berlin).
On 13th August 1961, East German Government started the construction of Berlin Wall. Anyone trying to defect or cross the border was shot. The construction of the Wall had caused considerable hardship to families divided by it. West Germany was ruled by a capitalist government while East Germany was a socialist state with a planned economy.
Tensions between USSR and USA grew again during Checkpoint Charlie Crisis. Checkpoint Charlie was a check post between the CCCP and USA since the partition of Germany. Shortly after the erection of the Berlin Wall, a standoff occurred between U.S. and Soviet tanks on either side of Checkpoint Charlie. It began on 22nd October due to a dispute over whether East German guards were authorized to examine the travel documents of a U.S. diplomat passing through to East Berlin. By October 27th, 10 Soviet and an equal number of American tanks stood 100 meters apart on either side of the checkpoint. The number of Allied tanks increased soon.
The Kennedy Administration gathers to discuss the next move as Soviet threat looms overhead.
Soviet Generals made an immediate response by sending more tanks to the checkpoint. Seeing the Soviet deployment, the Allied tanks backed up. For approximately 22 hours, the world was tensed as these two giants stood against each other waiting for a chance to start a war. The entire USSR was in red-alert for a possible nuclear war in case of an escalated crisis. The next day evening, an American tank backed a few meters. Immediately, a Soviet tank backed for a few meters. Likewise, all tanks backed up thus saving the day again.
Meanwhile a year later, US secretly installed Missile launchers in Turkey targeting Moscow. This alarmed the USSR considerably and the Soviet Union counteracted by installing nuclear-tipped missiles in Cuba. The then Cuban leader Fidel Castro assisted the Soviet Government to counteract the US threat. The tensed moment was yet to come! The photographs taken by US spy planes over Cuba indicated Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles. The Cuban Missile crisis was taking shape. The remaining 14 days were a tensed period as USSR threatened to hit back strongly for US deployment of missiles in Turkey. Do you think anyone would be hatching eggs if someone tries to act smart?
President Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Soviet ships carrying nuclear missiles were seen moving towards Cuba. The then President John F. Kennedy ordered for a blockade of Russian (Soviet) ships. Though Russia was a part of the USSR, Soviet Union was often considered as the synecdoche of Russia. Blockade is an act of war. Kennedy felt that the USSR might not retaliate if the ships were blocked. The news was given to the press about possible Soviet first strike on US. But the sad news is that US deployment of nuclear missiles in Turkey to hit USSR was kept low. When USSR claimed the fact, no one believed.
U-2 plan shot down by Cuban forces.
Meanwhile, different things were happening inside a Soviet submarine. On October 27, 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, a group of eleven United States Navy destroyers and the aircraft carrier USS Randolph trapped a nuclear-armed Soviet Foxtrot class submarine B-59 near Cuba and started dropping practice depth charges, explosives intended to force the submarine to come to the surface for identification. Allegedly, the captain of the submarine, Valentin Grigorievitch Savitsky, believing that a war between USSR and USA might already have started, prepared to launch a retaliatory nuclear-tipped torpedo.
Three officers on board the submarine — Savitsky, Political Officer Ivan Semonovich Maslennikov and Second Captain Arkhipov — were authorized to launch the torpedo if they agreed unanimously in favour of doing so. An argument broke out among the three, in which only Arkhipov was against the launch, eventually persuading Savitsky to surface the submarine and await orders from Moscow. The nuclear warfare which presumably would have ensued was thus averted.
At the conference commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis held in Havana on 13 October 2002, Robert McNamara admitted that nuclear war had come much closer than people had thought. Thomas Blanton, director of the National Security Archive, said that "a guy called Vasili Arkhipov saved the world."
US forces landed in Cuba to overthrow the Fidel Castro government. US Airforce constantly bombarded Cuba, but failed to overthrow the Castro Government. US forces were defeated in the Bay of Pigs episode. After 14 tensed days, US agreed to withdraw the missiles in Turkey. But this was never exposed to the outside world. When USSR withdrew the missiles from Cuba, it again caused an embarrassment to the upper echelons of the Soviet Union as it was viewed as if the Russians were backing up after starting a crisis on their own. Nikita Khrushchev was blamed heavily of poor handling of the crisis and was later ousted. He was replaced by Leonid Breznev as the General Secretary.
