By this time, the relaxed, lighter mood had completely disappeared. It had taken only a few minutes.
President Kennedy expressed his deep concern that no error should occur, and that any attack against one of our planes be verified before we return the attack. He asked about the fate of pilots who might be shot down. He then asked Secretary McNamara to put into effect a rescue mission to supplement our U-2 flights. He agreed with Secretary McNamara on extending certain military-personnel tours of duty and on placing the 101st Airborne in readiness for early action. He wanted to make certain that we would have taken all the necessary steps, in case of a military reaction by the Soviets.
“Now, the only thing I say once again is that if the Russians’ response makes a military action or invasion inevitable, I want to be able to feel that we will not have to waste any days having to get ready,” he said.
At the end of the meeting, the President pointed out that an attack on one of their installations might very well bring an attack against our airfields. He asked for a report from the military as to whether our own planes had been dispersed. When it was reported to him that our photography showed that the Russians and Cubans had inexplicably lined up their planes wing tip to wing tip on Cuban airfields, making them perfect targets, he requested General Taylor to have a U-2 fly a photographic mission over our fields in Florida. “It would be interesting if we have done the same thing,” he remarked. We had. He examined the pictures the next day and ordered the Air Force to disperse our planes.
Finally, he made arrangements for regular meetings with ambassadors from the European countries, to prepare for a blockade of Berlin, as well as other contingencies elsewhere. Nothing, whether a weighty matter or small detail, was overlooked.
We came back about 6:00 that evening. The OAS had announced its support, and the President prepared the proclamation which would put the quarantine into effect at 10:00 the next morning.
During the course of this meeting, we learned that an extraordinary number of coded messages had been sent to all the Russian ships on their way to Cuba. What they said we did not know then, nor do we know now, but it was clear that the ships as of that moment were still straight on course.
The President composed a letter to Khrushchev, asking him to observe the quarantine legally established by a vote of the OAS, making it clear that the U.S. did not wish to fire on any ships of the Soviet Union, and adding at the end: “I am concerned that we both show prudence and do nothing to allow events to make the situation more difficult to control than it is.”
We then discussed in detail the rules that were to be given to the Navy intercepting a merchant vessel in the quarantine zone. To avoid a major military confrontation if a vessel refused to stop, the Navy was to shoot at its rudders and propellers, disabling the vessel but, hopefully, avoiding any loss of life or the sinking of the ship. The President then expressed concern about the boarding of these vessels if the Russians decided to resist. We could anticipate a rough, fierce fight and many casualties, he said. Secretary McNamara felt the vessel might not have to be boarded but would, within a reasonably short period of time, have to be towed into Jacksonville or Charleston.
“What would you do then,” the President said, “if we go through all of this effort and then find out there’s baby food on it?” Everyone agreed that we should try to intercept the vessels on which there was quite clearly military equipment, but the treatment of other vessels in the meantime posed a serious problem. What criteria could we use for letting some merchant ships through and stopping others? And then how could we be sure?
Our problems for that day were hardly over. John McCone reported that Russian submarines were beginning to move into the Caribbean. One had refueled the day before in the Azores and was headed now toward Cuba. The President ordered the Navy to give the highest priority to tracking the submarines and to put into effect the greatest possible safety measures to protect our own aircraft carriers and other vessels.
After the meeting, the President, Ted Sorensen, Kenny O’Donnell, and I sat in his office and talked. “The great danger and risk in all of this,” he said, “is a miscalculation—a mistake in judgment.” A short time before, he had read Barbara Tuchman’s book The Guns of August, and he talked about the miscalculations of the Germans, the Russians, the Austrians, the French, and the British. They somehow seemed to tumble into war, he said, through stupidity, individual idiosyncrasies, misunderstandings, and personal complexes of inferiority and grandeur. We talked about the miscalculation of the Germans in 1939 and the still unfulfilled commitments and guarantees that the British had given to Poland.
Neither side wanted war over Cuba, we agreed, but it was possible that either side could take a step that—for reasons of “security” or “pride” or “face”—would require a response by the other side, which, in turn, for the same reasons of security, pride, or face, would bring about a counterresponse and eventually an escalation into armed conflict. That was what he wanted to avoid. He did not want anyone to be able to say that the U.S. had not done all it could to preserve the peace. We were not going to misjudge, or miscalculate, or challenge the other side needlessly, or precipitously push our adversaries into a course of action that was not intended or anticipated.
Afterward, the President and I talked for a little while alone. He suggested I might visit Ambassador Dobrynin and personally relate to him the serious implications of the Russians’ duplicity and the crisis they had created through the presence of their missiles within Cuba.
“I met with Dobrynin…”
I CALLED DOBRYNIN and made arrangements to see him at 9:30 that same Tuesday night. I met with him in his office on the third floor of the Russian Embassy. I reviewed with him the circumstances of the past six weeks which had brought about this confrontation. I pointed out to him that when I had met with him in early September, he had told me that the Russians had not placed any long-range missiles in Cuba and had no intentions of doing so in the future.
He interrupted at that moment and said that was exactly what he had told me and that he had given me his word that the Soviet Union would not put missiles in Cuba that could reach the continental United States.
I said that, based on that statement and the subsequent statement by Tass, the Soviet news agency, the President had taken a less belligerent attitude toward the Soviet Union’s actions than other political figures in the U.S. and assured the American people that military action was not necessary against Cuba. Now the President knew he had been deceived, and that had devastating implications for the peace of the world.
Dobrynin’s only answer was that he told me there were no missiles in Cuba; that this was what Khrushchev had said, and, as far as he knew, there were still no missiles in Cuba. He then asked me why President Kennedy had not told Gromyko the facts when he had seen him the previous Thursday.
I replied by saying there was nothing the President could tell Gromyko that Gromyko didn’t already know—and, after all, why didn’t Gromyko tell the President? In fact, the President was shocked that Gromyko’s statements even at that late date were so misleading. Dobrynin was extremely concerned. As I left, I asked him if the Soviet ships were going to go through to Cuba. He replied that that had been their instructions and he knew of no changes.
I left the Russian Embassy around 10:15 P.M. and went back to the White House. I found the President meeting Ambassador David Ormsby-Gore of Great Britain, an old friend whom he trusted implicitly. I related the conversation to both of them. The President talked about the possibility of arranging an immediate summit with Khrushchev, but finally dismissed the idea, concluding that such a meeting would be useless until Khrushchev first accepted, as a result of our deeds as well as our statements, the U.S. determination in this matter. Before a summit took place, and it should, the President wanted to have some cards in his own hands.
Ambassador Ormsby-Gore expressed concern that the line of interception for the quarantine had been extended 800 miles
. This would mean a probable interception within a very few hours after it was put into effect. “Why not give them more time,” he said, “to analyze their position?” The 800 miles had been fixed by the Navy to stay outside the range of some of the MIG fighters in Cuba. The President called McNamara and shortened it to five hundred miles.
The next morning, Wednesday, the quarantine went into effect, and the reports during the early hours told of the Russian ships coming steadily on toward Cuba. I talked with the President for a few moments before we went in to our regular meeting. He said, “It looks really mean, doesn’t it? But then, really there was no other choice. If they get this mean on this one in our part of the world, what will they do on the next?” “I just don’t think there was any choice,” I said, “and not only that, if you hadn’t acted, you would have been impeached.” The President thought for a moment and said, “That’s what I think—I would have been impeached.”
The choice was to have gone in and taken steps which were not necessary or to have acted as we did. At least we now had the support of the whole Western Hemisphere and all our allies around the world.
This Wednesday-morning meeting, along with that of the following Saturday, October 27, seemed the most trying, the most difficult, and the most filled with tension. The Russian ships were proceeding, they were nearing the five-hundred-mile barrier, and we either had to intercept them or announce we were withdrawing. I sat across the table from the President. This was the moment we had prepared for, which we hoped would never come. The danger and concern that we all felt hung like a cloud over us all and particularly over the President.
The U-2s and low-flying planes had returned the previous day with their film, and through the evening it was analyzed—by now in such volume that the film alone was more than twenty-five miles long. The results were presented to us at the meeting. The launching pads, the missiles, the concrete boxes, the nuclear storage bunkers, all the components were there, by now clearly defined and obvious. Comparisons with the pictures of a few days earlier made clear that the work on those sites was proceeding and that within a few days several of the launching pads would be ready for war.
It was now a few minutes after 10:00. Secretary McNamara announced that two Russian ships, the Gagarin and the Komiles, were within a few miles of our quarantine barrier. The interception of both ships would probably be before noon Washington time. Indeed, the expectation was that at least one of the vessels would be stopped and boarded between 10:30 and 11:00.
Then came the disturbing Navy report that a Russian submarine had moved into position between the two ships.
It had originally been planned to have a cruiser make the first interception, but, because of the increased danger, it was decided in the past few hours to send in an aircraft carrier supported by helicopters, carrying antisubmarine equipment, hovering overhead. The carrier Essex was to signal the submarine by sonar to surface and identify itself. If it refused, said Secretary McNamara, depth charges with a small explosive would be used until the submarine surfaced.
I think these few minutes were the time of gravest concern for the President. Was the world on the brink of a holocaust? Was it our error? A mistake? Was there something further that should have been done? Or not done? His hand went up to his face and covered his mouth. He opened and closed his fist. His face seemed drawn, his eyes pained, almost gray. We stared at each other across the table. For a few fleeting seconds, it was almost as though no one else was there and he was no longer the President.
Inexplicably, I thought of when he was ill and almost died; when he lost his child; when we learned that our oldest brother had been killed; of personal times of strain and hurt. The voices droned on, but I didn’t seem to hear anything until I heard the President say: “Isn’t there some way we can avoid having our first exchange with a Russian submarine—almost anything but that?” “No, there’s too much danger to our ships. There is no alternative,” said McNamara. “Our commanders have been instructed to avoid hostilities if at all possible, but this is what we must be prepared for, and this is what we must expect.”
We had come to the time of final decision. “We must expect that they will close down Berlin—make the final preparations for that,” the President said. I felt we were on the edge of a precipice with no way off. This time, the moment was now—not next week—not tomorrow, “so we can have another meeting and decide”; not in eight hours, “so we can send another message to Khrushchev and perhaps he will finally understand.” No, none of that was possible. One thousand miles away in the vast expanse of the Atlantic Ocean the final decisions were going to be made in the next few minutes. President Kennedy had initiated the course of events, but he no longer had control over them. He would have to wait—we would have to wait. The minutes in the Cabinet Room ticked slowly by. What could we say now—what could we do?
Then it was 10:25—a messenger brought in a note to John McCone. “Mr. President, we have a preliminary report which seems to indicate that some of the Russian ships have stopped dead in the water.”
Stopped dead in the water? Which ships? Are they checking the accuracy of the report? Is it true? I looked at the clock. 10:32. “The report is accurate, Mr. President. Six ships previously on their way to Cuba at the edge of the quarantine line have stopped or have turned back toward the Soviet Union. A representative from the Office of Naval Intelligence is on his way over with the full report.” A short time later, the report came that the twenty Russian ships closest to the barrier had stopped and were dead in the water or had turned around.
“So no ships will be stopped or intercepted,” said the President. I said we should make sure the Navy knew nothing was to be done, that no ships were to be interfered with. Orders would go out to the Navy immediately. “If the ships have orders to turn around, we want to give them every opportunity to do so. Get in direct touch with the Essex, and tell them not to do anything, but give the Russian vessels an opportunity to turn back. We must move quickly because the time is expiring,” said the President.
Then we were back to the details. The meeting droned on. But everyone looked like a different person. For a moment the world had stood still, and now it was going around again.
“The danger was anything but over.”
DESPITE WHAT HAD happened, the danger was anything but over. We learned later in the day that fourteen of the ships had stopped or had turned back to Russia. Most of those continuing were tankers.
The ship that became the matter of greatest concern was a Russian tanker called the Bucharest. During the day, it had reached the barrier, identified itself to one of our naval ships, and, because it was a tanker, been allowed to pass. There was little likelihood that the Bucharest carried any missiles or any of the kinds of armament covered by the quarantine. Nevertheless, there were those in the Executive Committee who felt strongly that the Bucharest should be stopped and boarded, so that Khrushchev would make no mistake of our will or intent. The President himself emphasized that eventually we would have to stop and board one of the ships approaching Cuba. Those who favored letting the Bucharest pass argued that it probably carried no contraband and that Khrushchev needed more time to consider what he should do.
The President postponed a decision and ordered the Bucharest shadowed by American warships. At that time, it was proceeding toward Cuba at 17 knots, and a decision had to be made before nightfall.
Meanwhile, the whole world was becoming more and more alarmed. All kinds of people were, officially and unofficially, giving their advice and opinions. Bertrand Russell sent a message to Khrushchev praising him for his conciliatory position and a message to President Kennedy castigating the United States for its warlike attitude. The President took time out of his other deliberations personally to compose an answer: “I think your attention might well be directed to the burglar rather than to those who caught the burglar.”
U Thant, Acting Secretary General of the United Nations, suggested that the quarantine be lifted fo
r several weeks if in return the Russians agreed not to send missiles to Cuba. Khrushchev agreed and suggested a summit meeting. President Kennedy responded that the crisis was “created by the secret introduction of offensive weapons into Cuba and the answer lies in the removal of such weapons.” He added that we would be happy to have any discussions leading to a satisfactory and peaceful solution, but the missiles in Cuba had to be removed.
Adlai Stevenson, at a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, publicly confronted Ambassador V. A. Zorin of the Soviet Union. President Kennedy had made arrangements for photographs of the missile sites to be furnished to Stevenson. Many newspapers around the world, and particularly in Great Britain, were openly skeptical of the U.S. position. At the urgings of Pierre Salinger, the President’s Press Secretary, and of Don Wilson, representing the USIA, the President, on October 23, had released the pictures for use at the UN and for publication. Stevenson used them most skillfully in his dramatic televised confrontation with the Russians:
STEVENSON: “Well, let me say something to you, Mr. Ambassador, we do have the evidence. We have it, and it is clear and incontrovertible. And let me say something else. Those weapons must be taken out of Cuba…. You, the Soviet Union, have sent these weapons to Cuba. You, the Soviet Union, have created this new danger—not the United States….
“Finally, Mr. Zorin, I remind you that the other day you did not deny the existence of these weapons. But today, again, if I heard you correctly, you now say that they do not exist, or that we haven’t proved they exist.
Thirteen Days Page 4
