Weekend Video: How Kennedy And His Aides Avoided A Nuclear War

This weekend video installment is about how US President Kennedy, his aides and some sharp minds within the Soviet Union came together to avoid a nuclear showdown.

The world has never been as close to witnessing a nuclear war as it was in the thirteen days between October 16 and 28, 1962 i.e. exactly 53 years ago.

In mid October, 1962, American military planes snapped images of Soviet Medium Range Ballistic Missiles (MRBMs) being placed and assembled in Cuba, off the south-east coast of the United States. This implied that many cities of America were now under direct range of Soviet nuclear missiles. In the Cold War era of the 1960s, that was unthinkable and unacceptable to the United States.

The thirteen days that followed was the closest the Cold War ever came to being an actual war between USA and USSR. And a conflict between the two sides then would have most likely involved the use of nuclear weapons. The question thus was how to avoid a reality that was too scary to even imagine.

Of course, there would be many books which would give a comprehensive factual account of the events in that fortnight. Roger Donaldson’s Thirteen Days instead expresses the raw tension and strain which President Kennedy and his aides went through in that period. And it is likely that no other book or film does that job as well. As the great Roger Ebert wrote

I call the movie a thriller, even though the outcome is known, because it plays like one: We may know that the world doesn’t end, but the players in this drama don’t, and it is easy to identify with them.

And it is not only from one side that events could close in.

In those thirteen days, Kennedy and his closest aides not only had to deal with the Soviet missiles but also had to ward off any advice from within the administration that would have made things worse. This inevitably meant that he had to fight two crucial battles at the same time—one with the Soviets, the other with some in his government.

Thirteen Days is account of how these two battles were fought, and won. The film is available in two parts on the web. Enjoy. Trust us, this wouldn’t be a bad way to spend a Sunday.