WI USA doesn't notice the nukes on Cuba until they are removed in the early nineties?
- Thread starter marcinL
- Start date
Khrushchev had actually planned on announcing the presence of the missiles later in 1962, on the anniversary of the Russian Revolution, but this was prempted by the American discovery of the missiles. So if the US doesn't uncover them first, then the USSR makes their presence public anyway.
Would this mean that Khruschev doesn't lost his position when there is not risk of WW3? If so USSR would avoid Brezhnev's premiership and perhaps there would be more capable leader.
But whole idea that Americans don't notice anything seems quiet implausible. Even if satelites don't notice anything there would be some leaks or rumors anyway.
marathag
Banned
Well, the USSR also made that Dr Stranglelove trigger, and told nobody.
Google up Soviet Dead Hand
Deleted member 94680
Dead Hand was to enable a second strike capability. Cuba was a first strike capability. It only works if it’s publicised.
Even that had a deterrent purpose: kill all us, and we still can kill all of you. I wouldn’t be surprised if the US knew about it, although a FOIA request would probably not get very far.
Which leads to a question: if the US discovered the missiles by espionage rather than U-2 overflights, could they have made the information public? The SA-2 Guideline/S-75 Dvina had already shot down a U-2, so it’s conceivable they’d stop flights over Cuba if there were SAMs in place and the risk of a shoot-down was deemed too high. The aerial photos must have boosted public confidence compared to verbal reports of SSMs from unidentified sources. That becomes moot if Khrushchev announces their presence, of course.
marathag
Banned
That they did not tell anyone about. The whole point of a Dead Man's Switch, is that others know about it.
'Why keep it a secret?' Right from Dr Strangelove
Deleted member 94680
Not necessarily. It was probably meant as it was designed, all else fails they still get to kill the Capitalist Monsters.
Did absolutely no one know about it? I get that the general public didn’t know, but were Western intelligence agencies and military unaware? The Americans had their own version after all.
Just say it was through aerial reconnaissance. Maybe doctor up some photos, which admittedly will leave the Soviets a bit confused at first.
What's nuts about a nation under siege wanting to keep a deterrent?
The fact that the nation's nutter-in-chief wanted a "preventative" first strike on the US.
GeographyDude
Gone Fishin'
The Soviets made mistakes, just like we on the U.S. did.
The Soviets may want to keep a nearby retaliatory strike in reserve. They may have the vague idea that it’s better to merely flash than the Ace than play it, but in any particular set of circumstances, it always feels riskier than it’s worth. And perhaps other similar aspects. And then, over the years, it simply becomes institutional inertia.
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Can the Soviets keep things ambiguous? I thought IOTL the USN would sail ships which "may or may not" have been equipped with nuclear weapons into ostensibly nuclear free ports. And I imagine it would be easy enough to play a shell game of "guess which bomber squadron rotating through Cuba has the nukes or the conventional bombs". Israel has had the bomb for decades without "officially" admitting it and the West Germans basically had keys to some nukes. I think it's pretty easy for the situation in Cuba to make it through the end of the Cold War without the United States ever solidly nailing down the presence or absence of Soviet atomic weapons in Cuba for sure.
Everyone knew the West Germans had at least theoretical access to nukes in wartime via the NATO nuclear sharing program. Everyone knows the Israeli's have nukes and have since the 60s. They're official ambivalence protocol is the result of a informal agreement with the US. The basic deal was that the Israeli's wouldn't publicly affirm or deny they had nukes (either of which has/ had official repercussions) and in return the US would stop demanding the Israeli's allow international inspections of suspected nuclear sites.