The Cuban Missile War of 1962: The World Will Never Be the Same

Greenville

Banned
I'm not sure what this thread will eventually become, but let's start with the beginning passage.

Negotiations to remove American missiles from Turkey in exchange for Soviet ones in Cuba fail in October 1962.

On October 29, the American plan to use aerial bombardment to remove the missile installations before they can become active takes place. Over 200 American aircraft attack and disable missile installations. Several of them are shot down and American lives are lost in the process. Hundreds of Soviet and Cuban military personnel are killed in the process also prompting retaliation.

Soviet forces in the Caribbean engage American aircraft carriers and other supporting craft which assisted in the bombardment. American forces defend themselves in an expanding naval war in the region. American air support from states around the Gulf of Mexico is called in to defend against Soviet and Cuban attacks where they occur.

In response to the aerial bombardment of Cuba, the Soviet Union sees need to respond equally on American targets in a similar fashion. The American naval installation at Guantanamo Bay is attacked and eventually captured. American forces nearby assist in the defense mission. Soviet forces also target American military and Air Force installations in western Europe as part of relation for the strikes. An aerial and naval war has begun between NATO, American, eastern European, and Soviet forces in the wake of the Cuban attack.

However, the aerial attack wasn't enough to remove all risk of an invasion. Given the need to protect American assets in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, President Kennedy, after obtaining a formal declaration of war from Congress on Cuba, authorizes a massive ground invasion to remove the missile sites and dangerous Castro regime. The invasion begins on October 30. Shorty after a significant amount of American forces have established beachheads in Cuba, tactical nuclear warheads, FROGS, are used at the complete shock of U.S. military forces. Within minutes, more than ten devices are detonated on invading American forces, killing and injuring tens of thousands in the process. A limited nuclear war has begun.

After learning of this chaos, President Kennedy feels no choice but to retaliate against Cuba with nuclear weapons as well on a similar scale. Air Force nuclear bombers will target several major cities in Cuba from Santiago, Havana, and others to inflict a similar scale of damage. American invasion forces are evacuated in the wake of the nuclear attack. On October 31, the American retaliatory attack kills hundreds of thousands of Cubans who will die in the weeks after because of either a direct hit or exposure to radiation. What Cuban military forces remain use the surviving tactical atomic weaponry they have and attempt to target either nearby American military units in the area or even installations and civilians communities along the Gulf coast. A handful of communities are hit in states like Texas, Alabama, Louisiana, and elsewhere. A number of American vessels such as aircraft carriers helping in the evacuation of the failed invasion are also hit. Many tens of thousands more will be killed in this conflict. A sizable nuclear retaliation in response to this attack also obliterates after major city in Cuba. Fidel and Raul Castro are also killed in the exchanges.

It's not only Americans and Cubans who are killed in this nuclear exchange, but also Russians and others from eastern Europe. The Soviet Union in the wake of the American nuclear attack killing so many of their civilians agrees to a similar scale counter attack on NATO and other American targets. Cities and bases in West Germany, Brussels, and France are targeted and destroyed in a nuclear exchange. This prompts NATO forces to retaliate in a similar manner to by November 1. Major cities and bases in the Soviet Union are obliterated. Soviet and American leadership both order the evacuations of their capitals and full scale alert in the event of a wider attack. President Kennedy is evacuated to Mount Hood outside of Washington D.C. along with all of the other cabinet and military leadership.

In the wake of this nuclear exchange American forces are put on full alert, Def-Con 1 awaiting any further presidential instructions. Mass exoduses from major cities begin as millions flee into rural areas hoping to escape potential further strikes by the Soviet Union. Paranoia, violence, and looting grip the nation. The global economy and world stock markets also immediately go into recession or crash spirals. Millions lie dead in the wake of the continuing crisis.

Naval and aerial battles continue throughout the globe between Allied and Warsaw Pact forces. However both sides see the potential for a ceasefire still possible in this wake. India of all nations offers to negotiate a ceasefire between the two powers before the situation gets too out of hand and the damage is global.

On November 3rd, battle channel negations between President Kennedy and the surviving Soviet leadership begin. NATO and American naval units will stand down alongside Soviet and Warsaw forces so that humanitarian aid and medical care in the increasing catastrophic refugee crisis in Europe and the Soviet Union itself can be handled. American forces are reduced in alert down to Def Con 3 awaiting further instructions. Any further planned operations in Cuba are halted because of the immense amount of radioactive fallout which has consumed the island to almost full inability to support life. Most Soviet naval forces agree under the terms of the ceasefire to withdrawal from the Gulf of Mexico into the Atlantic, with only those carrying medical aid into the major remaining ports of Cuba. The American blockade remains in effect to ensure no other nuclear devices are smuggled into the area for a surprise attack in the wake of the ceasefire.

In the nuclear aftermath tens of millions of peace in the Caribbean, the American south, and Europe will have died either from direct nuclear exchange or the radioactive fallout to follow after. For months, the globe will be at a political and economic standstill with fears that further strikes could occur at any time and the ceasefire forgotten without warning.

To be continued.
 
Soviet Union is probably now so messy place that it hardly can survive or at least it will not be able recover in several decades. It wasn't evem recovered from WW2 yet.
 
Interesting
instead to total annihilation like in classic "The Cuba Missile War" and it's spinoff "Voices of Doomsday"
Ende this scenario in Classical World War Three scenario: fist conventional, escalate in limited Nuclear exchange then ending with peace negations talks.

I'm very curious how the cold war develop under this scenario of a surviving USA and USSR

subscribed
 
If the Soviets use nuclear weapons based on Cuba the American retaliation will not be limited to Cuba. It means the whole SIOP is launched (very bad day for Albania btw). Now this is where it gets interesting, even if the Soviets decide to immediately retaliate on detecting the American strike the time it would take to deliver those orders from Moscow to the Strategic Missile Forces added to the time it would take to fuel the missiles is longer than it would take for American missiles and bombers to reach their target.
It is possible that Theatre and battlefield weapons in Europe could be launched in time, but that would depend on whether US, UK, French and NATO nuclear forces fire first.

In 1962 America could really have 'won' a nuclear war. At this point in time there was no MAD.

EDIT: I'll add that in 1962 there was no concept in America of the 'limited nuclear war'. The SIOP assumed that 'if one flies, they all fly'.

instead to total annihilation like in classic "The Cuba Missile War" and it's spinoff "Voices of Doomsday"

Classic in the terms of quality of writing, but not in plausibility. I know I'm a heretic here. :)
 
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thorr97

Banned
The end result of this would be that the "Bloody But Necessary" view of those days would go unchallenged for decades to come. This would be due to the combination of so many American, Western European, Japanese, South Korean, and Latin American deaths making searingly unpopular even the slightest hint that their deaths might have been in vain, the revelation of the true scope of the multiple genocides perpetrated by the Soviet Union and Communist China firmly solidifying history's view of the incarnately evil nature of their regimes - and of Communism in general, and also due to the post-war economic boom as the world could afford to essentially zero out its military spending in favor of economic development now that the Cold War no longer had to be fought.

There would, eventually, be papers and historical analyses that tried grappling with the question of "was it worth it?" While those posing such a question could do so standing atop the piles of the West's dead, the refutations would come from those, figuratively, standing atop the archives recovered from the Soviet Union and from Communist China detailing their world domination plans and detailing the results of their serial genocides. There'd also be the almost manic focus the world would've exerted in recovering from the war and "putting it all behind us" with a determined focus on making things better.

Thus it would be a very "tough sell" for anyone questioning that "Bloody But Necessary" view of the times...
 
A slightly different take on this would be the novel Resurrection Day by Brendan DuBois. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resurrection_Day
The US-Russian confrontation over the Cuban missile bases goes hot, and both countries launch nuclear weapons at each other. The European nations stay out and the novel follows the situation in an America blighted by the nuclear strikes. Britain provides aid to the USA, in a reverse of the WWII/post WWII events. Elements in the British government aim to seize the remaining American nukes to prevent their future use. There is some useful background to what happened when the Americans tried to eliminate the Cuban sites and what the resulting war does to the country as a whole.
 
I don't think there is any way the Russians would distinguish a US strike from a European one. They'd move against both. For one thing they will assume, via basic psychological projection, that the relationship of Western Europe to the USA is fundamentally the same as their own domination of the Warsaw Pact--whether it is in the interest of Britain and France and West Germany and Italy to go to war against the WP is irrelevant, Washington, which is to say ultimately Wall Street, pulls their strings. Then too, if the USSR takes a beating from US forces, but Europe is left untouched, it is European nations that the decimated Soviet Union would be at the mercy of. America is far, Germany is near. Poland is nearer still! The notion that all the Western powers are really all one piece serves them better and will guide them I think. So in retaliating against the USA they will not spare the Western European powers--besides a lot of American force is deployed intermixed into the European landscape anyway. There is no way to war agains the most immediately threatening US forces without blasting Europe to smithereens anyway; as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb then. If they strike at European forces, they decimate all their foes.

A general war that is halted with a cease-fire, truce and possible treaty seems far more likely to me than the European nations being allowed to sit at mutual peace while the Americans and Soviets pound each other into the ground.

In fact, the Soviets just don't have many weapons capable of striking at the USA anyway; most have far more limited range.
 

thorr97

Banned
Greenville & all,

In case I wasn't clear enough in my earlier post, there's no way in the scenario you started that doesn't end with the Soviet Union being extinguished as a nation state. Nor with the Warsaw Pact countries escaping being incinerated. And lastly, this scenario would also lead to the People's Republic of China existing only in history books.

Nuclear attacks on the US would immediately draw nuclear strikes upon the USSR. Those would be of such magnitude and totality as to ensure that nothing but smoke and ash would ever come from the Soviet Union ever again. There's no way, once started, that the US response could be anything less. Yes, a "ceasefire" could eventually be negotiated but it would be one in which the few survivors left in Russia somehow managed to convince the West that they'd been obliterated enough to no longer pose any threat to anyone. If there was even the slightest doubt of that, then the US and NATO countries would keep the nuclear hellfire raining down all across the USSR.

Cuba? It'd be glassed over from Las Tumbas in the west to Punta de Maisi in the east. So there'd be no point to any Soviet aid even being sent - let alone allowed - across the Atlantic to that island. Just as there'd be no point to allowing the Soviet Red Fleet to exist anywhere but as shattered hulks on the sea floor or securely tied up at what few docks had somehow managed to survive LeMay's loving touch.

I also don't think that Mao and his murderers could somehow manage to "go to ground" convincingly enough to also escape that sort of touch from LeMay. If not during the fighting between the Soviets and the rest of the world then shortly thereafter as the rest of the world demand the Chinese prove they'd no nuclear weapons program of their own. Which was so far along by '62 that there'd be no way they could hide it from outside inspection and the refusal of that inspection would be sufficient grounds for that hellfire to rain down upon the Middle Kingdom as well.

The end result would be a world scarred by nuclear blasts but otherwise then free of Communist dictatorships. This because even if any Communist countries somehow survived the war intact enough to still function as a nation state the fear in the West would be too strong to allow them to continue as Communist nations once the mushroom clouds had dissipated.

This is pretty much the inevitable outcome once even a single nuke hit an American city in 1962 and was one of the reasons the Soviets blinked first and blinked pretty damn hard. They knew how appallingly outgunned they were when it came to nuclear arsenals. And they also knew, from reading all our open source documentation, that the US though the USSR essentially equaled our nuclear arsenal. Thus, if that nuclear genie did get unbottled the US would be compelled to go all out in order to ensure it stood even a prayer of stopping enough of the Soviet response to survive.

Thus any start of a nuclear exchange in '62 meant extermination for the Soviets.
 
Oh, I think there might be some chance that a President like John Kennedy, or for that matter Dwight Eisenhower--heck, I have to suppose even the men I think were the worst who have served as President thus far--might respond to a cease fire request. They might even do so if some US cities (but only a few) and bases have been struck, but no Soviet ones. They might order a cease fire if the enemy shows signs of also standing down, and talk. They might insist on the enemy submitting in ways beyond their ability to accept, and the war resumes, but I do think that faced with ongoing loss of US population and assets versus a chance to buy time and maybe talk their way out of worse disaster they'd at least give words a try.
 
I also don't think that Mao and his murderers could somehow manage to "go to ground" convincingly enough to also escape that sort of touch from LeMay

It wouldn't be LeMay, but Gen. Power.

Many look to Dr. Strangelove with LeMay as Ripper, but actually is the then Commander of SAC, General Power.

"I used to worry about General Power. I used to worry that General Power was not stable. I used to worry about the fact that he had control over so many weapons and weapon systems and could, under certain conditions, launch the force. Back in the days before we had real positive control [i.e., PAL locks], SAC had the power to do a lot of things, and it was in his hands, and he knew it."


— General Horace M. Wade, (at that time subordinate of General Power)

JFK knew Power still had Predelegated Launch Authority from Ike, but though the new PAL meant no release could happen without his OK: he was wrong. At this point, most of SACs PALs were compromised/bypassed

As soon as the first Soviet Nuke pops, even a 'small' one like a FROG/Luna, the SAC portion of SIOP flies, and the USN portion goes as soon as SAC goes live

Part of that plan involved blasting a path thru Red China for B-52 Egress/Ingress to the Soviet Union
 

thorr97

Banned
Part of that plan involved blasting a path thru Red China for B-52 Egress/Ingress to the Soviet Union

Really? Damn, that's... cold. Understandable, rational, justifiable but... wow. Unleashing nuclear annihilation on another country which most likely had not declared war on the US at that point? Sure, the PRC would have to go to war with the US if the USSR was being attacked but at the speed at which SAC had to operate, that declaration would most likely not have happened yet.

Wow....
 
As a creative exercise, I like the Kennedy chooses to not go full SIOP and do an uneasy pause plot. Lots of interesting paths to take from here. A few questions-- it does seem like JFK jumped from counter-force to counter-value pretty quickly when he targeted Cuban cities. I wonder if you could have a stray nuke hitting an American city/military base as kind of a bridge. If you want to get the fighting going in Europe quickly as well and get a war with the Soviets going, wasn't it pretty widely thought that any US attack on Cuba = USSR move on Berlin?
 
As a creative exercise, I like the Kennedy chooses to not go full SIOP and do an uneasy pause plot. Lots of interesting paths to take from here. A few questions-- it does seem like JFK jumped from counter-force to counter-value pretty quickly when he targeted Cuban cities. I wonder if you could have a stray nuke hitting an American city/military base as kind of a bridge. If you want to get the fighting going in Europe quickly as well and get a war with the Soviets going, wasn't it pretty widely thought that any US attack on Cuba = USSR move on Berlin?

Some Info on that
The Soviet Commander of Cuba Missiles bases, had explicitly orders to act on his own initiative, if Communication to Moscow was broken or the Base were Attacked.
for later case he had order to attack Nuclear the USA in case of Bombardment or Invasion by USA.
what let to that reaction in first post of Greenville scenario.

Another issue is amount of ICBM the USSR had there just around 4 x R-7 operational to 36 x R-16 in testing phase.
And USA know that exactly, so JFK switch from counter-force to counter-value on Global scale.
I not sure, but i remember vaguely that President had this option in SIOP-62.

But that not Case in Europe, in 1960s NATO need Tactical Nukes to stop Soviet Invasion and Red Army will use also them in exchange.
Making the War very "dirty" so that border between West and East German is a radioaktive hellhole.

Greenville, i have question: Is the NATO HQs around and in Paris hit by Soviet MRBM in your scenario ?
 

Greenville

Banned
A short update for now until I have more time:

November 5, 1962. American president John F. Kennedy assembles his cabinet both in person and via teleconference from inside of Mount Weather nuclear installation outside of Washington D.C. Kennedy hopes to maintain and expand the ceasefire to eliminate the nuclear threat. After the nuclear strikes no one is sure which leaders have survived the exchange in the Soviet Union. Communication is down and scattered between both sides. Fears that a radical leader coming to power in the vacuum created in the aftermath could occur who might launch a surprise attack on America and NATO in the hysteria killing hundreds of millions instead of tens in the process. American forces remain on DefCon 1 just in case.

Regarding other discussions with his cabinet secretaries, reports are very grim of the action taken. Tens of millions around the world are presumed dead in this situation. The ceasefire still remains in effect at current time. Wildfires burn in all areas erected causing millions to be evacuated from various areas in Eastern Europe mainly. Nuclear fallout brews in each location. Many continue to flee major cities and others. The global economy immediately enters a massive recession with trading halted because of naval warfare in different areas of the globe or fear of the potential for future nuclear attack. It may be months before anyone is calm enough to return home. Millions of refugees leave large cities attacked and not. Massive protests against future nuclear force and calls for immediate disarmament occur. Rioting and looting in the wake of the crisis also does. Violence and civil disorder erupt in many areas even those not effected by nuclear force. Neighbors attack and even murder each other. The rush on grocery stores, banks, and other places of resources only increasingly worsens. Thousands are killed in the hysteria and violence in the United States alone.

Preparations are actively being made in Kennedy's cabinet urge him to go forth with a live television and radio broadcast to the nation of the extent to of the crisis and resolve. The November 1962 elections are suspended by most local officials until a future time. Members of Congress and the Senate also remain out of Washington in case of surprise nuclear attack.

The evacuation of the American invasion of Cuba has retreated to American ports and bases along the Gulf of Mexico. Over forty thousand Americans are killed or still missing in action after the nuclear barrage which was released upon them. The burns and radiation from this attack are among the worst ever experienced by American armed forces in combat. If the Cubans hadn't launch so quickly the total casualties would've been much higher. In other news, the surviving central leadership of Cuba under military junta and based in the defacto capital of Moron, one of three remaining major cities on the island has offered unconditional surrender to the Americans in exchange of aid and humanitarian support. Kennedy sends a reply that terms will be accepted with additional terms for reply that open inspections must be allowed by air without interferences or attempted interception by remaining armed forces. Soviet soldiers and equipment must all be withdrawn from Cuba under simlar terms. Kennedy hopes for talks of disarmament. However, suddenly President Kennedy suddenly faints at the cabinet table to the shock of his cabinet and members of the Joint Chief of Staff who fear he has been the victim of a potential assassination plot. Doctors rush in as the president goes into shock over unknown to most others his Addison's disease kicking in because of such a long period of extreme stress. Panic ensues to which Attorney General Robert Kennedy intends to keep secret no matter the cost.

Outside of the ruins of Moscow in a bunker, the surviving leaders of Premier Khruschev's cabinet can no longer make contact with him. He is presumed dead or incapacitated and an emergency governing council is established to handle the crisis. Many consider it an armed military cou with unknown intentions. Rumors of such will eventually reach the American leadership.
 

Greenville

Banned
Soviet Union is probably now so messy place that it hardly can survive or at least it will not be able recover in several decades. It wasn't evem recovered from WW2 yet.

The Soviet Union west of the Uralsmat this point is devastated. Most major cities and bases are obliterated in nuclear exchange with NATO. Soviet leadership is scattered and confused. The economic and recovery impact of the more damages Soviet Union will be among the most catastrophic.

Interesting
instead to total annihilation like in classic "The Cuba Missile War" and it's spinoff "Voices of Doomsday"
Ende this scenario in Classical World War Three scenario: fist conventional, escalate in limited Nuclear exchange then ending with peace negations talks.

I'm very curious how the cold war develop under this scenario of a surviving USA and USSR

subscribed

It will become a very different global stage.

As a creative exercise, I like the Kennedy chooses to not go full SIOP and do an uneasy pause plot. Lots of interesting paths to take from here. A few questions-- it does seem like JFK jumped from counter-force to counter-value pretty quickly when he targeted Cuban cities. I wonder if you could have a stray nuke hitting an American city/military base as kind of a bridge. If you want to get the fighting going in Europe quickly as well and get a war with the Soviets going, wasn't it pretty widely thought that any US attack on Cuba = USSR move on Berlin?

I figured the Soviets would retaliate at any place of choosing probably because they believed the West would be first choice. Berlin is part of multiple targets hit across NATO territory.


Greenville, i have question: Is the NATO HQs around and in Paris hit by Soviet MRBM in your scenario ?

No. Only major military installations in France are hit for now.
 
No. Only major military installations in France are hit for now.
oh that's allot of installation in 1960s before DeGaulle trow NATO out of France
North France was literally dotted with Nato installation Ammo depots, Airfields and other installation

I figured the Soviets would retaliate at any place of choosing probably because they believed the West would be first choice. Berlin is part of multiple targets hit across NATO territory.
On Berlin there indications that USSR wanted the west part of City intact.
Allot of Soviet NATO targets like airfields, army bases, communication sites, Radar installation, Missile sites and also nuclear bomb storage sites !

Next to that is this issue: 1960s Soviet Missiles Targeting systems were inaccurate, So they put bigger Nukes on them to compensate that.
it was unimportant it missile hit it target one kilometer off, if got a 2.3 Megaton warhead to destroy it.
But they were unaware in 1960s that bigger nukes meant bigger fallout carry by wind to east to Soviet union !
 
Just remember this: In 1962 the Soviets had no way to detect incoming ICBM launches. All their radar was keyed to stop incoming aircraft. A U.s. first strike decimates them................then the bomberrs arrive
 
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