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Summary: The Cuban Missile Crisis

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During the Cold War, the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis was possibly the most dangerous moment between the United States and the Soviet Union. The discovery of nuclear weapons being installed in Cuba was from the pilot of an American U-2 spy plane who passed over Cuba and had photographed nuclear weapons being installed, which led to more tension between the two sides (History.com Staff 2010). The Cuban Missile Crisis was an important historical event that should be kept in the new textbooks in order for students to learn about how it affected America because politically, this was when the US and the Soviet Union came closest to nuclear conflict during the Cold War which could have started WWIII, environmentally, it led to the creation on the …show more content…

The Cuban Missile Crisis was the height of the Cold War since there was so much tension between the two superpowers, and both sides had deadly nuclear weapons which could have led to war. During this time, war seemed inevitable to the citizens such as Dino Brugioni. Brugioni “made arrangements for his young family to get out of Washington in the event of war” and stated "’I had seen atomic blasts and I knew the destruction they had left, and I felt sure that Washington would be a target’" (Fidgen 2012). Brugioni is one of many US citizens who believed that nuclear war would be inevitable after the discovery of the Soviet missiles in Cuba, which shows the widespread fear of nuclear war during this time. The nuclear weapons were “an explicit threat to the peace and security of all the Americans” and war was only avoided because of the agreement that Khrushchev and Kennedy had come upon (Cantelon). This is important because students should learn that the Cuban Missile Crisis added to the tension between both the Soviet Union and the United States, and caused fear within the citizens. Students need to learn this because this historical event opened up everyone in the world’s eyes and helped them to understand what led to the brink of nuclear war, and how to avoid it. Secondly, the Cuban Missile Crisis had environmental/political impacts on the world because it led up to the creation of the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty,

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