Thirteen Days

On Saturday morning, a “feeling of foreboding and gloom” dominated the meeting (71). The committee reviewed a new message from Khrushchev, an official communication from the Foreign Office of the Kremlin, very different in tone and feeling from the previous one. This message proposed that the Soviet Union would withdraw its missiles from Cubaif the United States withdrew its missiles from Turkey. The Russian request that America withdraw missiles from Turkey was in fact realistic. President Kennedy had previously asked the State Department to negotiate the removal of the outdated Jupiter missiles. However, the Turkish government would not consent to having them withdrawn. “The change in the language and tenor of the letters from Khrushchev indicated confusion in the Soviet Union; but there was confusion among us as well,” and as the committee attempted to devise a response, they learned that the Soviets were accelerating development of the missile sites (72). 

The committee struggled to determine a course of action, aware that the Soviets were developing the missile sites as they deliberated, and that Turkey could also be a target for Soviet reprisals for an American military strike on Cuba. President Kennedy was concerned that the NATO countries did not understand their vulnerability even as they advocated a strong response to the Soviets.