What did Khrushchev try to achieve by emplacing nuclear weapons in Cuba?
In 1962 the Soviet Union’s position vis–vis the United States was in decline. The United States had recently learned that the Soviet Union’s supposed superiority in nuclear weapons was a myth. Not only did this mean that the Soviet Union had lost the image of nuclear superiority, but that the United States had gained it (Taubman, 2003). Moreover, the gap was widening in the United States’s favour as American armaments programmes based on this assumption were continued (Kahan & Long, 1972).The Soviet Union would have considerable difficulty in reaching parity. The situation was particularly difficult for Khrushchev personally, since he had wanted the Soviet Union to rely on the threat of their intercontinental missiles – which in reality were virtually non-existent (Taubman, 2003). He needed an alternative. Positioning missiles in Cuba presented the Soviet Union just such an alternative. The capability of the Soviet Union to strike at the United States would be significantly enhanced,
