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dertaking flexible measures towards settlement of the Indian-Chinese border conflict in a peaceful manner by negotiations.

In general, life confirms daily the need for flexible policies to solve international problems. We do not doubt that the ChineseIndian border conflict can be settled peacefully.

By "speculating" on the Chinese-Indian border conflict, the reactionary forces in India have strengthened their activity and their offensive against the country's [India's] Communist Party and democratic forces.

We are convinced that the measures that your government has taken towards a ceasefire on the Indian-Chinese border, toward the withdrawal of border troops and towards the future settlement of this problem by negotiation will generate positive results. We are of the opinion that this would be, on the one hand a blow against reactionary forces in India itself, and on the other hand a blow against the forces of imperialism, with the USA at its head. We assume that such measures will strengthen India's neutral stance and will prevent India from abandoning this position. This will advance the battle for peace in the whole world. The American imperialists are making efforts to derive advantages from this conflict. The peaceful settlement would undoubtedly be a serious [line illegible-trans.] for imperialism.

After the signing of the border agreement between our countries, we will begin the demarcation of the borderline. As is well known, during the negotiations our delegation raised the question of the village of Hurimt in the Balgan-Ulgiisk district in western Mongolia. Our inhabitants have erected several buildings there and begun lumbering. Your delegation, however, replied that this place cannot be recognized as Mongolia, because this would meet with difficulties. At the same time, your delegation answered that the inhabitants on both sides have come to an agreement and can find a reasonable solution [to the problem of] the use of the forest's riches. Therefore, I do not want to insist that Hurimt should necessarily belong inside Mongolian borders. Of course, I think that this question must be decided by taking both sides interests into consideration. We are grateful that you have declared yourselves ready to make possible our use of our buildings as well as the forests in this district. This problem

occurred, because there are no other woods nearby. But it can be solved on the basis of friendly, mutual understanding.

Since the founding of the PRC it has become a good tradition that during temporary difficulties caused by drought and dry wind, the administrations of individual districts of our countries, in friendly contacts, have permitted the reciprocal use of pasture land. We hope that it will also be possible in the future, in case of difficulties, to continue this excellent tradition.

I suppose that our Comrade "Landowner" ["Gutsbesitzer"] Shagwaral, who is responsible for agricultural questions would be very interested in this.

We thank you for the help that you have provided in difficult times to the cattlebreeders in our Aimaks and Somons, especially in winter and spring. We also express further our satisfaction that the border question between our countries will soon be settled.

I would like to make use of this meeting, Comrade Premier, to broach two aspects [of Sino-Mongolian relations].

We were and are grateful that for the construction of our country the PRC has provided us with financial and economic help as well as qualified workers. The appropriate authorities in our countries are already negotiating regarding the building of objects agreed upon earlier by our governments. I suppose that these negotiations will continue.

I would like to pose the following two questions to you: First, has railway freight traffic gone down considerably in the last years? Maybe that is also an effect of your drought. We hope that railway freight traffic will go up in the future. The full use of the railway that will be built as a consequence of a three-sided agreement between us and the Soviet comrades is economically advantageous for our country, Comrade Premier. We are convinced that you will take this factor into consideration.

Secondly, one of the forms of help that you provide to us is the provision of workers from appropriate professions. This labor is a great help in the building up of our country. Recently, it has nevertheless happened that a few less conscientious and inexperienced people put down their work. I think you know about this.

[segment of conversation not printed regarding Chinese guest workers, particularly

those from Inner Mongolia (Zedenbal assured Zhou that these are needed for linguistic, not nationalistic reasons); resettlement of Mongolians in China; SinoMongolia trade relations-trans.]

ZHOU ENLAI: With regard to China's economic help to Mongolia, we can discuss this tomorrow afternoon, since we have too little time today to negotiate concrete matters, such as workers, construction, trade and railway freight traffic.

I do not understand the word “regrettable", that you used regarding the ChineseIndian border conflict. If this refers to India, it is correct. If you said it in reference to China, in order to make us out to be the guilty [party], then that is false. On this question there are differences of opinion among the fraternal parties.

We have undertaken considerable work to inform and provide explanations to the appropriate states and countries. The Indian side put us in an intolerable position. We were forced to take measures. India began a new invasion and set off a conflict. We rebuffed them, since it was such a serious situation. We have taken measures to defuse the situation. We have ceased fire and pulled out troops back. These are unilateral steps. There is no guarantee that this problem is definitively solved. The cause is the aggressive policies of the ruling circles of the Indian government. The Nehru government is wavering and turning away from neutrality. India did indeed declare non-alignment to aggressive blocs, but became ever more dependent on American dollars. India received 640 million dollars from America for military purposes. Nehru's government is turning away from the policy of peace. We must understand imperialism's threat and danger. In India itself, the domestic forces of reaction are becoming ever more active. India is turning away from the policy of peace. Our country, however, ceased fire and took the initiative towards negotiations. The Indian government has not yet expressed itself regarding our proposals and the measures we took. Under these circumstances, I ask you to understand Indian-Chinese relations correctly.

The MPR, as is known, has entered the United Nations. Therefore, the circumstances must be understandable for you. India's representative in the UN is following the policy of the Western countries. India supports the Western powers' policy on

the Hungarian, Korean, and Chinese questions as well as on disarmament. In this way, India is getting ever further onto the side of the reactionary imperialists.

You, Comrade Zedenbal, will probably agree with some of what I'm saying and disagree with part. I am not forcing my opinion on you. Further development will show who is right. Our policy is a peace-loving foreign policy that is guided by the principles of Marxism-Leninism.

J. ZEDENBAL: Our main task is the signing of the Mongolian-Chinese border agreement. This work is on the verge of a successful conclusion.

Clearly, the Soviet Union, the PRC and the other countries of the socialist camp play a major role in keeping peace in the whole world. The socialist countries have taken on the goal to contribute to the fight for peace, each according to his strength. Naturally the socialist countries are interested in the peaceful settlement of the Indian-Chinese border conflict. It is my understanding that our discussion takes this standpoint, as a point of departure. We and you both know that Nehru is not a Communist, but a bourgeois politician. But we and you both understand how important it is, in the interests of the whole socialist camp, to exploit the positive sides of individual bourgeois politicians. We know that your party in its long history has garnered much experience in the exploitation of the deeds of individuals, who are on the enemy's side.

The exploitation of India's policy of neutrality is very important for the socialist camp. We assume that this is what the five principles of co-existence that you, Comrade Premier Zhou Enlai, together with Nehru, proclaimed. It will be very disadvantageous for our camp, if in place of Nehru, a man such as [Moraji] Desai comes to power. Then there will be a danger that India will join an aggressive bloc. In general, we attach the greatest meaning to the preservation and exploitation of India's neutrality. I think you will probably agree with this. The Chinese-Indian border conflict is now on all lips, since in contemporary international relations every event, even if of local character, becomes widely known.

We think that the ceasefire, the pulling back of troops and the readiness for a negotiated settlement of the border conflict through negotiations, a readiness that you decided on after appropriate evaluation of

the conflict and its connections to international problems and in consideration of all the complicated factors, correspond to the interests of the peoples of the socialist camp and all progressive mankind.

ZHOU ENLAI: The hitch is that the Nehru government represents the Grossbourgeoisie and is two-faced. It is correct that in the fight for peace one must also exploit the bourgeoisie. Nehru is however a representative of the Grossbourgeoisie. The reactionary tendency has the upper hand in the Nehru government's policies. We must lead a decisive struggle against him, we must unmask his treacherous machinations. In his pro-American policy, there is no difference between Nehru and Desai. Resumption of negotiations to strengthen peace will be useful. But the Communists see this question differently from other men. The Communist Party of England has differences of opinion with us on other matters, but on the Indian-Chinese border question, we are of the same opinion. It would be good, if in the future you kept this in mind.

J. ZEDENBAL: I understand that the Chinese side does not unconditionally insist on immediately incorporating a 90,000 square kilometer area on the eastern border, that this question will be decided in the future. Is that true or not?

ZHOU ENLAI: I already went to India with Comrade [Foreign Minister] Chen Yi in 1960 in order to settle the ChineseIndian border question, but we returned with empty hands.

J. ZEDENBAL: The Chinese-Indian border question must not be solved only in the interests of China, but also in accordance with the interests of the whole international communist movement. Given this, I personally think that it would be somewhat better, if you didn't bring up the matter of the 90,000 square kilometers on the eastern sector of the border, but, on the contrary, support the development of class struggle within India in favor of socialism and communism, so that it can contribute to the strengthening of the Communist Party and the democratic forces whereby you would help to accelerate India's transition to communism. There can be no doubt that the border question will be resolved in the future. I repudiate the thought of your intending to weaken or undermine in any way the forces of the Communist Party of India. It would be absurd, if such an idea came into

the head of a Communist.

The kindling of conflict and noise over some 5-10 kilometers of land will, in the end, result in the strengthening of the domestic reactionary forces in India and the fanning of nationalistic passions. This would effect the Communists negatively and be disadvantageous for Socialism.

You Chinese Communists are much more experienced than us, and tempered in revolutionary battle. I am only saying what I think about this question and how I understand it.

ZHOU ENLAI: (Becoming nervous, with altered facial expression)

If you are interested in the Indian-Chinese border question, please examine again the literature that we have provided for the Asian and African countries. Our government is not fighting with India because of a few dozen kilometers of area. We have made absolutely no territorial claims, only the Indian side has. One must understand this correctly. The essence of the matter is that the Indian side is trying to annex an even larger area on the Western sector of the border. How quickly India treads the path of socialism depends, above all, on the revolutionary struggle of the Indian Communist Party and the Indian people. It is important to expose to the world public the evil machinations and dangers, that the reactionary forces of India represent. If we do not expose their reactionary activity, they will go over to the American side, and that is even more disadvantageous.

J. ZEDENBAL: The main thing is not to play into the hands of American imperialism.

It was agreed to continue the conversation the next day.

29 December 1962

[Source: Stiftung "Archiv der Parteien und Massenorganisationen der ehemaligen DDR im Bundesarchiv," Berlin, JIV 2/202283, B1.0; obtained by D. Wolff; translation by Wolff, O. Corff, and C. Ostermann, with the assistance of J. Hershberg.]

VISIT CWIHP'S SITE ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB AT:

http://www.seas.gwu.edu/nsarchive/cwihp

New Evidence on the Cuban Missile Crisis: More Documents from the Russian Archives

by James G. Hershberg

The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 continues to exert an intense fascination on historians, political scientists, journalists, and the general public, and—as apparently the world's closest brush to thermonuclear war-is likely to continue to do so. Over the past decade, the study of this crisis has expanded to encompass a major influx of new sources and perspectives, primarily stemming from the declassification of new U.S. (and British) documents, but also the addition of Soviet and then Cuban archival materials and perspectives-a process expedited by international scholarly projects as well as the anti-communist upheavals that led to the (partial) opening of Russian archives. 1

The Cold War International History Project Bulletin has previously reported on various new findings regarding the crisis-known to Russians as the "Caribbean Crisis” and Cubans as the “October Crisis”—particularly in issue no. 5 (Spring 1995), which featured an extensive compilation of translated documents from the Russian Foreign Ministry archives in Moscow.2

In this issue, the Bulletin presents more translated materials from that repository-the Archive of Foreign Policy, Russian Federation (AVPRF)—documenting various aspects of Soviet policy during the events of the fall of 1962. Most were declassified by Soviet/Russian authorities in 1991-1992 and provided to NHK Japanese television in connection with a documentary on the Cuban Missile Crisis aired to mark the 30th anniversary of the event in October 1992; Prof. Philip Brenner (American University), one of the consultants to the show, in turn, subsequently gave copies of the documents to CWIHP and the National Security Archive-a non-governmental research institute and declassified documents repository based at George Washington University-where they are now deposited and available for research. That collection also contains photocopies of some of the same documents that were separately obtained from AVPRF by Raymond L. Garthoff (Brookings Institution) with the Archive's assistance.

The translations into English came primarily from two sources. Many of the AVPRF documents obtained by NHK were translated by Vladimir Zaemsky of the Russian Foreign Ministry, who granted permission for their use here. For most of the rest of the documents, the Bulletin is grateful to Philip Zelikow, Associate Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University, and Harvard's Center for Science and International Affairs, for commissioning translations from John Henriksen of Harvard. (Prof. Zelikow, the co-author, with Condoleezza Rice, of Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft (Harvard University Press, 1995), is currently involved with two Cuban Missile Crisis-related publication projects, a revision of Graham Allison's Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis, originally published in 1970, and, with Prof. Ernest R. May of Harvard, an edited compilation of transcripts of declassified tape recordings of "Excomm" meetings involving President John F. Kennedy and senior advisors during the crisis, which were recently released by the Kennedy Library in Boston.) In addition, Vladislav M. Zubok, a Russian scholar based at the National Security Archive, translated the records of the two conversations of Soviet Politburo member Anastas Mikoyan (with U Thant and John McCloy) in New York on 1 November 1962, and CWIHP Director David Wolff translated a conversation between Mikoyan and Robert Kennedy.

The translations themselves are broken into three sections: 1) before the crisis, 14 September-21 October 1962 (although for Kennedy and his advisors the crisis began on October 16, when the president was informed that a U.S. U-2 spy plane had photographed evidence of Soviet missile sites under construction in Cuba, for the Soviets the crisis only started on October 22, when Kennedy announced the discovery and the American blockade of Cuba in a televised address); 2) the crisis itself, 22-28 October 1962 (from Kennedy's speech to Moscow's announcement of its agreement to withdraw the missiles under United Nations supervision in exchange for Washington's lifting of the blockade, its pledge not to attack Cuba, and its private assurance that American Jupiter missiles in Turkey would shortly also be removed); and 3) the aftermath, 28 October-10 December 1962 (which included a period of wrangling between Washington and Moscow-and between Moscow and Havana-over the crisis' settlement, especially over the terms of U.N. inspection of the missile removal and the inclusion of Soviet IL-28 bombers in the weapons to be pulled out, which was not finally nailed down, permitting the blockade to be lifted, until November 20).

For the most part, unfortunately, these materials shed little light on the actual process of decision-making at the highest levels of the Kremlin, and minutes or notes of the discussions among Soviet leader Nikita S. Khrushchev and his associates during the crisis have still not emerged.3 The Russian Foreign Ministry documents did include top-level correspondence between Khrushchev and Kennedy, and between Khrushchev and Castro, but these have already been published elsewhere and are omitted from the selection below, as are other documents containing material already available to researchers, such as translations of press reports, correspondence between Khrushchev and U.N. Secretary U Thant (and between Khrushchev and British philosopher Bertrand Russell), and cables to Soviet diplomats circulating or reiterating public Soviet positions.

Nevertheless, the Russian archival materials presented here make fascinating reading for anyone interested in the missile crisis, in Soviet or Cuban foreign policy, in crisis politics or diplomacy generally, in some of the leading characters involved in the drama (such as Robert Kennedy, Fidel Castro, Mikoyan, and U Thant), or in reassessing the accuracy and efficacy of American policy and perceptions during perhaps the Cold War's most perilous passages. For the most part, they consist of Soviet cables from three diplomatic venues (with occasional instructions from "the center," or Moscow):

* the Soviet Embassy in Washington, D.C., including reports from the USSR's newly-arrived ambassador to the United States, Anatoly F. Dobrynin, on the situation in Washington and his meetings with leading personages, and from Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko on his conversation with Kennedy on October 18;

* the United Nations in New York, from which USSR ambassador Valerian Zorin reported on debates in the Security Council, and on contacts with other delegates and U.N. officials, and then more senior Soviet officials sent to handle the diplomacy of the settlement, such as Deputy Foreign Minister Vasily V. Kuznetsov and Mikoyan, reported on their negotiations with U.S. negotiators John J. McCloy and Adlai Stevenson as well as conversations with U Thant;

* and the Soviet Embassy in Havana, from which USSR Ambassador Aleksandr Alekseev reported on Cuban developments, including the fervor gripping the country when it seemed war might be imminent, the leadership's angry reaction when Khrushchev accepted Kennedy's request to withdraw the missiles without advance consultation with Castro, and the difficult conversations which ensued as Soviet officials, in particular Mikoyan, tried to mollify the upset Cubans and at the same time secure Havana's acquiescence to the measures Moscow had accepted in order to resolve the crisis.

The fact that almost all of the documents below came from the Foreign Ministry archive should induce some caution among readers seeking an understanding of Soviet policy regarding the crisis. Not surprisingly, for instance, they illuminate diplomatic aspects of the events far more than, for instance, either military or intelligence aspects. In fact, the Russian Defense Ministry has declassified a substantial amount of material on “Operation Anadyr"-the code-name for the Soviet missile deployment to Cuba-and other military actions related to the crisis, and the Bulletin plans to present some of those materials, with translation, annotation, and commentary by Mark Kramer (Harvard University), in a future issue.5 As for Soviet intelligence archives, these have not been opened to researchers except on a highly selective basis; however, a book scheduled for publication in 1997 by Aleksandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali is expected to draw on these sources. Finally, as noted above, documentation on decision-making at the highest level of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CC CPSU) remains classified, presumably in the Archive of the President, Russian Federation (APRF).

It is not possible to provide a comprehensive commentary on the significance of the documents, both because of space limitations and also because they may be used by researchers for so many different purposes-not only historians of the Cold War but political scientists, specialists in bureaucratic politics, nuclear theory, and "crisis management," psychologists, specialists in U.S., Soviet, and Cuban foreign policy, biographers of key figures, and many others have looked to the Cuban Missile Crisis for answers and illumination. Best read in conjunction with the other Russian documents published in Bulletin 5 and elsewhere, as well as American materials, the documents below are offered merely as useful raw primary source material rather than as evidence for any particular interpretation. Nevertheless, some preliminary reactions can be offered on a few issues.

Pre-Crisis U.S. Military and Covert Policies Toward Cuba

One issue of vital importance during the run-up to the crisis on which the documents here (and in Bulletin 5) provide some evidence is the question of how the Soviets perceived the Kennedy Administration's policies and actions toward Cuba, particularly Washington's covert operations against the Castro regime and the likelihood that it would take more direct military action. They clearly show that Moscow's representatives noted, and blamed the United States government in general and the Central Intelligence Agency in particular for, what it called the "piratical raids" by anti-Castro Cuban exile groups being carried out with U.S. support against the island. Although one does not find specific references to "Operation Mongoose"-the code-name for the massive CIA covert operation undertaken with the aim of toppling Castro after the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961-the reports of Ambassador Alekseev in Havana and Ambassador Dobrynin in Washington in September and early October 1962 show that Moscow had no doubt as to who was responsible for what the former called the “landing of counter-revolutionary bands of spies and arms” and “constant acts of provocation.”6 Dobrynin's cable of 15 October, for instance, lays out the role of the CIA in supporting actions of the exile group “Alpha 66.”

However, the documents suggest that the Soviets had only a general knowledge of "Operation Mongoose”—although Soviet military intelligence (GRU) archives might well contain more detailed reports—and Moscow remained uncertain as to the significance of the American support of the harassment operations-i.e., whether they presaged a direct U.S. military intervention to overthrow Castroright up to the eve of the crisis. As the crisis approached, however, Soviet officials appeared to feel more assured that U.S. military action against Cuba was not imminent (which to those in the know in Moscow signified that the secret deployment of missiles could proceed safely). In a document published in Bulletin 5, Foreign Minister Gromyko, in fact, cabled Moscow after meeting Kennedy on October 18 in the Oval Office—unaware that the American already knew about the Soviet missile bases in Cuba—that “Everything we know about the position of the USA government on the Cuban question allows us to conclude that the overall situation is completely satisfactory...There is reason to believe that the USA is not preparing an intervention and has put its money" on economic sanctions.7

The actual Soviet record of the Gromyko-Kennedy conversation, excerpted here, offers readers a chance to follow in detail this duplicity-filled conversation, in which neither man told the other the most important fact in the situation under discussion. Gromyko dutifully criticized Washington for its actions against Cuba, and acknowledged only that Moscow was providing Cuba with “exclusively defensive armaments" which could not “represent a threat to anybody." Kennedy, for his part, with the U-2 photographs of the Soviet missile bases in Cuba under construction lying in his desk drawer, told Gromyko that the United States "take[s] on trust" Soviet statements about the defensive character of the weapons it was shipping to Castro but reiterated his public warnings that "were it otherwise,

the gravest issues would arise.” While stressing that the situation had taken a turn for the worse since July as a result of Moscow's stepping-up of military aid to Cuba-calling the situation "perhaps the most dangerous since the end of the Second World War❞— Kennedy made no mention of the missiles.

After reading the account of the conversation, it is hard to explain Gromyko's smug assessment that the situation was "completely satisfactory," other than as a spectacular case of wishful thinking (or a blase memo to mask a more candid assessment relayed through other channels). It is clear, from his repeated statements of concern, that Kennedy was trying to caution Moscow to rethink its adventure without tipping his cards-and perhaps even signalling a possible way out of the crisis that had (so far as Moscow knew) not even begun. Repeatedly assuring Gromyko that the United States had “no intentions to launch an aggression against Cuba,” Kennedy noted pointedly that, "If Mr. Khrushchev addressed me on this issue, we could give him corresponding assurances on that score,” and repeated the offer twice later in the conversation. A little more than a week later, of course, after the world had been brought to the brink, precisely such a declaration from Kennedy would give Khrushchev the fig leaf he needed to swallow his pride and accept the removal of Soviet missiles from Cuba.

The Russian documents reveal nothing new on the issue of whether, in fact, the Kennedy Administration had been moving toward taking military action against Cuba even before it discovered the existence of the Soviet nuclear-capable missiles on the island in midOctober. In a previous publication, the current author presented evidence that the U.S. government and military undertook serious contingency planning, and even some preliminary redeployments, in September and the first two weeks of October 1962 toward the objective of achieving, by October 20, “maximum readiness" for either an air strike against or invasion of Cuba, or both, although the article remained agnostic on the issue of whether Kennedy had actually made a decision to attack Cuba or simply wanted the option 8 available. Recently, a potentially crucial, yet still problematic, piece of evidence from American archives has surfaced to suggest that, literally on the eve of the crisis, the Kennedy Administration was not on the verge of imminent military action against Cuba.

At issue is a recently declassified purported fragment of notes of a conversation on the afternoon of Monday, 15 October 1962, between Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor. (At that point, the U-2 photographs taken over Cuba the previous day had not yet been identified as revealing Soviet missile sites under construction, a development that would take place only later that afternoon and evening and be reported to the president the following morning, October 16.) During a discussion of contingency plans concerning Cuba, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) minutes-obtained by the National Security Archive through the Freedom of Information Act—paraphrase McNamara as saying: "President wants no military action within the next three months, but he can't be sure as he does not control events. For instance, aerial photos made available this morning show 68 boxes on ships that are not believed to be I1-28s and cannot be identified. However, the probabilities are strongly against military action in the next 30 days."9 Similarly, a recently-declassified JCS historical report prepared in 1981 evidently relies on those notes in stating (without citation) that in their meeting on October 15, "the Secretary [McNamara] said that President Kennedy wanted, if possible, to avoid military measures against Cuba during the next three months.” "10

If accurate, the notes would certainly constitute a strong piece of evidence against the hypothesis that the Kennedy Administration believed it was headed toward, let alone desired, a military confrontation with Cuba in the immediate future, just before news of the missiles. The evidence is problematic, however, due to an unfortunate case of destruction of historical evidence by the JCS that apparently makes it impossible to evaluate the context or provenance of McNamara's reported remarks (see footnote for details).11

Berlin and Cuba

One issue which has long intrigued students of the crisis is the nature of its connection, if any, to the simmering U.S.-Soviet confrontation over Berlin-which had quieted somewhat since the erection of the Berlin Wall in August 1961 and the Checkpoint Charlie confrontation between Soviet and U.S. tanks two months later, but remained unfinished business and a potential flashpoint. Given the centrality of Berlin and Germany to the Cold War in Europe, in fact, some U.S. officials jumped to the conclusion upon the discovery of Soviet missiles in Cuba that their deployment was actually a Khrushchevian gambit to distract American attention and energy from Berlin, where Moscow might make its next move. Indeed, during the crisis, a special subcommittee of the White House "Excomm" (Executive Committee) was formed, under the chairmanship of Paul H. Nitze, specifically to assess the situation in Berlin in the event that the crisis spread there, perhaps if the Kremlin applied renewed pressure there in response to U.S. threats or use of military force against Cuba.

Some evidence has surfaced to show that at least some Soviet officials did suggest the option of opening up a Berlin front in response to Kennedy's speech announcing the blockade of Cuba on October 22. In a toughly-worded cable the next day, Ambassador Dobrynin cabled an analysis from Washington recommending an “appropriate rebuff” that might include "hinting to Kennedy in no uncertain terms about the possibility of repressions against the Western powers in West Berlin (as a first step, the organization of a blockade of ground routes, leaving out for the time being air routes so as not to give grounds for a quick confrontation)."12 Deputy Foreign Minister Vasily Kuznetsov also suggested that Khrushchev respond with a troop build-up around Berlin. 13 Years later, in his smuggled-out memoirs, Khrushchev blustered that during the crisis, "The Americans knew that if Russian blood were shed in Cuba, American blood would be shed in Germany."14 But in fact Khrushchev acted cautiously with regard to Berlin and rejected suggestions to mass Soviet forces around the city.

Instead, a different Berlin connection seems to emerge from the Russian documents-that Soviet leaders had, in September and

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