Cuban Missile Crisis Reflection
“Thirteen Days”
(10 Pts.)
- For each of the following ExComm participants, identify their positions (perspectives) on the crisis as either Hawk, Dove, or Owl. Use direct evidence from the film to explain and also indicate if any of them changed their position as the crisis unfolded. Ask yourself, to what extent did that change in a position significantly influence the final outcome?
John F. Kennedy
Robert McNamara (Bob)
Bobby Kennedy
McGeorge Bundy (Mack)
Gen. Max Taylor
- For each of the following “other” participants, identify their positions (perspectives) on the crisis as either Hawk, Dove, or Owl. Use direct evidence from the film to explain and also indicate if any of them changed their position as the crisis unfolded. Ask yourself, to what extent did that change in position significantly influence the final outcome?
Dean Acheson
Adlai Stevenson
Kenny O’Donnell
Theodore Sorensen (Ted)
Curtis LeMay
Please view the following 3 short videos from YouTube.
Each video attempts to get into the historical mindsets of Castro, Khrushchev and Kennedy. How do each of these vignettes produced by Professor James G. Blight help to explain each individual leader’s behavior during the crisis?
To what extent do you think that focusing on the individual level analysis contributes to an overall understanding of the crisis? (Answer these questions below the last of the links shown below)
Fidel Castro —
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHVpuhApSC0
Nikita Khrushchev –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8hLWDdvBm8
John F. Kennedy –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJuKpf_8IJ0&t=114s
- In your personal and informed opinion, what does the Cuban Missile Crisis have to say to us? In other words, what lessons can be learned so nations never come close to Armageddon again?
