Impacts of the Cuban Missile Crisis on US-Soviet relations The Cuban Missile Crisis can be considered as a major turning

point in not only the development of the Cold War, but also on US-Soviet relations. For the past few decades, ever since the Soviet Union became a communist state, the Soviets relationship with the United States had been on the decline. The two superpowers had vastly conflicting ideologies with the US supporting democracy and capitalism, and the Soviets backing communism and both were hell-bent on widening their spheres of influence (i.e. the Soviet Unions expansion into Europe the Iron Curtain). This resulted in a sustained period of intense competition between the two superpowers, lasting from 1947 to 1991, in what has become known today as the Cold War. While both nations had a large, sophisticated arsenal of weapons, and even a significant stockpile of nuclear warheads, both nations chose not to engage directly in a full-scale war; instead choosing to confront each other indirectly, such as in the Space Race with the launch of the Sputnik, the worlds first artificial satellite to be launched into space, the Nuclear Arms Race, with both nations competing with each other to see who would be able to develop more sophisticated weaponry and technology, and proxy wars such as the Korean War and the Vietnam War. However, these confrontations were nowhere as tense as the thirteen days that is the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Cuban Missile Crisis marked the first ever eye-to-eye confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union, with the Soviet Union placing nuclear missiles in Cuba, which is well-within range of the contiguous United States, in response to the United States situating their nuclear warheads in Turkey and Italy, and to protect Cuba, a fellow communist state, from any further invasion by the United States. The Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world to the brink of a full-scale nuclear war. Thankfully, the Crisis was averted in time, with both the leaders, President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev, making rational decisions and agreeing to compromise on the situation. The Soviet Union dismantled all nuclear missile installations in Cuba, and in return, the United States secretly removed their nuclear weapons from Turkey and Italy. Subsequently after the Crisis was resolved, it marked the beginning of a general easing on the tension between the United States and the Soviet Union a first in decades.

Relations between the US and the Soviet Union improved, mainly due to these two reasons: both superpowers realized the risks of engaging in a game of brinksmanship, and they also came together to take steps to reduce the risk of nuclear war. Firstly, the Cuban Missile Crisis was essentially a game of chicken. During the Crisis, both sides held their ground firmly and refused to back down, with both countries pushing their luck further and further. In reality, however, both nations had no intention of starting a war. In fact, they were adopting a strategy known as brinkmanship, where both sides would seem to approach the brink of war, but not over it, in order to persuade and pressurize the enemy to back down. Both sides were hoping for the other to retreat first. This game of chicken all started off with the Soviet Union installing their nuclear missiles in Cuba. In response, instead of a retaliatory attack, the United States instituted a naval blockade (quarantine) of Cuba, blocking all offensive weapons from entering Cuba. The United States thought that such a move would put them into control of the situation, however, the Soviet Union went a step further. On October 27 th, 1962, the Soviet Union shot down a U-2 reconnaissance plane flying over Cuba, and fired upon other US surveillance aircraft. While the shooting of US surveillance aircraft was not an act of the Soviet government, but the decision of an individual Soviet commander, the fact was not known at the time and this intensified the relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. This brought the two superpowers dangerously close to nuclear war, and both nations were prepared to respond; the Soviet missile installations in Cuba were almost ready and the United States Strategic Air Command was at DEFCON 2, ready to respond to any imminent nuclear threat. Thankfully, President Kennedy chose not to retaliate, Premier Khrushchev chose not to heed the advice of his officials to go ahead and engage with the US, and both nations decided compromise and back down. Both countries saw how their game of brinkmanship had nearly caused mutually assured destruction, and this enabled US-Soviet relations to thaw slightly. This can be evidenced by the establishment of a permanent direct communications link between the two nations, allowing the two nations leaders to make contact instantly in the event of an imminent nuclear war. This showed that US-Soviet relations improved after the Crisis, with both nations willing to establish communications with each other.

Secondly, after the Cuban Missile Crisis, the entire world finally came to grips with the reality that nuclear war was a real and very possible threat to the security of the entire world. This was especially so for the United States and the Soviet Union, having come dangerously close to engaging in a full-scale nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis. As such, the recent events of the Crisis compelled the leaders of the two nations, along with the United Kingdom, to come together despite their differences and cooperate to prevent a future recurrence of the Crisis. This was achieved through the signing of the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963, which prohibits the detonation of nuclear weapons except underground, in order to slow down the Arms Race and prevent the excessive release of nuclear fallout into the atmosphere. The very fact that the United States and the Soviet Union managed to come together to negotiate on the Treaty speaks volumes that their relationship had finally thawed and was warming up again. With the establishment of a direct, permanent communications link between the United States and the Soviet Union and the signing of the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, all this evidence effectively shows that US-Soviet relations improved after the Cuban Missile Crisis, and played a major role in paving the way for dtente in 1969. However, the improvement of US-Soviet relations did not last long. Tensions rose once again during the Vietnam War, when the United States supported the government of South Vietnam and the Soviet Union supported North Vietnam. Both superpowers provided military and monetary aid to their allies, and with both nations on opposing ends, worsened relations between them. Furthermore, both nations re-ignited the nuclear arms race, with both nations involved in extremely intense competition, inventing more and more terrifying weapons. With both nations constantly trying to best the opponent in nuclear arms, this effectively caused the dtente to come to a total standstill. While the improvements in US-Soviet relations did not last long after the Cuban Missile Crisis, we must however recognize that the Crisis did thaw the decades-long icy tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States. Both nations came together after realizing the risks of brinksmanship and also made strides in reducing the risk of

nuclear war by signing the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and this definitively shows that US-Soviet relationships did in fact improve after the Cuban Missile Crisis.