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"Thirteen Days," Kevin Costner''s new movie, dramatizes the most dangerous moment in human history: the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. The film''s producers consulted with a number of affiliates of the Belfer Center including Graham T. Allison, Ernest R. May, and Philip D. Zelikow. The screenwriters utilized the secret tapes of the Missile Crisis, transcribed by May and Zelikow, as well as Allison''s analysis of the crisis in Essence of Decision.
Allison notes that "Thirteen Days" is not a documentary, but rather a dramatization inspired by history. Despite distortion of many historical facts, he believes the central themes of the movie are essentially faithful to what happened in 1962 when John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev stood "eyeball to eyeball."
The movie makes real the fact that confrontation could have ended in nuclear war. Viewers see the essential and ultimately decisive role of presidential leadership in choosing among conflicting recommendations of persuasive advisers.
In 1962, the U.S. discovered the Soviet Union in the midst of a surreptitious effort to place nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba. Kennedy demanded withdrawal of the missiles, but during a week of bargaining the Soviets accelerated construction of the missiles and brought them to operational readiness. The U.S. faced the choice between capitulation and escalation to war. At the final hour, Kennedy devised a complex proposal; Khrushchev withdrew the missiles, and war was thankfully averted.
Could our new President find himself facing his own nuclear test? A decade beyond the Cold War, scenarios for a nuclear crisis are fortunately much more difficult to imagine. But, as Allison points out, the Cuban Missile Crisis offers lessons.
Khrushchev''s recklessness at the time seemed "inexplicable," but with the benefit of the historical record one can see how earlier American actions created a context for Khrushchev''s decisions. A buildup of U.S. strategic nuclear missiles lead Soviet strategic planners to fear a surprise first strike by the U.S. that would eliminate their ability to retaliate. Cuba offered an attractive location from which Soviet short-range missiles could hit the American homeland.
Allison notes that as President George W. Bush reviews proposals to build national missile defenses, the lessons of the Cuban Missile Crisis are worth reviewing. What could Russia, China, and others do in response? As history shows, such reactions can include unlikely, unforeseen, and highly risky initiatives that pose grave dangers for America.
Caption: In collaboration with the producers of "Thirteen Days," BCSIA created a Web site— http://www.cubanmissilecrisis.org— to help movie viewers explore historical facts of the Cuban Missile Crisis and analyze nuclear danger today.