Privately, the president contemplated his options, which included air strikes, a military invasion, or a blockade of the island. Kennedy chose to blockade the island and went on television and radio on October 22 to inform the American people of the missiles and his decision to quarantine Cuba. Meanwhile, American forces began practicing in Florida for a possible invasion of Cuba while Strategic Air Command kept a fleet of nuclear bomb carrying Bs in the air at all times.
In exchange for reassurances from Kennedy that the United States would not invade Cuba, the Soviets removed the missiles from Cuba and the crisis passed. Kennedy and Robert McNamara. Kennedy and Khrushchev. Fidel Castro. Construction of the Berlin Wall. Constructing the Berlin Wall. Reconnaissance photo showing missile sites in Cuba. By the late s, the Soviet Union had built up a convincing nuclear arsenal that could be delivered on the territory of the United States and Western Europe.
By the mids, unilateral deterrence gave way to "mutual deterrence," a situation of strategic stalemate. The superpowers would refrain from attacking each other because of the certainty of mutual assured destruction, better known as MAD.
This theory is still a major part of the defense policies of the United States and Russia. Both superpowers recognized that the first requirement of an effective deterrent was that it should survive or "ride out" a surprise "counterforce" targeted attack without being decimate — a task made difficult by the ever increasing numbers of accurate delivery systems, "penetration aids," and multiple warheads.
This led to the foundation of the nuclear triad, or use of three different types of delivery systems bombers, missiles, and submarines to assure that a second-strike capability existed able to cause massive destruction to the attacking nation.
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