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Kennedy characterized the buildup as a “deliberately provocative and unjustified change in the status quo,” carried out in violation of prior Soviet assurances. He then outlined seven measures: a quarantine on all offensive military equipment bound for Cuba; increased surveillance; a declaration that an attack launched from Cuba would be regarded as a Soviet attack; reinforcement of the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base; a call for a meeting of the Organ of Consultation; a call for an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council; and a demand that Premier Nikita Khrushchev cease his current course of action. The President framed his appeal to Khrushchev as a call to halt a “clandestine, reckless, and provocative threat to world peace and to stable relations between our two nations.”
Approximately one hour before the speech, Secretary of State Dean Rusk formally notified Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin of its contents. Kennedy closed with remarks addressed directly to the captive people of Cuba, to whom the speech was being carried by special radio facilities, expressing sympathy for their situation under what he described as foreign domination.
“The 1930’s taught us a clear lesson: aggressive conduct, if allowed to go unchecked and unchallenged ultimately leads to war.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source“We will not prematurely or unnecessarily risk the costs of worldwide nuclear war in which even the fruits of victory would be ashes in our mouth—but neither will we shrink from that risk at any time it must be faced.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source“Our goal is not the victory of might, but the vindication of right—not peace at the expense of freedom, but both peace and freedom, here in this hemisphere, and, we hope, around the world. God willing, that goal will be achieved.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source“It shall be the policy of this Nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source“The cost of freedom is always high—and Americans have always paid it.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source“To halt this offensive buildup, a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated. All ships of any kind bound for Cuba from whatever nation or port will, if found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons, be turned back. This quarantine will be extended, if needed, to other types of cargo and carriers. We are not at this time, however, denying the necessities of life as the Soviets attempted to do in their Berlin blockade of 1948.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary source• Title: Address During The Cuban Missile Crisis
• Author: John F. Kennedy
• Type: Speech
• Publisher: n/a
• Publication time: October 22, 1962
• Publication place: The Oval Office (The White House), Washington, D.C.
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