HUFFINGTON POST: …It began the moment that Khrushchev told Kennedy he would remove the “weapons which you call offensive” from Cuba, nuclear warheads capable of reaching U.S. cities as far as 1,550 miles away. What the Soviet leader neglected to mention was that he had deployed nearly 100 tactical nuclear weapons designed to defend against another Bay of Pigs, the botched U.S.-led invasion just 18 months before. Officials in Washington knew about the Luna missiles but wouldn’t learn until 1992 that they carried nuclear warheads.
While the world breathed a sigh of relief as the Soviets began removing the long-range missiles, Castro fumed. He had been bypassed in negotiations between the two superpowers. Set on keeping the Hiroshima-sized nuclear warheads, he began to chafe at his handlers in Moscow. Concerned the cigar-chomping revolutionary might do something to ruin the agreement, Khrushchev dispatched his number two, Soviet Deputy Prime Minister Anastas Mikoyan, to Havana to calm Castro down.
Although he would learn soon after arriving that his wife of 43 years had died, Mikoyan had little time to grieve. In sensitive negotiations that would remain secret for decades, Mikoyan initially told Castro he could keep the tactical nukes that had escaped U.S. notice… (more)
