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October 18, 1962

Telegram from Polish Embassy in Washington (Drozniak), 18 October 1962

Drozniak forwards a report from US Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs [Edwin M.] Martin. Martin says that the Americans are well-informed of the military situation in Cuba, that Cuba does not possess nuclear weapons (nor will they be likely to because the USSR did not give such weapons to China, so why would they give them to Cuba?), that the level of the Cuban economy is twenty-five percent lower than the period before Fidel Castro came to power and Cuba is much more economically dependent on the USSR, and finally that any military invasion or complete blockade of Cuba would be considered an act of war by the USSR.

October 22, 1962

Cable from Federal Republic of Germany Embassy, Washington (Knappstein)

An analysis of American decisions during the Cuban Missile Crisis and the economic blockade, as well as of American perceptions of Soviet intentions during that time period, by the West German Ambassador to the United States.

March 12, 1962

Alexei Adzhubei's Account of His Visit to Washington to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Alexei Adzhubei, Khrushchev’s son-in-law and the editor-in-chief of Izvestia, reports on his meetings with US journalists and officials in Washington, DC. Especially significant was his 30 January meeting with President John F. Kennedy in which Kennedy compared the communist revolution in Cuba with the 1956 Hungarian Revolution suppressed by the Soviet Union. Adzhubei also described Kennedy's comments on German reunification.

October 18, 1962

From the cable on the conversation between Gromyko and Kennedy

Gromyko reported on his meeting with Kennedy. The Soviet representative argued that Cuba was never a threat to the US and Washington should end its hostile activities against Havana. He also warned Kennedy of the possibility of nuclear war in the event of an invasion of Cuba. Gromyko reiterated the Moscow's intention of supporting Cuba only in economic and defensive issues. Kennedy, however, pointed out that it was difficult to explain the surge in Soviet military aid to Cuba. The US president reaffirmed that Washington did not have any plan to invade Cuba, at least after Bay of Pigs and Operation Mongoose. The US was only preventing actions that could have led to war. Gromyko reemphasized the peaceful rivalry of the two ideological systems and proposed a meeting between the two leaders.