Since the United States had a lot more nuclear bombs than the Soviet Union in 1962 (which the national-security state concealed and said was the opposite), the Pentagon and the CIA figured that it would be best to go ahead and have a nuclear war then rather than later. Their rationale? They believed that the fight against communism was ultimately a fight to the death, much like they view today their war on terrorism and their war on Islam. national-security establishment was exhorting Kennedy to do precisely what the Soviets feared - initiate a surprise nuclear attack on the Soviet Union, much like the Japanese did at Pearl Harbor. In fact, what Americans didnвЂ™t realize at the time - and many still donвЂ™t realize - is that the U.S. LetвЂ™s not forget another principle regarding paranoia: Paranoid people are sometimes followed too. Countries generally donвЂ™t like to have nuclear missiles pointed at them, especially when the nuclear missiles are nearby. governmentвЂ™s response to a similar situation, one in which, say, Russia was installing nuclear weapons in, say, Cuba, which is located quite near the United States. Paranoia? Maybe, but really no different from the U.S. That meant, then, that in the eyes of the Soviets, those Jupiter missiles had another purpose - to serve as a first strike in a surprise nuclear attack against Russia. Thus, in a real war it would have been easy for the Soviets to knock them out before they could be fired. As Schwarz points out in his article, the Jupiter missiles in Turkey would take an inordinately long time to activate. national-security stateвЂ™s standard story is that all of its anti-Russian activities, both during the Cold War and today, are entirely defensive. As part of its Cold War activities, the Pentagon had installed Jupiter nuclear missiles in Turkey, something that the Soviets didnвЂ™t like, especially given the close proximity of Turkey to Russia. national-security establishment, the totalitarian-like apparatus that had been grafted onto AmericaвЂ™s federal governmental system to wage a Cold War against AmericaвЂ™s World War II partner and ally, the Soviet Union. President.вЂќД«y вЂњwe,вЂќ Bundy was referring to the U.S. Now thatвЂ™s be goddammned dangerous, I would think.вЂќ KennedyвЂ™s national security adviser McGeorge Bundy responded, вЂњWell, we did it, Mr. Hypothesizing, Kennedy said, вЂњItвЂ™s just as if we suddenly began to put a major number of MRBMs in Turkey. As Benjamin Schwarz pointed out in a fascinating and insightful article on the Missile Crisis in the Atlantic magazine, Kennedy was trying to figure out why Khrushchev would initiate the crisis in the first place. had nuclear missiles in Turkey aimed at the Soviet Union. nuclear weapons get back into Turkey? More important, what are they doing there? What is their purpose?ДЄt the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, President Kennedy himself was surprised to discover that the U.S. nuclear missiles from Turkey more than 50 years, as part of the deal he struck with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to resolve the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy ordered the removal of U.S. nuclear weapons in Turkey? ThatвЂ™s not possible, I thought. nuclear missiles in that country in danger of falling into the wrong hands. The article pointed how the political instability that is roiling Turkey places the U.S. national-security branch of the federal government - i.e., the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA - does surprises me anymore, but I must admit that I was bit taken aback when I read an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times entitled, вЂњ LetвЂ™s Get Our Nuclear Weapons Out of TurkeyвЂќ by Steve Andreasen.

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