CURTIS LEMAY WOULD HAVE LIBERATED CUBA RIGHT THEN:

[I]t was the events of October 1962 -- the so-called Cuban missile crisis -- that would shake the world.

Speaking at the United Nations, U.S. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson demanded to know from Valerian Zorin, his Soviet counterpart, whether Moscow was deploying nuclear-tipped missiles in Cuba that could hit U.S. cities.

"All right, sir, let me ask you one simple question," he said. "Do you, Ambassador Zorin, deny that the USSR has placed, and is placing, medium and intermediate range missiles in sites in Cuba? Yes or no? Don't wait for the translation! Yes or no!"

Zorin refused to reply, much to Stevenson's chagrin, but Russian missiles had indeed been deployed on the Caribbean island. 

Taped records of conversations involving U.S. President John F. Kennedy show that the world has perhaps never been closer to a nuclear confrontation.

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