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Excomm is the Executive Committee of the National Security Council. It was a body of United States government officials that convened to advise President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
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What is ExCom?
A group of advisors hand-picked by President Kennedy to help him handle the Cuban Missile Crisis. EXCOMM is short for Executive Committee of the National Security Council.
What are the three options presented at the EXCOMM meeting?
there were 5 options available they were: launch a full scale invasion on Cuba launch an airstrike Do nothing Naval Blockade (Quarantine) Or try to solve the crisis by diplomatic means
What was Cuban Missile Crisis?
Cuban Missile CrisisBasically, through photographic evidence convened through U-2 flights over Cuba, the US discovered that the Soviet Union was deploying nuclear missiles in Cuba. The crisis began on October 14th, 1962, and lasted for 38 days. It is regarded as the time when the Cold War came the closest to an actual nuclear confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union; it could have developed into WWIII. With the news of this confirmed evidence, President Kennedy called together a special group of senior advisers to meet secretly at the White House to help him come to a strategy as to avoid nuclear destruction of the United States. At this point in time, at the Cuban missile base, the Soviets were capable of hitting any city in the United States sans the far reaches of Washington state. This group created by Kennedy came to be known as the ExComm, or Executive Committee of the National Security Council. These officials discussed the various options, such as an immediate bombing strike or an appeal to the United Nations, both of which were dismissed early on. The real options for ExComm were only military- either a naval blockade and an ultimatum, or a full-scale invasion. The blockade was eventually chosen, even though a few of the officials of ExComm, notably Paul Nitze and Generals Curtis LeMay and Maxwell Tayler, pushed for more aggressive actions.In the end, it came down to the wire. Soviet ships threatened to break the blockade and, at the last moment, turned back. The Soviets removed the missiles- under the condition that the US removed their own missiles from Turkey. President Kennedy ordered an end to the quarantine of Cuba on November 20th.More information from WikiAnswers' contributors:Cuba was afraid that, after the bay of pigs (in which US-backed rebels attacked Cuba and failed) the US would try to topple the Communist party there. So they went to Khrushchev, an ally, and asked for help, and received some missiles. The Americans, who happened to be spying on Cuba at the time, discovered the missiles and raised a fuss, blockading the island. Khrushchev responded by telling his commanders that they could launch the missiles at the US if the Americans made any aggressive move. The world was sitting on the brink of nuclear war. Khrushchev realized this and, knowing that nuclear war would probably kill all human life, gave the order to remove the missiles.The Cuban Missile Crisis occurred in October 1962. When the Soviet Union secretly put nuclear missiles on the island of Cuba, it nearly started a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The missiles were discovered by routine spy-plane surveillance. The missiles were still in the process of being made launch-ready. However, President Kennedy had very little time to make a decision regarding what to do about it. His military advisers all but demanded a full-scale air strike, followed by an invasion of the island. Instead, President Kennedy order the U.S. Navy to "quarantine" the island by not allowing any Soviet ships to travel to Cuba. This, combined with diplomacy, forced Soviet Premier Khrushchev's hand, and the missiles were withdrawn.
How many people were involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis?
That list would take forever to crank out. The three major or central figures were Fidel Castro of Cuba, who wanted a defenisve and offensive nuclear missle system that could enhance the power and prestige of a small island in the Western Hemisphere. Nikita Kruchev sought a method to counterbalance the IRBM threat that the US had introduced around the Soviet Union. Cuba as a missle base was a Golden Opporunity that might not be presened ever again. JFK selected an unconvential way to revert a crisis to something that may be resolved in the diplomatic arena. International Law spells out the difference between a Quarantine and a Blockade and a JFK chose the language that enabled negotiations and the withdrawal of the Soviet weapons from Cuba.
What made JFK intelligent?
President Kennedy was certainly smart in the traditional meaning of the word. His intelligence however came in even greater significance in the form of wisdom. And it was wisdom inspite of his years. Singularly among the ExComm committee, for example, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, he stood against the invasion of Cuba. Unbeknowst to any of the American advisors, nuclear weapons had already been activated on the island 90 miles from US shores. Had Kennedy relented and agreed to the invasion, it would have certainly started WWIII and resulted in the annihilation of close to 100 million people. If any other politician been President instead of JFK, you wouldn't be reading this now. Subseqauently and sobered by the near disastrous clash with Kruschev's generals in the Soviet Union, Kennedy authored and signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, again saving hundreds of thousands of people from contracting cancers from the fallout of of continued nuclear testing. Listen to JFK's American University speech a couple of months before he was killed and you will understand why the "powers that be" could not tolerate Kennedy's vision of peace and the necessary end to a state of constant war, that this peace required. He was eons ahead of his time and no President has come close since, in terms of his vision and wisdom in advocating for peace "for all people, not just in our time but for all time".
Where was the Cuban Missile Crisis?
Cuban Missile CrisisBasically, through photographic evidence convened through U-2 flights over Cuba, the US discovered that the Soviet Union was deploying nuclear missiles in Cuba. The crisis began on October 14th, 1962, and lasted for 38 days. It is regarded as the time when the Cold War came the closest to an actual nuclear confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union; it could have developed into WWIII. With the news of this confirmed evidence, President Kennedy called together a special group of senior advisers to meet secretly at the White House to help him come to a strategy as to avoid nuclear destruction of the United States. At this point in time, at the Cuban missile base, the Soviets were capable of hitting any city in the United States sans the far reaches of Washington state. This group created by Kennedy came to be known as the ExComm, or Executive Committee of the National Security Council. These officials discussed the various options, such as an immediate bombing strike or an appeal to the United Nations, both of which were dismissed early on. The real options for ExComm were only military- either a naval blockade and an ultimatum, or a full-scale invasion. The blockade was eventually chosen, even though a few of the officials of ExComm, notably Paul Nitze and Generals Curtis LeMay and Maxwell Tayler, pushed for more aggressive actions.In the end, it came down to the wire. Soviet ships threatened to break the blockade and, at the last moment, turned back. The Soviets removed the missiles- under the condition that the US removed their own missiles from Turkey. President Kennedy ordered an end to the quarantine of Cuba on November 20th.More information from WikiAnswers' contributors:Cuba was afraid that, after the bay of pigs (in which US-backed rebels attacked Cuba and failed) the US would try to topple the Communist party there. So they went to Khrushchev, an ally, and asked for help, and received some missiles. The Americans, who happened to be spying on Cuba at the time, discovered the missiles and raised a fuss, blockading the island. Khrushchev responded by telling his commanders that they could launch the missiles at the US if the Americans made any aggressive move. The world was sitting on the brink of nuclear war. Khrushchev realized this and, knowing that nuclear war would probably kill all human life, gave the order to remove the missiles.The Cuban Missile Crisis occurred in October 1962. When the Soviet Union secretly put nuclear missiles on the island of Cuba, it nearly started a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The missiles were discovered by routine spy-plane surveillance. The missiles were still in the process of being made launch-ready. However, President Kennedy had very little time to make a decision regarding what to do about it. His military advisers all but demanded a full-scale air strike, followed by an invasion of the island. Instead, President Kennedy order the U.S. Navy to "quarantine" the island by not allowing any Soviet ships to travel to Cuba. This, combined with diplomacy, forced Soviet Premier Khrushchev's hand, and the missiles were withdrawn.
What were the results to the Cuban missile crisis?
Relations between the United States and the Soviet Union improved. The US agreed not to invade Cuba, if the Soviets agreed to remove all the nuclear missiles from Cuba. The US even dismantled the missiles they had in Turkey and, perhaps as a result of the crisis, Kennedy and Kruschchev began to trust each other. They introduced a Washington-Moscow Hotline, a telephone line that linked Russia and America which could be used if something like the Cuban Missile Crisis happened again, and a Treaty was signed in 1963 which banned the testing of nuclear weapons, unless underground, by Kennedy and Kruschchev. These were great achievements, considering the two nations hadn't agreed on anything or even spoken for years, and they were important steps towards peace, or at least tolerance, between them.
