Notes

The Cuban Missile Crisis threatened world peace because:
The way Kennedy responded to the crisis caused tension. When Soviet ships continued to sail towards Cuba after Kennedy imposed a naval
blockade, the world watched expecting war.
It brought the superpowers to the brink of nuclear war. Kennedy had considered a nuclear attack as an option when responding to the photos
of missile sites in Cuba.
During the crisis, there were moments when the possibility of war was high- once when Cubans shot down a U2 plane and once when
Americans stopped and boarded a Soviet ship containing nuclear bombs.
However the crisis actually resulted in an attempt to reduce tension & limit the arms race because they had got so close to war.
The Berlin Crisis threatened world peace because:
 It was a propaganda victory for the USA but there was pressure on Kennedy to react by taking direct action. Kennedy did not want
to go to war over Berlin, but he was concerned that he did not want to be seen as weak. This may have encouraged his reaction in the
Cuban Missile Crisis.
 In 1963 Kennedy visited Berlin and declared “Ich bin ein Berliner” promising to defend Berlin against the Soviets. This made the
Soviets angry.
 It showed the USA that Khrushchev could be just as cruel and brutal system as Stalin.
 However in some ways it removed an area of conflict between the superpowers as the USA no longer feared a repeat of the Berlin
Blockade (