Has everyone forgotten Cuban missile crisis and for reasons unknown by me not care about North Korean threat?

Answer 1

Cuba was apparently paranoid about having a powerful non-friend nearby and was "rattling the saber" to show its strength and warn off aggression. Near as I can see the situation is similar with N. Korea, except the Cubans were supplied with Russian missiles and I presume the N. Koreans are testing their own design. (Although N. Korea is not physically nearby the U.S., distance is not so much a factor these days). I personally am a bit nervous about the situation lest paranoia leads someone to make a bad decision in N. Korea.

Answer 2

Forgotten? Hardly! I was married with two children at the time (1962) and most of us believed that we were on the brink of atomic war.

It is nothing like the present North Korean situation. The missiles inCuba were real, they worked, and were loaded with atomic war heads, all supplied by the USSR and more were on the way. All of the United States was targetted.

By and large, North Korea’s missle don’t work or work quite poorly and their atomic war heads are limited in number. This is a problem for the United Nations, and the Nations immediately surrounding North Korea. However, North Korea is doing this just to get bilatteral talks with only th eUnited States. Do they want this to solve some problem? No! They want this so that the unbalanced leader can believe that he is on the world stage as a great leader. He can’t feed his own people and in fact starves them to have some weapons even though no one is threatening them. He threatens his neighboring countries. He makes fools out of his friends (Russia and China). He makes agreements and breaks them.

None of this is anything like 1962 and Cube.

Answer 3

I have not forgotten the Cuban Missle Crisis even though I was only a child. I am worried about the North Koreans but I have more confidence in the Chinese and Japanese stopping the threat than I do in George Bush.

Answer 4

I thought of the Cuban missle crisis also when this North Korea thing came up too. I think that we're in such a position with Iraq that there isn't a whole lot we can do unless the situation escalates. I don't think we can afford to do anything without NATO's support or we would alienate the rest of the world even more than now.

Answer 5

Cuba had cause for concern since the US was a stones throw away and was actively trying to take down Castro. Cuba needed money and help and help and Russia was willing to provide both if Cuba allowed Russia to position missles there.Russia needed this "forward" base because we were placing missles in Europ, Turkey and Alaska, right in their back yard.

N. Korea is not next door, does not poise a nuclear threat and we have not actively been trying to topple it (ok so maybe in a subtle way). Eisenhower became a big wimp and instead of finishing N. Korea off he signed a cease fire so technically war has never ended in Korea.

Answer 6

I haven't forgotten and I wasn't even born yet. Why do we pretend to attack terrorists that aren't there but let KNOWN nuclear weapons fly?????? I am amazed that the moroon that runs our country hasn't done anything. What the hell is he thinking?? Does he want to wait till they figure out the bugs and launch a missile at one of our coasts?? I live on the Iron Range and don't think that this part of the country won't go first. Thay have to shut down our productions. AMAZING

Answer 7

If you look back over the history books it appears that no one has EVER in history learned from the past!

Apparently after its all over, everyone forgets it ever happened.

The Iraq war...this North Korea fiasco...HELLO..BEEN THERE DONE THAT!

Maybe its a case of..."We can do this better this time".

I dont know.

Answer 8

I remember in school we had to " duck & cover " ....yeah,... like that would keep you from gettin' fried ! We also had bomb drills ! Oh yeah, growing up in Washington DC was a real treat ! We would have been the first to FRY !!!

Answer 9

The Russians' missles actually worked, though.

Answer 10

Life's already too short to worry about it. I'm more curious than anything.