Cuban Missile Crisis Essays (2640 words) - International Relations

Cuban Missile Crisis John F. Kennedy's greatest triumph as President of the United States came in 1962, as the world's two largest superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States, edged closer and closer to nuclear war. The Soviet premier of Russia was caught arming Fidel Castro with nuclear weapons. The confrontation left the world in fear for thirteen long days, with the life of the world on the line. In 1962, Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union, employed a daring gambit. He secretly ordered the placement of Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba. Earlier the Soviet premier had promised Soviet protection to Cuba (Cuban 774). This was the first time any such weapons had been placed outside of Eurasia (Hersh 345). Several explanations for his actions have been offered by historians. One factor in Khrushchev's decision was a strategic one (Hersh 346). A year earlier, the United States had placed several medium-range nuclear missiles in Turkey (Cuban 774). The missiles were just across the Black Sea from the Soviet Union, within sight of Khrushchev's summer home (Hersh 346). President Kennedy had earlier ignored his advisors and placed nuclear missiles in Turkey. Another factor was a threat by the US to one of the Soviet Union's satellite countries, Cuba (Hersh 346). The United States had, in the past, attempted to kill Fidel Castro, dictator of Cuba (Brinkley 1047). In July of 1962, the United States found out that nuclear missile shipments were being made to Cuba. United States U-2 spy planes flew over the island, bringing back reports of construction and ballistic missiles (Cuban 744). The CIA found that five thousand Russian military technicians were in Cuba, and various military weapons were being unloaded onto the island. When U-2 activity was increased, reports showed the presence of SAMs (surface-to-air missiles) and torpedo boats with ship-to-ship rockets (Mills 233). On September 4, Soviet ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin met with Robert Kennedy to discuss a message from Khrushchev. According to the message, the military buildup was defensive in nature and not militarily threatening. Robert F. Kennedy informed the ambassador that the United States would closely watch all military activity in Cuba and warned of severe consequences should the Soviets place offensive weapons (Mills 233). President Kennedy apparently did not believe the message. He asked Congress for the authority to mobilize over 100,000 reservists into active duty. The Soviets response was that they could fire rockets from Russia just as easily as from Cuba. Offensive missiles in Cuba, they argued, were therefore unnecessary for an offensive base(Mills 234). Furthermore, the United States had over 3,000 nuclear warheads and nearly 300 missile launchers, opposed to the Soviet Union's 250 warheads and 24 to 44 missile launchers (Hersh 343). Still, John Kennedy thought that Cuba could become a base for military operations at any given moment. The United States had to be prepared to face it (Mills 234). At this point in the crisis, John McCone, the CIA director, was regularly sending President Kennedy reports of missiles capable of launching a nuclear warhead being sent to Cuba. According to McCone, medium-range ballistic missiles(MRBMs) would be next (Hersh 348). U-2's were sent to scout the west end of Cuba. On October 14, the CIA reported that construction had begun for MRBMs (Mills 235). Despite the increased state of readiness in the US, many people did not realize that the Soviet Union had done nothing on its home territory during the crisis. Its fleet of ICBM launchers were not mobilized and neither were Soviet reserves. There were not even any threats against Berlin (Hersh 343). Regardless of what the Soviets said, the United States was still far ahead in the nuclear arms race. ICBM's were expensive to build and the Soviet Union did not have an abundance of money. Installing the smaller missiles in Cuba was much cheaper than building more ICBMs. Khrushchev believed that Kennedy would not oppose the building of the missile bases in Cuba because the United States President had not opposed Khrushchev in the past (Mills 236). Not only did he secretly place the missiles in Cuba, but Khrushchev used Georgi Bolshakov and others to tell President Kennedy that missiles were not being shipped to Cuba. The Soviet premier was cautious to avoid a

Jews Without Money essays

Jews Without Money essays Personal struggles, we all have them. Some have them more than others. In the partly autobiographical novel Jews Without Money, By Michael Gold, He depicts how the Jews struggled to make ends meet. His life was not easy growing up. Gold and his brothers were forced by poverty to get low-paying, unskilled jobs. They were forced to drop out of high school to support the family. Their father was a small businessman. His big dream was to own a business, but he didnt know how to run it. He ended up injuring himself at work and therefore in turn, confined to his bed Life was hard for Mike living in the ghetto of the Lower East Side of New York City. For centuries The Jews has lived in this universal ghetto. Yiddish literature is saturated with the ghetto melancholy and poverty. Jews Without Money is much compared with works such as All Souls by Michael Patrick Macdonald. Michael Gold was a communist all his life. Gold helped found "The New Masses," a literary periodical intended to "revive the spirit of the old Bohemian-left-liberal alliance." Gold was a journalist for the Communist press from 1933 off and on for the next thirty-three years. He developed radical political views and began contributing to socialist journals such as the Masses and the Call. Gold was strong opponent of the United States becoming involved in the First World War. When the USA entered the war in 1917 Gold moved to Mexico to evade the draft. All Souls, by Michael Patrick Macdonald was also a book about struggle. South Boston was also a ghetto and Michael and his family try to survive in a harsh world. His Sisters and Michael saw first hand, all the cruelty that went down in a place called The best place in the world. This book is related to Jews Without Money because they both came from poor backgrounds. McDonald and his family struggled to make ends meet. Go ...

System Implementation Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

System Implementation - Essay Example All the different types of users have limited privileges for their data as well as other users’ data. For example, the customer can only view but cannot insert, delete, or update their information. Consequently, that makes our system more secure. The principle involved designing very simple web pages for all the users. These simple pages view served the security features that were used. For example, the page shows three choices for them that are accessing their data, or customer data or transaction data. That occurs if the user is an employee. If the user selects their information, the page displays a table with the user’s information only. However, the pages that are designed to look for the customer contains two input fields to search for the client based on their id or first name. For instance, if the Employee wants to look for their customer’s information. In this situation, we applied the feature of a prepared statement and variable binding in Java JDBC component in order to avoid any vulnerability in our project. The system also applied this principle. There were no standard mechanisms for our users that will cause extreme effects. Every user has his mechanism, privilege, and flow. The Manager works differently from the employee or the customer. Moreover, we created users in the database for each category. Thus, the user who uses the database as manager1 is different from manager2. The concept is taken care in the attack phase. We exposed the system designs and security mechanisms to other teams. That helped us a lot because it is better to know about the System’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities from friends before the attackers. In this situation, we can fix and update the missing points and errors quickly. Further, we don’t need to batch after the attacker misusing.

Impact of World War II on the United States Essay

Impact of World War II on the United States - Essay Example Prior to the war, the New Deal was not able to overcome the stagnant state of the US economy despite the concerted efforts of the Roosevelt government. The unemployment rate remained steadily above 14 percent despite having considerably fallen since the darkest years of the depression. A consideration of a more penetrative government fiscal intervention gave way to speculations about real economic recovery in which it was posited that the recovery would become elusive if given to the care of the private sector (Vatter 1985, p. 7). Such recovery required much more Keynesian doses for the New Deal to finally affect full employment (Vatter 1985, p.11). Political impacts include several pursuits that aimed to repair a damaged economy during the New Deal era and the war itself. A political, psychological, and economic shift was a product of the New Deal and World War II in the United States. These concerns troubled the American government during the war years and immediately afterward: big government, the economy, and communism at home and abroad. It was inferred that the bourgeoning bureaucracy that ensued in the United States during the WWII was one characterized by the mounting of commissions, agencies, and administrations, aiming to serve the legal and political necessities of the period. Examples of these are the Foreign Economic Administration, Maritime Commissions and the War Shipping Administration, Selective Service System, US Employment Service, War Manpower Commission, War Labor Board, and War Food Administration (Vatter 1985, p. 87). Each of these had their on designated purposes in which central is the organizing and carrying out of American war-time economic production and output. All of these bureaucratic organizations formed a government front aiming to push through all forms of opposition in the interest of allied victory. The War Production Board (WPB) was established in order to distribute strategic materials as well as suspend the production of consumer products. The WMC attempted to balance the appropriat e distribution of men and women in military, industry, and agriculture during the war (Maddox 1992, p. 193). There was no questioning that the United States placed itself in a hegemonic position as a world power after the war, which may be referred to as one of its political impacts. Likewise, America's preoccupation with the promotion of democracy is essentially an idealist stance that emerged from the moralism and exceptionalism of the America political tradition (Ikenberry 2000, p. 103). This tradition is manifested through actual foreign policy, often carried out at the expense of more sober American international interests (Ikenberry 2000, p. 103). It is for the pursuit of making foreign policy commitments more acceptable to American public that the American democratic stance becomes a minor distraction. The American promotion of democracy after World War II reflects a pragmatic and evolving understanding of creating a stable political order in the international arena, which was later called "an American liberal grand strategy"

Forklift Accident Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Forklift Accident - Article Example An accident occurred at the construction site of a light industrial building. A worker was driving a 3 ton forklift down a circular vehicle ramp from the fourth level towards the third level. There was no load on the forklift. The vehicle suddenly swerved and overturned on the third level and the worker who was driving the forklift was crushed beneath the vehicle and died on the spot. The driver had not undergone the mandatory forklift driver’s training course. Findings revealed that the forklift involved in the accident belonged to the main contractor and was poorly maintained. The driver was an employee of the plastering and bricklaying works contractor. The numbers of trained forklift operators were inadequate with respect to the number of forklifts. Also there was no risk assessment conducted on forklift operations.Another such accident occurred at a warehouse in a distribution park. A worker tallying stock stored on metal racks squeezed himself into the gap between two ra cks. A forklift driver was pushing racks closer together to make space for more racks. He did not see the employee, and the employee was crushed to death between the metal racks. If risk assessment had been carried out, forklifts and other workers would not have been allowed to operate in the area concurrently. It also seemed that there was inadequate safety training awareness among the employees.The key to preventing such accidents is training and enforcement of safety measures at places where forklifts are used.

Constructivist and Liberalist Argument on State Shared Value

Constructivist and Liberalist Argument on State Shared Value According to realism, relations between states in the anarchical world is doomed to the state of constant conflict in which states can only count on themselves. Whatever cooperation exists in the world they prescribe it to the hegemonic order. This means that hegemon, creates institutions which facilitate cooperation but that these institutions are carriers of hegemonic interests and their existence is related to the existence of a hegemon. Representatives of liberal school deny the abovementioned argument and point at contemporary networks of cooperation in many fields which they see as a positive current in the world politic. Realists and liberals agree that the status of international system is anarchy and sovereign states make up the international order. As Alexander Wendt stated in 1992 in his article[1]: neorealists and neoliberals share generally similar assumptions about agents: states are the dominant actors in the system and they define security in self-interested terms[2]. As for the Liberals, they underline the importance of international institutions and cooperation between states thus placing a principle of the shared values in the center of state-behavior. Constructivist Argument According to Alexander Wendt, concept of power politics is socially constructed: If self-help is not a constitutive feature of anarchy, it must emerge casually from processes in which anarchy plays only a permissive role. This reflects a second principle of constructivism: that the meanings in terms of which action is organized arise out of interaction[3] Wendt views self-help as something not given by nature but instead, socially constructed. Having in mind the fact that power politics is socially constructed means that it can be transformed by human practice. Furthermore, constructivists look at international arena as a constructed structure which is built by socio-cultural practices, ideas, domestic and international interactions. According to Wendt, the basic tenets of constructivism are the structures of human association that are determined primarily by shared ideas rather than material forces, and that the identities and interests of purposive actors are constructed by these s hared ideas rather than given by nature[4]. According to the theory of constructivism the effect of anarchy on the state is proportionate to the states perception of anarchy, identity and interest. If in the state of Anarchy state A perceives the rise of power of state B as threat to its security, then a security dilemma is created and states apply to the self-help principle. But, if state A and state B view their security in the form of cooperation and collaboration, then a security dilemma is not formed, thus not establishing logical grounds for self-help principle to develop. Alexander Wendt in his article anarchy is what state make of it: The social construction of power politics states that: the nature of international anarchy appears to be conflictual if states show a conflictual behaviour towards each other, and cooperative if they behave cooperatively towards one another. Therefore, it is states themselves that determine anarchys nature.[5] Liberal argument Representatives of liberal theory agree with realists on a notion that international system is anarchical. But unlike realist, liberalism mitigates the risks coming from the nature of anarchy with cooperation and collaboration between states.[6]. While liberalism agrees on an anarchical condition of international politics, it provides three main mechanisms that can explain a state behavior in order to avoid the risks coming from the anarchy: consolidation of democracy, economic interdependence, and transtational institutions.[7] In order to mitigate the threats and risks coming from the anarchy representatives of the liberal theory believe that states should become more interdependent with each other. Shared democratic values and economical interdependence significantly reduces the risk of military confrontation between states. Free trade relations between states, which result in a close economic ties between its citizens, excludes the chance of military confrontation with each other. According to Michael W. Doyle: Wars occur outside the liberal zone because conflicts of interest are deeper there.[8] Liberalism also allows a probability of the world peace despite the anarchical feature of international politics. If the state behavior is prone to establishment of international organizations and institutions then this behavior may lead to the long term cooperation between the member nations which share the same values. According to the liberalism military conflicts are not inevitable but can be prevented through collaboration. The development of an international organization such as United of Nation, NATO and European Union are the examples of cooperation between states that could promote stability. A central claim of this theory is that once created, institutions tend to persist, because it is cheaper to maintain institutions than to create new ones. Therefore, when confronted with new sets of problems, states seek to modify an already existing institution to meet new challenges. Thus, institutional liberal theories have easier time explaining why NATO persisted after the end of the Cold War even when the enemy that it was supposed to counter disappeared. Liberalism underlines the significace of the shared values between states. The principle of shared values can explain state behavior as they create alliances and develop joint capabilities, rather than focusing only on the development of their own.

Emancipation :: essays research papers

Emancipation has been defined as the pursuit, expansion, and security of freedom. I believe that most people including myself would say successful emancipation has taken place when freedom has been pursued, expanded upon, and secured. What makes peoples views of emancipation different is not its definition, but what is freedom? Freedom shows a lot of faces throughout the times and environments studied in both the Haitian and Jamaican Revolutions. Freedom for myself is a peace of mind. I feel that a person who wakes up with a peace of mind has experienced successful emancipation. Successful emancipation does not mean that everything is perfect and the way it should be. Perfection does not exist in this world; everything has its flaws and downfalls including emancipation, justice, and freedom. I think we all work towards the day we have established who we are and find comfort with our role in society. I also feel it is hard for us to be as thoughtful and passionate about emancipation as the slaves of these times were. Our minds can’t conceive the true feeling of what is like to be treated like something other than a human being. I feel our lifestyles are far beyond a slave’s view of what emancipation is. Slaves in both Haiti and Jamaica did not rebel in order to live a lifestyle we live today. They were willing to settle for far less than we have today. Slaves were willing to die in order to experience what they felt was successful emancipation. Successful emancipation for slaves was not be confounded to land or owned by whites. Slaves simply wanted the opportunity to work their own land, start families, and enjoy life. Although most people in Haiti and Jamaica of African descent were slaves, there was a small minority of free people, which consisted of mulattos and free blacks. Even though these free people witnessed first hand the experienced of slavery the compassion and empathy for it was definitely disappointing. Their understanding of emancipation was totally different than that of slaves. The free people already experienced and had what slaves desired and viewed as emancipation. Free people had their own land to farm, build houses on, and start families. Thus giving them a totally different perspective on emancipation and freedom. Despite free people had their own land, they still were not close to sharing the same rights as the whites.