Cuban Missile Crisis

[guzzijohn]

I was only seven years old at the time. I have read quite a bit about the missile crisis and have been able to talk to one retired AF pilot that was on runway alert with a nuke on board in Florida and one retired army officer that was in Florida at the time in charge of a AA missile battery which were issued nukes. Both of these people said it was a very scary time understandably. Is there anyone here that was in the armed services that was directly involved in some way? If so, what was your experience and take on the crisis at the time?
GuzziJohn

[magooch]

I was in the Air Force at the time and was stationed in Alaska where one of our prime missions was to support Chrome Dome.

We got President Kennedy's announcement before the general public was aware of the situation and I thought the world was about to come to an end.  We weren't that far from Russia and I figured we'd be one of the first bases to see the beginning of the end.

Everyone was put on Red Alert.  It was pretty scary and no one I knew thought the Soviets would ever back down.  After a couple of weeks, things settled down a bit and we were allowed off the base at least to go to town.  On a bus ride to town I had the opportunity to talk to one of the Army guys that manned one of the missle batteries that guarded the base.  I asked him what they would do if a barrage of missles came our way.  He refused to give me any details, but he said, "Don't worry about it, we've got ya covered."  I don't know if that made me feel much more secure, but at that point, anything was better than nothing.

I was never a Kennedy supporter, but perhaps he was the right man for the job at that particular time.

[nw_hunter]

I was only seven years old at the time. I have read quite a bit about the missile crisis and have been able to talk to one retired AF pilot that was on runway alert with a nuke on board in Florida and one retired army officer that was in Florida at the time in charge of a AA missile battery which were issued nukes. Both of these people said it was a very scary time understandably. Is there anyone here that was in the armed services that was directly involved in some way? If so, what was your experience and take on the crisis at the time?
GuzziJohn

I remember it well! I was stationed in Germany  with the 26th Inf.at the time, and as we were a "Strike unit" on combat alert, we were flown out unexpectedly to Georgia. After landing in Savannah Ga, we were bussed to Ft Benning, where we remained  on alert until the crisis was over. We were told later,had the Soviets not removed their missiles, that we would have been sent to Cuba after the B52's and Intercontinental Ballistic missiles had done their job.

My unit remained at Benning , and later were assigned to a new test group called the 11th Air Assault Div.
I didn't realize it at the time, just how close we came to a nuke war.

[beerbelly]

I was never a Kennedy supporter, but perhaps he was the right man for the job at that particular time

The Russians call Kennedy's bluff at the Bay Of Pigs and he backed down! They thought he would do so again, but he had no choice but to stand his ground this time. Nuke armed rockets in Cuba and they owned us.
                             Beerbelly

[Pat/Rick]

I was in grammer school also at the time. I have since talked to one person that was in the 101st Abn and he said that his unit was in planes on the tarmac ready to go at one point. Also remember "duck and cover" drills at school and the civil defense pamphlets that were distributed through out town. A scary time for America. I don't know if alot of folks understand just how close it was. I think that afterwards was when krushev said "I don't have to destroy America, America will destroy itself". Seems a bit prophetic at times.

[powderman]

I was working in a factory in ILL, night shift. The rumours going around were many and yes, it was a scary time. It was hard to concentrate on my job. POWDERMAN. 

[Gun Runner]

Was on my second enlistment and going to Navy Radio man school in SDiego  CA. Classes that were over half way thru school were placed on standby for immd. trans to the fleet . I fell in that catagory. The instructor we had was of spanish decent, and was pulled from schools command and sent to a ship near cuba because he spolke the language. We were restricted to the barracks if not in class. It got so bad that if you wanted to go to the head down the hall you had to tell somebody where you were going Was glad when they settled that mess and you could go get a BEER, withv out a note from your MOMMY.    Got my attention real quick as had done a lot of patrols durning the quemoy matsu thing with china and tawain, lobbing couple shells across the strights every once in a while.

Gun Runner

[ironglow]

  I had gotten out of the Army in 1957, after completeing my hitch. When that occurred in 1962, it prompted me to reup. I expected we would be "mixing it up" in Cuba. I was in training in Ft Jackson, SC when they sent some "freedom fighters' there to train. Ended up, the only place I fought Cubans was in Ft Jackson...
  Shipped to Germany and was there when JFK got zapped..we were immediately placed on "alert" status.

[torpedoman]

I was in an AUW shop in Norfolk N.A.S. at that time and we were loading aircraft with every weapon we could produce.as fast as we could produce them.working until you could not function, go sleep a couple of hours in a corner of the shop, then back at it.