Above & beyond : John F. Kennedy and America's most dangerous Cold War spy mission

Sherman, Casey 1969- (author.). Tougias, Mike, 1955- (author.).

Summary: "In 1963, President Kennedy gave the commencement address at the American University in Washington, DC. The Cuban Missile Crisis had forced him to reexamine the Cold War and his onetime foe Nikita Khrushchev. Those tense thirteen days in October 1962 had brought both leaders closer together as the world itself drew perilously close to nuclear war. JFK had pushed for direct contact with his Soviet counterpart and had a special hotline installed between the White House and the Kremlin and a second hotline in the basement of his home so that the leaders could discuss future issues themselves without the dangers of misinterpretation. The world seemed a warmer and brighter place than it had been that previous October, during the darkest and coldest days of the Cold War. The United States and the Soviet Union were now working toward a treaty that would outlaw nuclear weapons testing, an outcome inconceivable just months before. It was indeed the dawn of a new era, something the president had promised during his inauguration in 1961. Now, two years later, he was about to give what Nikita Khrushchev called 'the greatest speech by any American President since Roosevelt'" --

Item details

ISBN: 9781610398046
ISBN: 1610398041
ISBN: 9781610398053
Physical Description: print
viii, 329, 8 unnumbered pages of plates ; 25 cm
Edition: First edition.
Publisher: New York : PublicAffairs, 2018.
Copyright: ©2018

Contents / Notes

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

Starbursts -- Born to fl -- Alive -- The pacifist -- The warrior -- The angel -- The dragon lady -- Ready and eager to go -- From thunderbird to UFO -- Cloak, dagger, and danger -- Secrets revealed -- High crimes -- Dawn of a new era -- Castro must go -- Vienna waits for you -- Trouble at home -- Soviets pour into Cuba -- A change in strategy -- "We've got MRBMs in Cuba" -- Grim decisions -- Brass knob -- General Curtis LeMay and the president -- SAMs tracking U-2s -- Taking a stand -- Crusaders -- Close encounters -- The quarantine -- Until hell freezes over -- Pressure points -- Lost! -- A single mission -- MAYDAY! MAYDAY! -- "Some son-of-a-bitch never gets the word" -- Target -- Kennedy and Khrushchev on the brink -- Two secret meetings -- Blast them now! -- Invasion imminent -- The day of the doves.