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Thirteen Days (2001)
What the...? Who's that?
You're bad Who grabbed me? Who grabbed me? Who grabbed me? Honey, you're gonna be late What'd you grab me for? Mom, I can't find my shoes for school They're under the couch Dad, will you sign my permission slip for tomorrow? Give it to your mother Your mother's arms are full You got time for pancakes? Nope Give us another one, Dad Secretary of Defense? Dean Rusk Wrong And you get to wax my car Rusk is State, moron It's Robert McNamara Attorney General? Too Easy! It's Bobby Kennedy All right, wise guys. Assistant Secretary of State for Latin America That's too hard Wait a minute This isn't a permission slip This is your report card! Have you seen these grades? No All right. Gotta go Be good You... And I'm talking to you later Morning, Evelyn Hi, Ken Those candies are for the kids Morning, Floyd Morning, Mr. O'Donnell Morning, Jackie Hi, Kenny Want a schedule? No Why'd you cross all my people off the list? You don't have anybody on it who means anything No votes there, there's not money It's party, Kenny And the one thing that we both can be sure of is that you don't know how to have a party Well, party to you, politics to me So, who do you want? For real Everyone on my list I don't want to spend an entire evening pretending that your votes and money are more interesting than they really are And I want my kids to stop eating the candy in the Oval Office That's not me Then who is it? I don't rat on my friends I'm going to take this whole list thing up with your "friend" Are you trying to go around me? Go around you, over you, through you Whatever it takes You're starting to bug me Good I'll get back to you Top of the morning, Mr. President Morning, Kenny Just ran into your wife Wanna talk about this party? No You see Homer Capehart's tirade today? I did Don't see why he needs to invent an issue He's got his election sewn up Even so we should still go out for Bayh It's good groundwork for us in '64 I'm looking for that... Vietnam thing The two planes that went down? Yeah It didn't make it before press time I haven't taken a look at the West Coast papers yet but I doubt we'll see anything 'til tomorrow I was eating that No, you weren't I was No, you weren't I was, you bastard so what have we got today? Today... That's it That's the one we're looking for I nee dot see the president, Kenny or 4:30 to 5:00. Take your pick I need to see him now, Ken Then go on up I'll let him know you're coming Coffee? Yeah That's not what you said That's not what... Listen to me you worthless piece of shit You will put Daly's man on the circuit and you'll do it today You owe your gaddamn job to this administration Are you saying I'm not grateful? Yeah, I can hear how grateful you are There's a word you need to learn It's the only word in politics It's called loyalty Loyalty Now, is there any part of this you don't understand? Good What? This isn't the blessed order of St. Mary the Meek You better come in here What was it you were saying to me the other day about Cuba? That it wasn't important Not as far as the election goes Mac! Can I see that for a second, please? Here, Kenny. You used to look down a bombsight for a living Just ignore the labels What does that look like to you? I don't know What is it? Our U-2's took these pictures of Soviet medium- range ballistic missiles in Cuba They appear to be the SS-4 range of a thousand miles three megaton nuclear warheads Seen here in this year's May Day Parade in Red Square Jesus Christ in heaven White House operator Mr. O'Donnell, please for Secretary McNamara White House operator What the crap is going on today? That's right The principals are assembling in an hour See you then Where's Bobby? He should be here any minute Oh, good Good Where the hell are you? We're in here Jesus Christ, guys What the hell is Kruschev thinking? Did you have any indication of this from your KGB pal, Bolshakov? Any possible warning or sense of motivation? Complete snowjob Then we went out and told the country they weren't putting missiles into Cuba Jesus I feel like we caught the Jap carrier steaming for Pearl Harbor Morning, gentlemen Morning, Mr. President Mr. Secretary Mr. President Bob. Bet you had a late night Sleep is for the week, Mr. President Mr. President CIA's been notified McCone's on his way back from the West coast He's been burying his step-son General Carter's here, though Ted Kenny Okay Let's have it Arthur? Gentlemen, as most of you now know a U-2 over Cuba Sunday morning took a series of disturbing photographs Our analysis at NPIC indicates that the Soviet Union has followed up its conventional weapons build-up in Cuba with the introduction of surface- to-surface medium range ballistic missiles, or MRBM's Our official estimate at this time is that this missiles system is the SS-4 Sandal We do not believe that the missiles are as yet operational IRONBARK reports that the SS-4 can deliver a 3-megaton nuclear weapon 1, 000 miles So far we've identified 32 missiles serviced by about 3, 400 men undoubtedly all Soviet personnel Our cities and military installations in the southeast as far north as Washington, D. C. are in range of these weapons and in the event of a launch would have only five minutes of warning Five minutes, gentlemen In those five minutes they could kill 80 million Americans and destroy a significant percentage of our bomber bases The Joint Chiefs' consensus Mr. President is that this signals a major doctrinal shift in Soviet thinking to a first-strike policy It is a massively destabilizing move How long until they're operational? General Taylor can answer that question better than I can GMAIC- Guided Missiles Intelligence Committee estimates ten to fourteen days A crash program could limit that time However, I must stress that there may be more missiles that we don't know about We need more U-2 coverage Gentlemen, I want first reactions here Assuming for the moment that Krushev has not gone off the deep end and intends to start World War Three What are we looking for? Mr. President, My team is in agreement If we permit the introduction of nuclear missiles to a Soviet satellite nation in our hemisphere the diplomatic consequences will be too terrible to contemplate The Russians are trying to show the world they can do whatever they want wherever they want and we're powerless to stop them If they succeed It'll be Munich all over again Yes. Appeasement only makes the aggressor more aggressive And the Soviets will be emboldened to push us even harder No, we must remove the missiles one way or another It seems to me the options are either some combination of international pressure and action on our part till they give up or... we hit them An air strike Bob? We've worked up several military scenarios Before I ask General Taylor to take us through the various options I'd like for us to adopt a rule If we strike we must agree to do it before the missiles become operational Because once they are I don't think we can guarantee getting them all before at least some of them are launched It's clear we cannot permit Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba We have to get those missiles out I don't think it's going to matter what Kruschev's intentions are Right now I don't see any way around hitting them If we kill a lot of Russians they'll move against Berlin If they attack Berlin, that's NATO and we're at war We're damned if we do, but if we don't we're in a war for sure somewhere else in six months If there are alternatives that make sense and I'm not saying that there are then we need 'em, and fast What about Congress? We may need to start letting key people know And they're all scattered across the country for the campaign We can get Congress back We're gonna need to get the U. N. staff in and warmed up What about the allies? We can't start worrying about everything Right now we gotta figure out what we're gonna do before we worry about how we're gonna do it Well, we've got a bunch of smart guys We lock 'em in a room and kick 'em in the ass until they come up with some solutions I'll do it It's too politicized with you in there anyway They need to be able to stick their necks out Yeah. It'll be the principals a couple of they key guys from each department The Executive Committee of the National Security Council We'll can it EXCOM Okay So I'm only gonna show for the meetings that you call me into Impress us Did it fast Kenny, you're in charge of keeping this thing quiet If word gets out before we know what we're gonna do there's gonna be panic And it's gonna ruin any chance we might have of surprise if we decide to hit them We're gonna need to do a few things right away No Pierre He knows, the press knows And you're gonna have to keep up your schedule Your movements are followed too closely George Ball's got a conference room at State Good You meet over there this afternoon We'll figure out a way to sneak you guys back in here tonight I think we should bring in Dean Acheson Ken he was fighting Soviets while we were still playing ball together at school Find him, Kenny We're gonna need all the help we can get Screw secrecy Try having that fat-ass, sit on your lap all the way from Foggy Bottom You were excited. I say no more Everybody agrees the diplomatic route won't work It's too slow and they'll finish the missiles while we're still talking I hear old Warren Harding used to get his grills in through here We have 850 planes assembling at Homestead Eglin, Opa Locka, MacDill Partick, Pensacola, and Key West Due to the tropical foliage the OPLAN calls for high explosive and napalm loadouts for our ground attack sorties I still think there are diplomatic approaches we haven't considered yet Peace at any price? We have a gun to our head We have high confidence in the expanded air strike option, Mr. President The problem, sir is that it's a short-term solution Kruschev can send in more missiles next month The Chiefs and I believe we should follow up the air strikes with the full version of OPLAN 316 An invasion? Yes, sir We can be sure we get all the missiles and we remove Castro so this can never happen again Is this the Joint Chief's recommendation? Yes, sir Our best option as Bob pointed out this morning would be to commence the strikes before the missiles become operational The invasion happens eight days later Dean What do you think? Gentlemen for the last fifteen years I have fought here at this table alongside your predecessors in a struggle against the Soviet I do not wish to seem melodramatic but I do wish to impress upon you a lesson I learned with bitter tears and great sacrifice The Soviet understands only one language action Respects only one word Force I concur with General Taylor I recommend air strikes followed by invasion perhaps proceeded by an ultimatum to dismantle the missiles If that is militarily viable So it appears we have three options Number one, a surgical air strike against the missiles themselves Two, a much larger air strike against their air defenses along with the missiles. And three invasion So we're certainly gonna do number one We're gonna take these missiles out It seems to me we can't wait very long We should at leat be making those preparations We're preparing to implement all three options Though I must stress again, sir there are risks to the strikes without the follow-on invasion You want to be clear, Mr. President that we've definitely decided against a political track Dean How does this all play out? Your first step, sir will be to demand that the Soviet withdraw the missiles within 12 to 24 hours The will refuse When they do you will order the strikes followed by the invasion They will resist and be overrun They will retaliate against another target somewhere else in the world most likely Berlin We will honor our treaty commitments and resist them there defeating them per our plans Those plans call for the use of nuclear weapons So... what is the next step? Hopeful cooler heads will prevail before we reach the next step Thank you, gentlemen What happened in there? I thought he was going to give us his decision Look, I know them. They just need to... make sure there's no other way They'll get there The Kennedys' father was one of the architects of Munich There's only one responsible choice here So let's hope appeasement doesn't run in families I fear weakness does Jesus Christ Call me Irish, but I don't believe in cooler heads prevailing You know, they think I froze in there You didn't freeze You did exactly what you should have done you stayed out of the corner You didn't decide Acheson's scenario is just... unacceptable And he's got more experience than anyone There's no expert on the subject There's no wise old man Shit, there's just us Acheson's right Talk alone is not gonna accomplish anything Well, let's bomb the shit out of them Everybody wants to Even you Even me Right? It sure would feel good Jack I'm as conniving as they come but a sneak attack is just wrong Things are happening too fast This is starting to smell like the Bay of Pigs all over again Tonight listening to Taylor and Acheson I kept seeing Lemnitzer and Dulles telling me all I had to do was sign on the dotted line And that the invasion would succeed and Castro... and Castro would be gone Easy, just like that There's something... immoral about abandoning your own judgment We just can't let this get out of hand And we'll do whatever we have to do to make this come out right I'm gonna stay here tomorrow You can't We talked about this. Your schedule? Best thing you can do tomorrow is go to Connecticut He's right Yeah Jesus Doesn't anybody in Connecticut have to work today? We love you, JFK The shole spectrum of air strikes is the minumum response the Joint Chiefs will accept No, no, no There is more than one option here And if one isn't occurring to us it's because we haven't thought hard enough Bobby, sometimes there is only one right choice and you thank God when it's so clear You're talking about a sneak attack How would that make us look? A big country blasting a little one into the stone age We'll be everyone's favorites Come on, Bobby. That's naive You know that better than anybody And you weren't so ethically particular when we were talking about options for moving Castro at CIA Bob If we go ahead with these air strikes you know what it'll come to in the end There has got to be something else Give it to me I don't care how crazy, inadequate or stupid it sounds Give it to me Six months ago we gamed out a scenario It's slow It doesn't get rid of the missiles It's got a lot of drawbacks The scenario calls for a blockade of Cuba The situation is worse than we thought We now count 40 missiles Longer range IRBM's They can hit every place in the country, except Seattle Mr. President you give me the order right now my planes will be ready to strike in 3 days time Just say "go" and my boys will get those red bastards General, how long until the Army's ready? We've just begun the mobilization under cover of a pre-arranged exercise, sir We're looking at another week and a half But you can order the strikes now The plans call for an eight day air campaign It'll light a fire under the army's ass to get in place General Lemay, do you truly believe that's our best course of action? Mr. President I believe it is the only course of action America is in danger Those missiles are a threat to our bomber bases and the safety of our nuclear deterrent Without our deterrent there's nothing to keep the enemy from choosing general nuclear war It's out duty Our responsibility to the American people to take out those missiles and return stability to the strategic situation The Big Red Dog is digging in our back yard and we are justified in shooting him Sir we have a rapidly closing window of opportunity where we can to prevent those missiles from becoming operational The other options do not guarantee the end result that we can guarantee However, as more time goes by the less reliable the choice we can offer you becomes Mr. President the motto I chose for SAC is "Peace is our Profession" God forbid we find ourselves in a nuclear exchange But launched missiles from Cuba would kill a lot of Americans The very presence of those missiles gives the Soviets first- strike capability Those missiles make a nuclear exchange more likely And that is why I'm being such a pain in the ass abut destroying them and destroying them immediately Hell, even Mac agrees And sir given your own statements about Cuba I think a blockade or a bunch of political talk would be considered by a lot of our friends and neutrals as a pretty weak response And I suspect many of our own citizens feel the same way You're in a pretty bad fix Mr. President What did you say? You're in a pretty bad fix Maybe you hadn't noticed you're in it with me General what are the Soviets gonna do when we attack? Nothing Nothing? Nothing Because the only alternative open to them is one they can't choose You know, they're... they're not just missiles we're gonna be destroying, General If we kill Soviet soldiers they're gonna respond How would we respond if they killed ours? They're gonna do something, General I can promise you that Those goddamn Kennedys are gonna destroy this country if we don't do something about this We're headed out to the back yard to look for that Big Red Dog Thanks, Bob I was hoping Lemay pushed you 'Cause I was ready to knock that son-of-a-bitch across the room We knew it was coming And I'll tell you one thing, Kenny Those brass hats have one big advantage That is that if we do what they want us to do none of us will be left alive to tell them they were wrong Mr. President we need to go over what you're going to say Gromyko should be on his way by now There's still no sign they know that we know about the missiles We're gonna keep it that way Kenny Be right there I'm getting funny questions from the guys Yeah? What sort of questions? About some sort of "military exercises"? You want me to do my job handling the press I need to know what's going on Military exercises? Yeah. Military exercises Haven't heard anything about it Ask Bundy I did. He said to ask you Mr. Gromyko! This way, please! Robert Hugh, how are you? Excuse me, Joan So, tell me about this military exercise going on in Puerto Rico What? It's called... ORTSAC, I believe Castro spelled backwards ORTSAC? I don't know what you're talking about Me either Why? Because maybe the President and Gromyko are gonna talk about it You're trying to drum something up Johnny. Forget it This meeting's been on the books for months Far as I know, it's just a friendly talk on U. S -Soviet relations Mr. President! Will you make a statement, sir? Alright, hold it, fellas You'll get your pictures Does it? I'll be damned Kind of simple for the Pentagon Mr. Gromyko Hold on one minute Gentlemen would you mind shaking hands? So that there should be no misunderstanding the position of the United States which has been made clear by the Attorney General to Ambassador Dobrynin here I shall read a sentence from my statement to the press dated September 13th "Should missiles or offensive weapon be placed in Cuba" "it would present the gravest threat to U. S. national security" Mr. President as Premier Kruschev's own statement of September 13th assured you our military assistance to Cuba is of a defensive nature only So I did not misunderstand you? There are no offensive weapons in Cuba Premier Kruschev's statement of September 13th remains the position of the Soviet government To that I have nothing to add Well, that's good enough for me Thanks so much Thank you Gentlemen if you'll come with me, please A most instructive meeting What happened? Lying bastard Lied right to my face We're split down the middle If I held a vote, I think air strike would beat blockade by a vote or two I want a consensus Either air strike or blockade Something everyone's gonna stand by even if they don't like it And I need it by Saturday So make it happen What if I can't? We go into this split the Russians will know it And they'll use it against us Have you cancelled Chicago and the rest of the weekend yet? You don't show for Chicago, everyone will know there's something going on I don't care. Just cancel it Forget it I'm not calling and canceling on Daley You call and cancel on Daley You're scared to cancel on Daley You're damn right, I'm scared Well, I'm not Watch this Welcome to Chicago, Mr. President Mr. Mayor, I wouldn't miss this event for the world Let's go Tonight you're going to experience true Midwest cunning What's going on? Now the guys are hounding me about some sort of troop movements in Florida What are you telling them? The truth. I don't know Am I out of the loop on something? No Tell 'em you've looked into it and all it is an exercise And Pierre, tomorrow the President may have a cold A what? A cold Do I get any input around here? Yeah How bad it is, is up to you There are major rail disruptions in the south two airbome divisions are on alert Sounds to me like that exercise is an invasion You know how Bobby has it in for the state of Mississippi We're invading Cuba Dammit, we are not invading Cuba! Are you crazy? Nobody gives a rat's ass about Cuba! Not now, not ever! If you print that, all you're gonna do is inflame the situation And nobody talks to assholes who inflame situations Assholes like that can find themselves cut out of the loop That's the first time you've ever threatened me All right I won't print anything until I have another source But I promise you I'll get one Bobby? We've got a consensus for a blockade but it won't last past tomorrow You have to bring him back By the way China invaded India today You're kidding, aren't you? I wish I were Galbraith's handling it in New Delhi Makes you wonder what's coming next What is it about the free world that pisses the rest of the world off? I don't know We have Tupperware parties? Maybe I'll see you tomorrow Okay The President has a cold He's canceling the remainder of this trip and returning to Washington on the advice of his doctor Is that the final word? President Kennedy! How do you feel, Mr. President? Mr. President, our deliberations have led us to the conclusion that a blockade of offensive weapons to Cuba is our best option A strong showing of support from the Organization of American States would give us an umbrella of legitimacy A blockade is technically an act of war Therefore we recommend calling the action a quarantine Let's hope that translates into Russian the way we want it to There are between 20... and 30 Soviet ships underway to cuba at this time the navy will stop them board and any vessels containing weapons will be turned back A quarantine prevents any more missiles from reaching Cuba but it doesn't remove the missiles already there It gives the Soviets a chance to pull back without a war If they refuse to remove the missiles we retain the option to strike and invade A sneak attack is counter to what the United States stands for It leaves us no room for maneuver And the inevitable Soviet response would force us into a war Mr. President there are still those of us who believe we should proceed with the strikes With the blockade we lose strategic surprise and we also run the risk of the Soviets launching the first strike against us if they decide they have to use the missiles or lose them So quarantine... or air strike There is a third option With either course we undertake the risk of nuclear war So maybe one of us in this room should be a coward So I guess I'll be A third course is to strike a deal We trade Guantanamo and our missiles in Turkey get them to pull their missiles out We employ a back channel We attribute the idea to U. N. Thant U Thant then raises it at the U. N. I don't think that's possible, Adlai I've not yet made my final decision I'll be asking the networks for airtime on Monday night We'll announce our course of action then Ted, get to work on speeches for both quarantine and air strike Thank you for all your advice gentlemen Did you hear Adlai? You'd think nobody learned anything from World War Two Somebody had to say it I respect Adlai for having the guts to risk looking like an appeaser We have to pull him He won't be able to handle the Soviets in front of the U. N. Zorin will eat him alive We've got bigger problems right now Ladies? No, thank you Honey, I'll be right back Adlai Just can't seem to get away from you guys Escaping from a night on the town? As D. C. 's most popular playboy the President felt my presence would be sorely missed, so... in the interest of National Security here I am Yes. Gotta keep up appearances Of course, I don't any more I'm a political dead man Did you ever see anyone cut his own throat like I did today? No It's alright By the way I spoke to a friend Reston and Frankel have the story The Times is going to run it tomorrow We're not gonna make it to Monday Shit I'll get Sorenson to try to lean on Reston But you're gonna have to call Orville Dryfoos This is the sort of decision a publisher makes himself Alright Thanks, Kenny Yes sir, I understand But we held on the Bay of Pigs and it was the biggest mistake of my life What makes this different? Orville, I'm asking you to hold the story until I can present our course of action on Monday night Alright But I'm gonna need a reason to give my boys They're gonna be screaming for my head on a plate Orville, you tell them this That they'll be saving lives including their own Yes, Mr. President How many Congressmen have not responded yet? Fourteen Boggs is in the Gulf fishing? I thought he was supposed to be campaigning He's not gone for long, sir Jesus. Get a plane out there and get him back He wants to talk to LeMay again He's still considering air strikes None of this works tomorrow Figure out how to cancel it Yes, sir We're on the phones Cam, can you guarantee me you'll get all the missiles? Sir, I guarantee we'll get all the missiles we know about Mr. President we can get better than I'll brief the Congressional leadership tomorrow evening at five At seven o'clock, all United States armed forces worldwide will stand up to DEFCON 3 I have a brief statement President Kennedy will address the nation tonight On radio and television on a subject of the hightest national urgency He has requested airtime on all three networks for seven p. m. Thank you very much Mr. President Congress cannot give you the support you're looking for Mr. President? Sir? If they want this goddamn job they can have it It's no great joy to me Mr. President, here's the speech with those changes you wanted I need a minute Kenny, no A minute I don't want a goddamn pep talk You're not the Harvard quarterback anymore We're on the brink here They're trying to second-guess me into World War Three Well, it's not gonna happen What did you think Congress was gonna do? Offer you unconditional support? Kiss your Catholic ass? They don't think we even deserve to be here What the hell do you think? I think we haven't been that impressive to date and they have good reason to question our judgment What do you want, Kenny? I want you to sit down I'm not gonna sit down I want you to sit down loosen your tie and take a minute for yourself I haven't got a minute! You're the President of the United States They can wait for you Why not Things can't get much worse We could have to... go down to Lyndon's ranch again dressed up as cowboys Shoot deer out of the back of his convertible That was a bad day You know I thought there'd be ore good days You know back when we were in the wards the day Bobby made me come down to meet you I didn't get you at first I thought you were lucky Your father had a lot of money You were skinny Girls loved you I thought I could beat you and Bobby up together But he... just kept going on and on about you I thought it was because he was your brother But I was wrong I was wrong You sleeping? No, not much I slept last night, though And when I woke up I'd forgotten that all this had happened And then I remembered and I just wished for a second somebody else was President You mean that? I said for a second Boy, there is a lot of noise out there, Kenny You know what you're doing Mr. President You're gonna make the best call you can And you know they're gonna second-guess you So what? We're just gonna have to take our beatings as we go So what are we gonna do now? I'm going on TV Maybe the American people will go with me Even if their... elected representatives won't You wear something nice for the TV Make sure Jackie picks it Excuse me Okay, everybody. I think we're ready No. I'm fine Mr. President, in five... four... three... two... Good evening, my fellow citizens This government, as promised has maintained the closest surveillance of the Soviet military build-up on the island of Cuba Within the past week unmistakable evidence has established the fact that a series of offensive missile sites is now in preparation on that imprisoned island The purpose of these bases can be none other than to provide a nuclear strike capability against the Western Hemisphere Acting therefore in the defense of our own security and under the authority entrusted to me by the Constitution I have directed that the following initial steps be taken immediately First to halt this offensive build-up a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated All ships of any kind bound for Cuba form whatever nation or port will, if found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons, be turned back Second I have directed the continued and increased close surveillance of Cuba and its military build-up Should these military preparations continue further action will be justified I have directed the Armed Forces to prepare for any eventualities And third It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union Good speech, Teddy I guess I get to keep my job No It was a really good speech I can't imagine what you did with the air strikes version I wasn't able to write, Kenny It's kind of hard to write the unthinkable I tried, I just... I couldn't We're getting the Soviet response It's coming in on the teletype "The community of nations recognizes" "the fundamental right of freedom of the seas... " THis is horseshit I agree They don't know how to respond yet So now you're Kruschev What do you do? You run the blockade They'll run the blockade Which is what they appear to be preparing to do, Mr. President We're tracking 26 ships inbound for Cuba They show no sign of changing course The closest ships the Gagarin and the Kimovsk will make the quarantine line by this time tomorrow Admiral Anderson if the ships do not stop exactly what are our rules of engagement? Russian- speaking personnel have been transferred to our ships When the quarantine takes place in the morning our ships will attempt radio contact with approaching vessels They'll be ordered to reduce speed and stand by for inspection An inspection team will then board and search the vessel If weapons are found, the ship will be ordered out of the quarantine area If they refuse they'll be towed into the nearest port What if the ship doesn't stop for inspection or want to be towed? We fire a warning shot across their bow And what happens if the ship ignores the warning shot? Wen then fire at its rudder disable it and carry on our inspection There will be no shooting without my explicit orders Is that understood? Yes sir Well, Admiral looks like it's up to the navy The navy won't let you down, sir There is one other thing Mr. President We're commencing low-level photography runs over Cuba this morning It'll be more detailed than the U-2 photography We'll firm up our estimates of the missiles' readiness and develop target packages for strikes if you should order them, sir To protect our pilots we're prepared to retaliate against any SAM site or anti-aircraft battery that may open fire We have a flight of Thunderchiefs that'll be able to respond within minutes to any attacks on our planes I've got a bad feeling about what's going on in there In the morning I'm taking charge of the blockade from the situation room And McNamara is gonna set up shop in the flag plot at the Pentagon He'll keep an eye on things there Good You get armed boarders climbing on the Soviet ships with shots being fired across bows What about these low-level flights? We need the flights They're starting in what? An hour Do you realize what you're in for? We need the flights because the minute that first missile becomes operational we gotta go in there and destroy them Fair enough. But Castro's on alert and we're flying attack planes over their sites on the deck There's no way for them to know we're carrying cameras, not bombs They're going to be shot at plain and simple I'm your political advisor I'm giving you a political analysis This is a set-up The Chiefs want to go in They need to redeem themselves for the Bay of Pigs They gotta go in this time and do it right I'm gonna protect those pilots They're boxing us in with these rules of engagement If you agree and one of our planes gets knocked down or one of the ships won't stop fro inspection the Chiefs will have us by the balls and will force us to start shooting They want a war and they're arranging thing to get one How does a man get to a place where he can say "Throw those lives away" so easily? Maybe it's harder for them to say than they let on but at the very least they believe it's in our best interest And you know what? At the end of the day they may well end up being right I'll tell you one thing We have to triple-check everything the Chiefs say to us with the guys that actually do it And nobody's to know about this but Bobby I need redundant control over what happens out there If things aren't advertised then you are gonna make sure they come out the way I want Starting with this low-level flight thing That's gonna be tough You know how these guys are about their chains of command Listen, tell them those chains of command end at one place - me Go ahead, sir Speak up, lady. I cannot hear you I got a train to catch and I'd like to be home by Christmas That's the one What's her name? Margaret Margaret Yes sir, I understand exactly what you're talking about I speak the language, too What? Margaret, would you mind helping me with something? What do you need, honey? That tone of voice, specifically What tone of voice? What the hell is he talking about? I told you, sir I'm sorry, you're outta here Ready Room Skipper. What are you doing? Looking out the door I'll get him for you At what? Cuba Skipper! Telephone Commander Ecker Commander Ecker This is the White House Operator Please hold Shit Honey, you don't know what shit is Commander my name's Ken O'Donnell Special Assistant to the President Yes, sir The Presiden'ts instructed me to pass along an order to you You are not to get shot down We'll do our best, sir I don't think you understand me, Commander You are not to get shot down under any circumstances Whatever happens up there you were not shot at Mechanical failures are fine crashing into mountains, fine You are not to be shot at, fired at or launched upon Excuse me, sir What the hell is going on here? Commander, if you are fired upon the President will be forced to attack the sites that fired upon you He doesn't want to have to do that It's very important that he doesn't or things could go very badly out of control What about my men? If we don't have anybody to protect us I'm gonna be writing letters home for parents If the President protects you, Commander he may have to do it with the Bomb I've known the man for fifteen years The problem is he will protect you So I'm asking you don't make him protect you Don't get shot at Okay, Mr. O'Donnell We'll do what we can I know you will Good luck Hey, Joey See you, Joey Thanks, Joey There you go, Jeremy Hey, Bruce Skipper? Never mind. Just do what I do Hand signs only You are clear Ready to go, sir Good luck, Skipper Shit! Did you see it? Man! You were lucky, Skipper! Danm sparrows Musta been migrating Sparrows? Probably hit a couple hundred of them How many did you hit, Bruce? Sparrows? A few, I guess These 20 millimeter or 40 millimeter sparrows, sir? Those are bird strikes Sparrows, to be precise That's the way it is, guys Get that film packed up! Commander Ecker Hello? Sir Commander Mr. O'Donnell, I've been ordered to deliver the film to the Pentagon personally What's going on here? The Chiefs must wanna talk to you They're gonna want to know if you were fired on Were you? You could say that, sir Commander, listen to me I know this must fly in the face of everything you've come to serve but I'm asking you to look through this to the other side Commander William B. Ecker reporting as ordered Commander Sir Put your gear down over here Would you like a glass of water or anything? No, thank you, sir Sir Ecker Have a seat Commander I assume you know why you're here Son I wanna know just one thing Did those bastards shoot so much as a BB gun at you? It was a cakewalk, sir Mr. President The OAS meeting starts in less than an hour Good. I think we need this one. Dean We can't expect miracles The quarantine is legal if we get a mandate Otherwise it's an act of war in the eyes of the world So you gotta get me the vote And make it unanimous Mr. President the Organization of American States hasn't had a unanimous vote since... Unanimous, Dean In accordance with this afternoon's vote at the Organization of American States the quarantine will hereby be effective as of ten o'clock tomorrow morning At eight a. m. this morning the United States detonated a hydrogen bomb above Johnston Island in the South Pacific The blast was quickly condemned by the Soviet Union who called upon all nations to denounce the United States for bringing the world to the brink of destruction Who the hell authorized the test? What is this gonna say to the Russians? They look warlike? Jesus Christ we're lighting off nuclear weapons like it's our own private Fourth of July You know what? We should have brought in the guys from the Atomic Energy Commission and talked this through Looked at these tests a little harder before just giving the go-ahead You know, last summer I read a book "The Guns of August" I wish every man on that blockade line had read that book It's World War One There's thirteen million killed It's all because the militaries of both alliances believed that they were so highly attuned to one another's movements and dispositions, they could predict one another's intentions But all their theories were based on the last war And the world and technology had changed and those lessons were no longer valid But it was all they knew so the orders went out couldn't be rescinded The man in the field, his family at home, they couldn't even tell the reasons why their lives were being destroyed But why couldn't they stop it? What could they have done? Here we are 50 years later Say one of their ships resists the inspection and we shoot out its rudder and board They shoot down one of our planes in response So we bomb their anti-aircraft sites in response to that They attack Berlin So we invade Cuba And they fire their missiles Helen, I want you to keep the kids close tomorrow I want you to leave the TV on I want you to sleep with it on in the bedroom until I call you and tell you can turn it off What's happened? Nothing you don't already know about Just have the car ready to go in case I call or a Civil Defense Warning comes on What happens to you? I'm not leaving without you I'll be evacuated with the President Great And while you're under a rock somewhere with the President what am I supposed to do with our five children, Kenny? Honey We're not gonna let it come to that I promise Jack and Bobby they're smart guys You're smart, too Not like them Hi, Ken Helen just asked me what arrangements we have for the families I just checked that myself They're being issued identity cards And if the call comes evacuation officers meet them at pre-arranged departure areas They go by helicopter to Mount Weather We meet them there Course that's for morale Missiles only take five minutes to get here The President has asked Jackie and the children to come back from the country to be with him You know those pictures upstairs... of Lincoln? He looked so old near the end When we got here, I said it's not gonna happen to us We were too young Why don't you go home tonight? Go on home Nah It's too much trouble to get a car Ken, we can get you a car in 15 minutes No Go ahead No I'll let her sleep I'll let 'em sleep It almost seemed today as if time stood still The shooting hadn't started yet but there weren't any really encouraging signs that it could be avoided But worried, alarmed afraid perhaps even... the American public nonetheless appeared determined and resolved This is Walter Cronkite Good night Gentlemen can you hear me? Yes, we hear you fine I've got one minute 'til ten here The quarantine commences in one minute And no sign of them stopping Sir The quarantine is now in effect And it looks like our first customers are the Gagarin and Kimovsk Chief, I've got something at zero three zero XO, take a look at this New contact, Skipper What do we got? A Russian sub General Quarters! All hands, man your battle stations Breaker 231, correlates to our Submarine at 9, 000 yards It's protecting the freighters Bob, is there any way to avoid stopping the submarine first? I'm afraid not, Mr. President The sub has positioned itself between the Pierce and the Soviet ships Admiral Anderson insists it's too much of a risk to proceed with stopping the freighters The Pierce would be a sitting duck for the sub Put me through to the Pierce Yes, sir Admiral Anderson the President wishes to speak directly to the Captain of the Pierce Is that a problem? No, it isn't, sir He's putting you through, sir Sir, I'm patching you through to the bridge now This is the Captain of the Pierce Captain this is the President speaking Mr. President Is there any way you can force that sub to the surface without damaging it or yourself? I can bring it up, Mr. President But whether it's damaged or not is up to the sub Even if they do force it up that sub'll be inspected over the crew's dead bodies They'd be executed for allowing it when they got home Captain, force the sub to the surface Yes, Mr. President Prepare to fire torpedoes Prepare to fire torpedoes. Aye, sir Prepare to launch ASROC Prepare to launch ASROC! Aye, sir What're they up to? Slowing down They stopped Mr. Secretary! We're receiving reports the Russian ships are stopping Mr. President Reports are coming in here to the Pentagon that the ships appear to b stopping Captain, belay that order! Hold you fire! Where's that coming from? One second, Mr. President Somebody find out what's going on Those ships are definitely stopping Some are turning around Are they stopping? I don't know what they're doing Admiral Admiral, what's happening? Yes, sir. They are... stopping Mr. President reports are coming in from all around The ships are stopping Some are turning around Soem are turning around We were eyeball to eyeball, and I think the other fellow just blinked Sir Mr. President Sir? We have the tally from NSA We have 20 ships stopping and/or turning around Six, however appear to be continuing for the line It's a mistake They must not have gotten their orders yet. Let 'em go That's unlikely, Bobby We've been monitoring the radio transmissions from the Gagarin and the Kimovsk Their radios are working just fine, Mr. President One ship, an accident, maybe Six, Mr. President, is intentional Mr. President, let them go You're still here? are still a day away from the line They stopped the ones we suspect have weapons aboard We'd look pretty bad shooting up a freighter full of baby food We sure as shit would Captain, I want you to maintain contact with those ships and do nothing until I order otherwise Is that clear? Yes, Mr. President Contact only At its beginning this day looked as though it might be one of... armed conflict between Soviet vessels and American war ships on the sea lanes leading to Cuba Find out how close our exercises are coming... to their anti-ship missiles Goddammit How the goddamn hell could this happen? I will have Power's head on a platter Next to LeMay's Kenny, you hear me give the order to got o DEFCON 2? 'Cause I remember giving the order to go to DEFCON 3 but I must be suffering from amnesia I've just been informed our nuclear forces are at DEFCON 2 Mr. President the orders were limited... to our strategic forces in the continental United States General LeMay is correct Technically SAC has the statutory authority... I have the authority! I am the commander-in-chief of the United States and I say when we go to war We're not at war, sir Not until DEFCON 1 General the Joint Chiefs have just signaled our intent to escalate to the Soviets You've signaled an escalation which I had no wish to signal and which I did not approve Get out of here, Max Yes, sir Rescind the order. Can all the Chiefs Put Nitze, Gilpatric and the Undersecretaries in charge Yes, we can We can't fire the Chiefs, Bobby Our invasion talk would look like a bluff Or even worse if there's been an attempted coup Jesus Kenny give me a couple minutes alone with Bobby Just try this on for size We get a hold of Walter Lippman and we leak the idea of pulling our Jupiter missiles out of Turkey The Soviets pull their missiles out of Cuba We back JFK! K. and K. must talk! End the arms race, not the human race Hey, hey, JFK! Let's not start a war today! Kenny Mac What did you think of the Lippman column this morning? It's a bad idea Thank God. Look everybody's furious about it We trade away our missiles in Turkey and we are dead politically You've gotta stop it We know it was Jack and Bobby's idea They leaked it to Lippman The military guys are going ape and they're not alone They should speak up Christ, Ken, it's not that easy It is It isn't. They don't trust the people that feel this way But these people are right and the Kennedys are wrong We need you to talk to them They'll listen to you Jack and Bobby are good men But it takes a certain kind of... You mean the President of the United States? And the Attorney General? Kenny, they are good men but it takes certain character moral toughness to stand up to the Soviets You're in the White House right now because of the Kennedys They may be wrong. They make mistakes But they are not weak The weak ones are these people who can't speak their own minds You know I don't mean that they're weak No, you just lack a "moral toughness" Jesus Christ, Mac! You think I'll play your Judas for you You never understood us, for you We've been fighting with each other our whole lives But nobody plays us off each other and nobody ever ever gets between us It's trial balloon, Kenny Then somebody better publicly deny it because there's only one way the world is gonna read this We sell out one of our own friends for own safety Fuck! Exactly Jesus Christ. They're killing us ... and enter into negotiations... in order to normalize this confrontation and avert the threat of a world war What is that Sun Tzu says? "War is a moral contest and they're won in the temples before they're ever fought. " This enormous danger for all mankind... which exists at this moment... It's right here This is where we turn it around You all Adlai. You tell him to stick it to this son of a bitch! The U. S. believes that with their economic boycott by pressuring other countries to cease trade with Cuba we would surrender due to hunger How does it feel, Mr. President, to be this heroic... and force a country to surrender due to... Am I still on hold? They're trying to find him right now Adlai's too weak! We have to convince Jack to pull him Get McCloy in there You can't talk him out this late in the game, bobby Zorin will eat him alive Then talk to your brother, goddammit! The two of you don't need my advice to get into trouble What's gotten into you? Are you still sore about this Lippman thing? That's something your father would have done My father? I'm just trying to make a pint This idea is that fucking bad Adlai can handle Zorin He knows the inning and the score He's better Because nobody believes he's up to this Nobody Yes? Adlai Yes It's Ken. How are you doing? I'm busy, Ken What do you need? The President told me to pass the word to you stick it to them I hear you I'm glad it's you calling I thought it would be Bobby Adlai, the world has to know we're right If we're gonna have a chance at a political solution we're gonna need international pressure You gotta be tough, Adlai You need to find it, Buddy If they're still sticking to their stonewalling strategy I'll get them I'm an old political cat, Kenny But I've got onw life left I know you do See you, Ken Boddy we call upon the world to condemn this purely American provocation We, the people of Romania stand in solidarity with the people of the Republic of Cuba and their revolution in the face of the American threat to world peace Thank you, Mr. Chairman We're very glad that you could join us, Mr. Stevenson For the last two hours the entire world here is asking only questions The United States is pushing the entire world to the brink of catastrophe People of the whole world want to know why We are told again and again about some incontrovertible evidence of offensive weapons in Cuba But no evidence can be shown to us Perhaps your spy planes are so secret that you are simply incapable to present such evidence Some Planes! I make the call, Adlai is out McCloy goes in simply don't have such evidence Perhaps the United States of American is simply mistaken The United States of America does not have any facts it has only falsifications False evidence... John, get ready to send your staffer in. He's coming out The Chair recognizes The representative from the United States of America Well, let me say something to you Mr. Ambassador We do have the evidence We do have it, and it is clear and incontrovertible And let me say something else Those weapons must be taken out of Cuba You, the Soviet Union have created this new danger not the United States Mr. Zorin, I remind you that the other day you did not deny the existence of these weapons but today again if I heard you correctly you now say they do not exist Sir, let me ask you one simple question Come on, Adlai. Don't let him off Do you, Ambassador Zorin deny that the USSR has placed and is placing medium and intermediate range missiles and sites in Cuba? Yes or no? Don't wait for the translation Yes or no? Yeah I am not in the American courtroom and I do not wish to respond to questions... that a prosecutor would put to the defendant You will get all the answers to your questions... as this session progresses You are in the courtroom of world opinion right now and you can answer yes or no You have denied they exist and I want to know if I have understood you correctly Continue your statement You will get your answers in due course. Don't worry I'm prepared to wait for my answer until Hell freezes over if that's you decision John, I'll get back to you to present the evidence in this room proving that the Soviet Union has lied to the world If you have decided not to continue your statement the Chair recognizes the representative from Chile I yield my time and the floor to the representative of the United States Ladies and gentlemen since it appears we're going to be here for a while shall we have a look at what the Soviets are doing in Cuba? May we have the presentation, please? Ladies and gentlemen If you will observe in photograph A - Yeah So Adlai had it in him after all Zorin must not have gotten instructions Somebody in their foreign ministry's blown it big-time we have October 14th a photograph taken then There are at least three missile sites being constructed The ship is called the Grozny We lost track of it yesterday at nightfall We thought we gave it plenty of room when we moved the quarantine line back We just reacquired it It crossed the line hours ago How the hell do you lose a goddamn tanker? What the hell's going on over there? Friday, October 26th Hail them again I want you to try them again We are kidding ourselves The coordinates for the Pierce Pierce coordinates, 25 degrees Not responding, Chief! Tell the Skipper They're not responding, sir General quarters! All hands man your battle stations! Very well. Load your guns Guns are loaded, sir What was that, Admiral? We've been hailing the Grozny for the last hour, Mr. Secretary The Grozny refuses to stop What are you doing? We're carrying out our mission Mr. Secretary We're very busy right now We need to able to do our job Admiral! I asked you a question We're going to follow the rules of engagement The rules of engagement which the President has approved and signed in his order of 23 October Yes You may proceed, Captain Cler your guns Dammit! Stop that firing! What? Stop that firing! Cease fire God help us That ship was firing starshells! Starshells -- Flares, Mr. Secretary! Goddammit, I've got a job to do here! You've been camped out up there since Monday night You're exhausted you're making mistakes You interfere with me and you will get some of my men killed and I will not allow that! Starshells Get out of our way, Mr. Secretart! The navy's been running blockades... since the days of John Paul Jones! I believe the President made it clear that there will be... no firing on ships without his express permission With all due respect, Mr. Secretary we were not firing on that ship What was that? Firing on a ship means attacking a ship! We were not attacking that ship! We were firing over it! That was not the President's intention when he gave that order What if the Soviets don't see the distinction? What if they make the same mistake I just made? There will be no firing anything near any Soviet ships without my express permission! Is that understood, Admiral? Is it? Yes, sir And I will only issue such instructions... when ordered to by the President! John Paul Jones! You don't understand a thing do you, Admiral? This is not a blockade! This is language! A new vocabulary, the likes of which the world has never seen! This is President Kennedy communicating with Secretary Krushcev (Atlas Missile Launch Vandenberg, AFB) Who the hell authorized this missile test? Who do you think? God knows what this is gonna communicate to the Soviets Communicate with the Soviets? We can't communitcate with the Pentagon and it's just across the goddam river LaMay must think you're afraid of him I'm not taking that biat The right move here is to move on Marcula! This is United States Destroyer Joseph P. Kennedy! This is point at which we are concemed... that there might be shooting among the ships at sea with the possibility that invasion might have to be undertaken to assure that those bases are eliminated If invasion is undertaken the Russians have said that they would retaliate with rocket fire We have said if there's rocket fire from Cuba we will retaliate And there goes the whole ballgame Kenny What's this? Can anyone just walk in here now? Ken, don't worry I'm not here to do an interview If you're looking for a cup of sugar John, you got the wrong door Kenny we need to see the President Something's happened I have lunch with him Maybe once a month Way the talks, he acts like he knows Kruschev personally but he's never elaborated I've used him as a source in a couple of stories The FBI has identified this Alexander Fomin as the... Soviet Rezident, the KGB equivalent of one of our station chiefs He's their highest ranking spy in this country And he knows John's a friend of mine All the trademarks of a back-channel overture Yeah. Some back channel ABC News guy My goddamn next-door neighbor So they'll remove the missiles And we'll pledge not to invade Cuba or de-stabilize Castro or assist anyone who plans on doing so I think this may be our first real message from Kruschev The alternative, Mr. President is that is this could be a trap And how is that exactly? Dangle a settlement tie us down in negotiations we come up short Why else would they approach us this way? It's deniable The Soviets have done nothing but lie to us This could just be more of the same That may be why Kruschev's introducing this guy We're been burned by his usual players in the formal channels so he brings in an honest broker That may be what they want us to think The truth is we don't really know who Fomin speaks for It could be Kruschev It could be some faction in the Politburo Or the KGB itself We just don't know By the way, Scali your activities now fall under... the secrecy codicils of the National Security Act Sorry, John No Pulitzer Mr. President, we haven't much time I'm scheduled to meet with him again in three and a half hours So it seems the question of the day is is the offer legitimate? And if it is we can't afford to ignore it So, John... We'll have instructions for you in a couple of hours Thank you Thank you We don't have much time to play out back-channe Kenny I want you to get over to your old stomping grounds... and go through everything the FBI has on Fomin I need your best call Is the guy legit and is he speaking for Kruschev? So what we've got here is this guy Alexander Feklisov AKA Alexander Fomin delclared Consul to the Soviet Embassy but in reality the KGB Papa Spy An illustrious tour of duty during the Great Patriotic War gets him on the Party fast track Various tours of duty in KGB American postings He's an expert on us And that is all we got on Papa Spy How do you become the KGB top spy in the United States? Gotta know someone You gotta know someone So politics is politics Walter, get me Kruschev's files Pass me that I wanna see their career chronologies side by side We know they're not related, right? Right They're not from the same hometown They went to different schools Right So if they were gonna meet they should have met here I think they could've met They could not He was an engineer stationed outside of Moscow at the end of '41 That's it They know each other They're war buddies That's pretty thin, Kenny Real life usually is, Walter They know each other, Jack Kruschev and Fomin were war buddies You sure? Don't take it to court, but we've got good circumstantial evidenct What's your instinct? I gotta move on this My gut's telling me that Kruschev's tuming to a trusted old friend to carry his message Okay. We're going I've been instructed to tell you that the American government would respond favorably to an offer along the lines that you have discussed If such a solution were raised at the U. N. by Ambassador Zorin he would find a favorable reply from Ambassador Stevenson So I understand you correctly if the missiles in Cuba were dismantled returned to the Soviet Union and a guarantee was made not to reintroduce them the United States would be prepared to guarantee that it would never invade Cuba That is correct And this is from the Highest Authority? Yes. The Highest Authority There are two conditions The U. N. must be allowed to inspect the removal of the missiles Of course the U. N. must also be allowed to observe the re-deployment of forces from the American Southeast I can't speak to that What's the second condition? Time is of the essence How much time? In 48 hours, there can be no deals I'll see what I can do I think it's very difficult to make a decision from this document It looks to me like Fomin's overture was genuine It's a big "if", Bobby It's ten pages of sentimental fluff but he's saying it right here He'll remove the missiles in return for a no-invasion pledge Mr. President, our early analysis says this probably... was written by Kruschev himself It's a first draft It shows no signs of being polished by the foreign ministry It probably wasn't even approved by the Politburo as they wouldn't let the emotionalism go by The analysts say it was written by someone under considerable stress Glad to know we're not alone It never was my intention to invade Cuba anyway till they put the missiles in there Gentlemen, I think we should seriously consider this deal Hi Hi You look old, O'Donnell You don't It's 2:30 in the morning You flirting with me? We got a back-channel communication form Kruschev this evening feeling us out about a deal He confirmed it just a little while ago in a letter Thank God Jack kicked us out of his house for the night Darn it For a second there I thought you'd been fired No such luck Driving home there was something I wanted to tell you Finish that thought Yes? Kenny, It's Bob We're getting another letter over the teletype from Kruschev I have a bad feeling I'll be right there You're beautiful It looks like Fomin was a ploy after all and they were just stalling for time It gets worse Gentlemen my specialists are in agreement This morning's letter is not Kruschev Last night's letter was The evidence supports only one conclusion There's been a coup and Kruschev was replaced overnight Dean? It does suggest he's been co-opted by hard-line elements Which at the end of the day amounts to the same thing A puppet Kruschev and a hard-line Soviet government pulling the strings No deal. And the missiles are almost operational What if the Soviets have no intention of honoring this second deal? The tomorrow they make another condition Meanwhile the quarantine isn't working and they're completing work on the missiles sites Sir, I think we have to issue pre- invasion orders for our forces Mr. President This morning's photography is in It appears the Soviet have commenced a crash program to ready their missiles The first missiles become operational last night We expect they'll all be operational in 36 hours Then we're out of time We have to go in That may not be as easy as we thought, either We have confirmation the Soviets have also deployed battlefield nuclear weapons to Cuba FROGS, we call them Short- range tactical nukes We don't know whether they've delegated release authority to their local commanders for use on our invasion troops But the good news is as of this moment we know where the FROGS are and we can target them, too But the longer we wait the harder it's going to get We have no choice General, issue orders to our forces to be prepared to execute the air strikes Monday morning and the follow-on invasion according to the schedule thereafter I'll need the official release orders on my desk Sunday night Understood, sir We need to step up our over flights finalize our pilots' target folders in order to carry out the strikes Permission granted Yes, sir Gentlemen if anybody's got any great ideas now's the time Major Anderson there's a phone call for you Thank you Gimme just a second here, guys This is Major Anderson Hello? Anyone there? Major? Yes, sir My name's Kenneth O'Donnell Special Assistant to the President Major, a few days ago the President ordered me to... help him keep control of what's going on out there I've been brow-beating pilots navy guys left and right to make sure you don't get us here in Washington into trouble But you know what? We're pretty damn good ourselves at getting into trouble So instead of riding your ass I'm just gonna tell you what's going on here and let you figure out how best to help us out up here Go ahead, sir Last night, it looked like we were gonna cut a deal to get us all out of this mess Today the Soviets are reneging We're gonna try and salvage the situation but a lot of things are going wrong today It's making everyone nervous If more things go wrong people will become more nervous and it will be very hard to aviod going to war I'm not sure what you're trying to tell me, sir Just my standard line I've been repeating to guys like you all week Don't get shot down Beyond that whatever else you can do to help us I'd appreciate it Sir When you're at 72, 000 feet a million things can go wrong Is your Oxygen mix right? Are your cameras gonna freeze up? Are you leaving a contrail? Those million things they're beyond your control, mostly But... when you realize that there's a kind of peace If you're a good man and if your ground crew are good men that is all you can ask for And with the grace of God that'll get you through Are you a religious man? I am Good The plane is missing, Kenny We are presuming the pilot is dead It's hard to believe with the Soviet centralized command structure that this could have been an accidental launch The question is, does this attack on our plane represent a definitive intentional escalation on the part of the Soviets? Mr. President taken with the events of the past few hours I believe this confirms our worst fears We're now dealing with a hard-line Soviet government perhaps with Kruschev as a puppet head, perhaps not You okay? Yeah I'm fine Mr. President What now? A U-2 on a routine air- sampling mission got lost and penetrated Soviet airspace over Siberia Oh, goddammit The Soviets scrambled MIG's in pursuit thinking it was a bomber It got out okay Somebody forgot to cancel the mission There's always some sonofabitch who doesn't get the word! This is just what we need the Soviets thinking we're bombing them Anybody else? Mr. President our pilots are in danger We must order punitive air strikes against the SAM site that shot down Major Anderson per our rules of engagement No I want confirmation it wasn't some sort of accident first Mr. President Good idea, Mr. President I can wait a day and half Be safer for my boys to get the SAM's on Monday when we get the rest of the bastards That's the quarter! Hey, Dad Hey, Sport You winning? Yeah Is everything gonna be okay, Dad? Everything's gonna be fine, Kenny I guess you won't be coming home tonight? I... Let's got! Second quarter! It's okay. Go on back to your game Alright. I'll see you around, Dad Dammit! Jesus, Mary and Joseph... Take off for two hours you're gonna miss a little drama I told you how stupid it was to float that Lippman article Now you're gonna do it for real? The Jupiters are obsolete, Kenny They were supposed to have been dismantled last summer I know they're obsolete That's not the point! The point is you trade our missiles in Turkey for theirs in Cuba they're gonna force us into trade after trade, until finally a couple of months from now they demand something we won't trade like Berlin And we do end up in a war Not to mention that long before that happens this administration will be politically dead I don't care if this administration ends up in the freaking toilet We don't do a deal tonight there won't be any administration It's the wrong move, Bobby and it's not just me who thinks that Everyone on this so-called EXCOM's telling you the same thing Whose side are you on now, Ken? Oh, goddammit What if there hasn't been a coup at all? What if it's you two? What is that supposed to mean? What if it was you two who invited that second letter by raising the possibility of a trade? Mr. President we have only 30 hours left and whatever response we send it'll take several hours to reach our embassy and be delievered to the Kremlin So early tomorrow morning is the earliest Kruschev could respond Which one of you geniuses is gonna tell me how to explain it to the world if we don't make this trade? So what are we gonna say to the Soviets about this offer? Well, it depends, doesn't it? Do we really believe there's been a coup? What if Fomin wasn't a ploy? What if his message was real? What if what is happening is a series of accidents? Accidents like them shooting down our U-2? Yes. Accidents like that And the accidents are making the second letter seem more aggressive and the whole situation appear worse than it really is "The Gun of August" That's right So we just reject the second letter? No We don't... reject it We accept the first letter and pretend the second one doesn't exist It won't work because that's wishful thinking Look, he made an offer. So I... The same wishful thinking, Bobby that blinded us all these months while the Soviets were sneaking those missiles in under our noses Ignore the second letter agree to the conditions of the first There is no reason to believe the Soviets will let it go Max is right. Why will they accept it? It can work If they believe we're gonna hit 'em hard We've got time for one more round of diplomacy, and that's it First airstrikes start in 28 hours But we have to make them agree to it So how do we do that? We give them something We tell them we'll remove the missiles from Turkey Hang on But we don that six months from now so it appears there's no linkage We also tell them if they go public about it we'll deny it Right we deny it. The deal's off And we do it under the table so we can disavow any knowledge of it It's transparent, Kenny The press will be all over it Six months from now we're not gonna care, are we? We'll deal with it then At the least, it'll expulse whether Kruschev has been overthrown We'll know who we're up against I've been thinking about Kruschev And if this is a move to appease the hard-liners in his government it may be just the bone he needs to regain control of his own house Whoever carries the message has to hit the nail on the head If we come across as too soft they'll push us Too hard, they'll be cornered and even more dangerous All of you do understand that there is an enormous risk in offering this deal Because if they turn us down and we've already told them that we're coming in on Monday morning They'll strike first Yes Bobby You know Dobrynin best Yeah Then you're it Ted, I want you to start working the draft Bobby, you gotta go in there and make them understand that we have to have an answer tomorrow Because Monday we go to war What do you want, a goodbye kiss? Listen I'll take care of him Go on inside, grab some coffee We'll be back pretty quick Are you sure? Sure What's the matter with you? Forget how to open a car door? Jesus! You rich people I promised the girls I'd take them riding tomorrow Make sure you keep that date We gave up so much to get here Sometimes I think "What the hell did we do it for? " I don't know about you but I'm in it for the money We knew we could do a better job than everyone else Remember? You know, I... I hate being called the brilliant one The ruthless one The guy everybody's afraid of I hate it I'm not so smart I'm not so ruthless Well, you're right about the smart part I don't know if I can do this There's nobody else I'd rather have going in there than you Nobody else I trust Helen and the kids' lives to Take a left You smell that? They're burning their documents They think we're going to war God help us, Ken Sir, Ambassador Dobrynin is here He's in your office I'll whistle up some luck for you Mr. Ambassador Thank you for coming Who are you? The friend My brother, my friends my countrymen, and I cannot and will not permit those missiles to become operational I promise you that Then I fear our two nations will go to war And I fear where war will lead us If the missiles do not become operational if you remove them there will be no war At this moment, the President is accepting the terms of Secretary Kruschev's letter of Friday night If the Soviet Union halts construction immediately removes the missiles and submits to U. N. inspection the United States will pledge to never invade Cuba or aid others in that enterprise If you Jupiter missiles in Turkey were removed also such an accommodation could be reached That's not possible The United States cannot agree to such terms under threat Any belief to the contrary was in error You want war? However While there can be no quid pro on this issue the United States can offer a private assurance Our Jupiter missiles in Turkey are obsolete and have been scheduled for withdrawal for some time This withdrawal should take place within six months Of course, any public disclosure of this assurance would negate the deal and produce... the most stringent denials from our government This private assurance... represents the word of the Highest Authority? Yes And it can be relayed beyond Comrade Krushcev's ears to the top circles of my government? Our pledge can be relayed to any government officials Secretary Kruschev sees fit to satisfy With the caveat that... it is not to be made public in any way, shape or form And we must have an answer tomorrow at the latest I cannot stress this point enough Tomorrow? Tomorrow Then you must excuse me and permit me to relay... the substance of our discussion to my superiors Of course We've heard stories that some of your military men wish for war You are a good man Your brother is a good man I assure you there are other good men Let us hope the will of good men is enough to counter the terrible strength of this thing that was put in motion What's going to happen? If the sun comes up tomorrow it is only because of men of good will And that's... all there is between us and the Devil This is Radio Moscow Premier Kruschev... has sent a message to President Kennedy today This message re-emphasizes the need for urgent measures to prevent a fatal turn of events and to preserve world peace In addition to instructions earlier transmitted to stop construction work on installations in Cuba the Soviet government has ordered the dismantling of weapons in Cuba as well as their crating and return to the Soviet Union Is everybody ready for church? It's a beautiful morning Pass the butter up to Dad Dad, you want your paper? Dad, what's wrong? The sun came up Every day the sun comes up says something about us What does it say, Dad? What's wrong with Daddy? This is the foreign policy trophy we were hoping for Mr. President great job Hold it Well, Mr. President I think I can speak for everyone here when I say bring on those mid-terms there's no stopping us now Four more years! All right! You know, it's been a long two weeks Whatever And I'd like to thank you all I think you did a great job I just don't think we should be gloating too much It was just as much a victory for them as it was for us Hear hear! Enjoy your morning Thank you, Mr. President Get some rest, Mr. President We've got a lot of new clout right now We can run the table on Kruschev the Middle East and Southeast Asia You're right Dear Mr. and Mrs. Anderson I was deeply shocked when advised your son was lost in an operational mission on Saturday October 27th, 1962 Your son rendered distinguished and dedicated service to his country throughout his career He was admired and respected for his courage and his professional skill by all with whom he served His tragic loss will be deeply felt and a grateful nation will be forever in his debt Ken! We're out here What kind of a peace do we seek? I am talking about genuine peace The kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living Not merely peace in our time but peace in all time Our problems are man-made therefor they can be solved by man For in the final analysis our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet We all breathe the same air We all cherish our children's futures and we are all mortal |
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