Polemic on General Line of International ... - From Marx to Mao

aggression against Cuba. It was amply clear to us that torebuff aggression, to defend the Cuban revolution effectively,would require the most resolute measures. Imprecations andwarnings — even if they are called “serious warnings” andare repeated 250 times — have no effect on the imperialists.Proceeding from the need to defend the Cuban revolution,the Soviet government and the government of Cuba reachedagreement on the stationing of missiles on Cuba, since thiswas the only realistic means of preventing American imperialistaggression. The delivery of missiles to Cuba signifiedthat an attack on her would meet with a resolute rebuff, withthe employment of rocket weapons against the organizers ofthe aggression. This resolute step on the part of the SovietUnion and Cuba came as a shock to the American imperialists— for the first time in history they were made to feel that anarmed attack on Cuba would be answered by a smashing blowat their own territory.Inasmuch as it was not merely a conflict between the UnitedStates and Cuba, but a clash between the two major nuclearpowers, the Caribbean crisis would have developed into aworld crisis. There was a real danger of world thermonuclearwar.There were two possibilities in the prevailing situation:either to fall in with the “wildmen” (the appellation of themost aggressive and reactionary representatives of Americanimperialism) and follow a path that would unleash a worldthermonuclear war, or, using the opportunities offered by thedelivery of missiles, to take all measures to reach agreementon peaceful settlement of the crisis and prevent aggressionagainst the Cuban Republic.We chose, as is known, the second path and we are convincedthat we acted rightly. We are confident that this is theunanimous view of our people. The Soviet people have onmore than one occasion demonstrated their ability to standup for themselves, defend the cause of the revolution, thecause of socialism. And no one knows better than they how548