center of things for the united states for all these years and particularly 1962 as you mentioned, when khrushchev moved missiles there to stop the united states from invading, we came near to a war that possibly could have cost lives of 40 million people in the northern hemisphere had it come to war. michael, just to think that in those very trying times for the world but especially for the united states and cube a there was a moment castro asked the soviets to push the button go after the united states of america. absolutely. fortunately cooler heads prevailed. as you know, when kennedy and khrushchev settled it over castro s head he was furious and saying i m not going to subscribe to the settlement that kennedy and khrushchev made which included no exporting of cuban revolution to the rest of latin america, which is something needless to say he did a lot in the next couple of