GenZedong

"In 1962, the USSR secretly tried to install nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba. After the U.S. imposed a naval quarantine, it withdrew. Soviet leaders saw the retreat as “bordering on humiliation.” The U.S. won wide praise for deftly managing the crisis."

Oh, is that what happened, The Hill?

Because I recall reading/learning that after Castro overthrew the US-favored assclown Batista in a popular revolution, the US via CIA and other secret orgs funded the gathering together of ex-Cuban, now American, counterrevolutionaries, who had fled in the wake of Castro and Che cracking down on those pieces of shit. Eventually this resulted in the somewhat comical Bay of Pigs failed invasion of Cuba by the US- oh I mean by the American ex-Cubans working with CIA money and backing... but not the US official sanctioning. Classic. Btw if the US gov say they'll pay for all your shit but won't go as far as openly claiming you if shit hits the fan you can be sure shit is about to hit the biggest fan and you are about to die.

Anyway, the US had also conveniently and brazenly placed Jupiter missiles with nuclear payloads inside Turkey within easy striking distance of the Kremlin and Moscow. A massive provocation which the US would never tolerate in a role reversal (proven immediately after!).

So the Cuba and USSR work out a plan to move nukes, secretly, to Cuba so that the next time the US decides to start fucking around they can lean back and go "oh? What do you think about these big boys?" This effectively gave Cuba full protection from further US invasions because that would result in nuclear missiles landing in the continental US. It also allowed the USSR to be on equal footing again, with a counter to the US's Turkish nukes. Win-win.

US: "Cuba and USSR consent, yes, but didn't you forget to ask someone else?"

The United States caught wind of the nukes and, somewhat understandably, but also in a fully hypocritical fashion simultaneously, flipped its fucking shit. They were talking about invading Cuba still anyway and I guess just sort of "tanking" any resulting nuclear fallout to send a message of strength to the Soviets/world (ie that the Americans are fucking insane and willing to die in nuclear apocalypse before allowing Soviet victory. Not the first or last time this happened!). Luckily this all did get resolved basically only because the Soviets finally blinked, probably because they knew the Americans were actually insane enough to die. Of course the promise with Kennedy, before his brains got splattered all over his wife, was that the Soviets openly withdraw their missiles and the US would also withdraw the Jupiter missiles. Pretty sure the latter did not happen... the US got a little distracted, one might say.

So, the suggestion that the USSR was the aggressor is fucking imperial propaganda. No other term for it. You can argue the Soviets made mistakes, whatever, but to frame them as the ones to cause the crisis is purely and fully a lie. Unless you're into victim blaming (the US is).

I also don't think the withdrawal of the Soviets, who had gotten concessions from JFK, was seen as embarrassing for the USSR more so like "holy fuck, the US is batshit insane... this is worse than we ever imagined." After the US military and intelligence reaction to events.

Again, imperial propaganda framing absolute bloodthirst and an objectively insane reaction based on a chain of events begun by an over reaction to the overthrow of a dictator. These right wing warhawk types think that immediately smashing the "withdraw right the fuck now or we will invade you, nukes be damned!" at the first slight reaction to your actions... is good?

They still act like this btw. Eg the retaliation against "Iranian-backed" MENA region militants recently. The US is doing a fucking genocide in Palestine, bombing Yemen again, and threatening the entire region. Three military die in a place the US never belonged to begin with and immediately everyone with Col or Gen in their name is screaming to the sky about nuking Tehran.

Dogshit, batshit country