Published: 10/14/2012 8:56 AM | Last update: 10/15/2012 8:09 AM
Cuban missile crisis beliefs endure after 50 yearsHAVANA - The
world stood at the brink of Armageddon for 13 days in October
1962 when President John F. Kennedy drew a symbolic line in the
Atlantic and warned of dire consequences if Soviet Premier
Nikita Khrushchev dared to cross it. An American U-2 spy plane
flying high over Cuba had snapped aerial photographs of Soviet
ballistic missile sites that could launch nuclear warheads with
little warning at the United States, just 90 miles away. It was
the height of the Cold War, and many people feared nuclear war
would annihilate human civilization. In the five decades since
the nuclear standoff between Washington and Moscow, much of the
long-held conventional wisdom about the missile crisis has been
knocked down, including the common belief that Kennedy's bold
brinksmanship ruled the day. On the eve of the 50th anniversary
of the Cuban missile crisis, historians now say it was behind-
the-scenes compr