A review by historyonthehudson
Thirteen Days: A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis by Robert F. Kennedy

5.0

When history is happening the ill-informed turn to books to gain a better understanding of the rapidly evolving world. That's why I added Thirteen Days by Robert Kennedy to my reading list. Thirteen Days follows the Kennedy Administration's response to the Soviet Union placing offensive missiles in Cuba. Bob Kennedy was the Attorney General and the President's brother, making him an intimate player in the United States response. Kennedy's short story is akin to a legal memo detailing the events with a splash of spotlighting the decision making of the President. I'm a Kennedy skeptic and try to look at the Administration with a real world view and not the Camelot Court the world often does. But what impressed me the most was the honesty in which the story was told, Kennedy is very clear about the fact that there were no clear answers during the early days of the crisis and even more clear about the back and forth between the different factions of the Administration and how these debates lead to President Kennedy's best decisions and ultimately a peaceful settlement between the United States and Soviet Union. Sometimes just talking out an issue works and history teaches us how to respond.