Although Kennedy had the option of launching air strikes against the missile construction sites, he decided to come into terms with Khrushchev that would see the Soviets remove the missiles in exchange that the U.S. would not invade the Island. Unmistakably, the U.S. won by giving in to Khrushchev's demands. Notably, the majority of its people were threatened by the missiles since they were in close striking range of the majority of its cities....
...The U.S. did not lose anything by agreeing not to attack Cuba and to remove its missiles from Turkey. Instead, the U.S. was able to dissociate Khrushchev from his primary objectives. As stated by Sechser & Fuhrmann (200), Khrushchev’s motives were to defend Castro’s regime, supplement the Soviet’s capacity to hit the U.S. mainland with nuclear missiles and to gain an advantage in Berlin after he had failed to eject American forces from the city from 1958 to 1961. Notably, Khrushchev succeeded in his motive to defend Cuba from the U.S. aggression by having the U.S. promise not to invade Cuba. He also succeeded in getting the U.S. to remove its missiles from Turkey. However, he failed to accomplish his motive to hit the U.S. mainland.