ExSim Link: https://bit.

ly/3m2JraO

Eyeball to Eyeball, 1962: The Cuban Missile Crisis

President-for-Life of the Republic of Cuba Fidel Castro (Cuba - 1)

Contingent Objectives:
1. Maintain Cuba’s independence
2. Allow the Soviet missiles to remain in Cuba.
3. If this is not possible, obtain as many concessions as possible from the US for an exchange.
4. Convince the UN Secretary General and at least one other Intermediary player to publicly
support Cuba’s right to self defense and/or denounce US foreign policy aggression.

General Situation: The Cuban regime is wholly reliant on the USSR for its survival. Cuban
leaders are true believers in the socialist revolution and wish to see it exported elsewhere; in fact,
some Cuban leaders suspect they are more committed to the revolution than the Soviets are! The
Soviets do not have a large amount of forces in the region (a few submarines and surface ships),
but have 42,000 troops in Cuba. The world does not know that there are missiles in Cuba and
you would prefer to deny that they exist, unless it is politically valuable to declare them. The
Soviets have 40 SS-4 Sandal Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles in Cuba. These missiles have
a range of 1,000 miles and carry a 3 megaton warhead. Those missiles will be operational in 40
minutes. A crash program could have them operational in 30 minutes, but it would look very
similar to launch preparations. The missiles can strike the eastern US in 1 minute. Such a strike
would likely kill 80 million Americans. Anti-aircraft systems are present near each of the
missile sites. The Soviet military has provided you with 40 IL-48 bombers (medium range) and
10 nuclear bombs (500 kiloton yield). The Soviets say there are more forces on the way, but you
have no way of verifying that until they arrive.

Character Objective: Retain the support of Moscow for your regime. If they stop backing you,
you are totally unprotected from American aggression.

Character Information: You are Fidel Castro, President-for-Life of the Republic of Cuba. You
do not want the missiles to leave: right now, they are your only insurance against an American
invasion (which of course they already tried at the Bay of Pigs). Besides, those crazy CIA guys
have been trying to assassinate you, and elitists like Botifoll and Lobo keep playing the victim
card from their villas in Miami. The United States’ imperialist arrogance must be stopped. To
protect Cuban independence, you would use the missiles against the US and will ask to be given
release authority yourself. You would especially like to see the Americans negotiate away their
naval base in Guantanamo Bay; you will advocate overrunning it by force in the event of a US
attack.
Different members of your team, including General Pliyev, will have information about the game
time required for certain actions. If you wish to communicate with the Soviets, you must
message the Soviet leaders in the MESSAGES tab and hope they respond. You cannot directly
message the Americans. Because you’ve carefully cultivated a media presence, you can message
Herbert Matthews (who has covered you in the past) and Hedrick Smith, both of the New York
Times. You may also post public announcements in the News Feed; those announcements will
be seen by all players: your own contingent, the leaders of other countries, and the media.

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Prep: Use the Historical Background, character info, and glossary to interpret the below primary
source documents. Try to read through Castro’s eyes. Mark passages that would encourage or
anger him, as well as points he could use to justify policies and actions.
 Must-read Primary Sources (from Appendix A in Game Book): 1-5, 11
 Recommended Primary Sources: 7, 8, 10, 17

In-Game Meeting and Messaging:

Meeting: You are physically located in Havana, Cuba. You can meet and discuss game actions
with anyone who is also in Havana. You cannot travel to other cities.

@: Meeting
To facilitate discussion within your contingent, the current online version of this game uses
Discord voice channels. Follow these instructions to create a Discord account (if you don’t
already have one) and then use this invite to get onto the actual server and into your
contingent’s channel. It’s a good idea to check your audio with another player and make
sure they can hear you (and vice versa). If you’re having trouble getting your audio to work,
try this troubleshooting guide. Your screen name should match the name of your role.
You can access the following voice channels in Discord; the second column shows who else
can access that same space:
Channel Access
Cuban Executive Committee Cuban Contingent, Pliyev
Havana Harbor Cuban Contingent, Pliyev
The Cuban Executive Committee Room is your “home” voice channel. When in doubt, you
should go there to communicate with members of your contingent.

Messaging and Game Prompts: Messages from other contingents, game prompts (aka
COMMUNICATIONS), breaking news (NEWSFEED), and requests for decisions (aka
ACTIONS) will come through the main Experiential Simulation platform; see sample interface
below, left. Again, all messaging with members of other contingents must go through the
Experiential Simulation platform (and even there, due to Cold War politics, there will be
characters you cannot Message directly, see below). Your profile and permissions for the
Experiential Simulation platform are already built; just use the link in the header to log in. You
can message the following characters directly; you will have to find go-betweens for others:

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Contingent Characters
Cuba All
Intermediary Thant, Zorin
Media Matthews, Smith
US None
USSR Khrushchev, Gromyko, Pliyev,
Dobrynin