Night session of the presidium of the Central Committee, 22-23 October 1962

Fursenko provides details on the meeting at the Kremlin, wherein Russian President Nikita Khrushchev summoned all members of the presidium of the Central Committee on the night of Oct 22, 1962. This rare look at Soviet decision making during perhaps the most dangerous gamble of the nuclear age provides a look at the critical role played by Anastas Mikoyan. Through remarkable political maneuvering within a decision-making apparatus that eschewed differences of opinion, Mikoyan managed to calm the famously emotional Khrushchev and discredit the forceful minister of defense, Rodion Y. Malinovsky. Had this powerful, if nearly solitary, voice of restraint been absent from the emergency Presidium session, one would be hard pressed to conceive of a positive outcome to the Cuban missile crisis.