Existing comment:
A Confrontation at the United Nations:
"Our job, Mr. Zorin, is to save the peace. And if you are ready to try, we are."
-- US Ambassador Adlai Stevenson to Soviet Ambassador Valerian Zorin
Even as the United States made military preparations for war, the President and the Ex Comm continued to pursue diplomatic solutions to the crisis. Seeking a show of solidarity with the countries in South and Central America, the United States presented its case to the Organization of American States (OAS), which voted unanimously on October 23 to condemn the Soviet Union and support the United States quarantine.
Back channels -- unofficial lines of communication between the United States and the Soviet Union -- remained open and active, with intermediaries conveying messages between the two sides outside the more cumbersome and time-consuming State Department channels.
And on October 25, at an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, US Ambassador Adlai Stevenson confronted Soviet Ambassador Valerian Zorin with photographic evidence of the missile site construction in Cuba. It was a dramatic encounter that took place on the world stage, broadcast on television and witnessed by millions. These diplomatic initiatives helped to establish a legal justification for the quarantine and to bolster worldwide support for the US position. |