This book presents the Cuban Missile Crisis through an examination of the personal roles of the leaders of the three countries involved in the crisis. The book begins in 1958, well before the crisis, and outlines Fidel Castro’s rise to power in Cuba and his courting of the Soviet Union. It follows Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev’s reciprocal efforts with Castro, as well as outlining U.S. president John F. Kennedy’s role in the Bay of Pigs invasion and other foreign policy clashes with both the Soviet Union and Cuba prior to the Cuban Missile Crisis. The authors then analyze the crisis, investigating its multiple causes. They describe how the crisis was resolved and its aftermath. The book is well researched and partly based on Soviet archival material that became available in 1997.