 This climate formed the background for the work of the writers of the Latin American Boom, and defined the context in which their sometimes radical ideas had to operate.The Cuban Revolution in 1959 and the subsequent U.S. attempt to thwart it through the Bay of Pigs Invasion can be seen as the start of this period.Cuba's vulnerability led it to closer ties with the USSR, resulting in the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 when the US and USSR came dangerously close to nuclear war.