Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Lee Glazer. I'm the director of the National Archives Museum, and it's a pleasure to welcome you all today to the William G. McGowan Theater at the National Archives, which is situated on the ancestral lands of the Anacocchan peoples. Welcome also to our audience members watching on our YouTube channel. I'm delighted to introduce today's discussion, poise, professionalism, and a little luck, the Cuban Missile Crisis 1962, and we're really pleased to be presenting this program in collaboration with the Army War College and the Naval History and Heritage Command. Before we get to the main event, I want to tell you about two upcoming virtual programs you can watch on the National Archives YouTube channel. On Thursday, October 6th at 1 p.m., authors Judy Zuchan Wu and Gwendolyn Mink will discuss their book, Fierce and Fearless, Patsy Takamoto Mink, First Woman of Color in Congress. Mink was best known for her work, Shepherding and Defending Title IX, the federal civil rights legislation that prohibits discrimination based on sex education, based on sex and education programs and activities receiving federal funding, and one of its greatest impacts was making it possible for girls and women to more fully participate in school sports. Then on Friday, October 14th at 1 p.m., we continue our commemoration of the Cuban Missile Crisis with a book lecture entitled The Abyss, Nuclear Crisis Cuba 1962 with author Max Hastings. And to find out more about our many programs and activities at the National Archives, please visit our website at www.archives.gov. Okay, now about today's program. For two weeks in October 1962, the world teetered on the edge of thermonuclear war. Earlier that fall, the Soviet Union, under orders from Premier Nikita Khrushchev, began to secretly deploy a nuclear strike force in Cuba just 90 miles from the United States. President John F. Kennedy said the missiles would not be tolerated and insisted on their removal. Khrushchev refused. The standoff nearly caused a nuclear exchange and is remembered in this country as the Cuban Missile Crisis. Among the holdings of the National Archives are many documents, photographs, cartographic and motion picture records related to the Cuban Missile Crisis. They're spread over several record groups. So it's most appropriate that we're presenting this program in this theater today. And now it's my pleasure to introduce our panel up on the stage. Moderating the discussion will be Jeff Hawks, Education Director at the Army Heritage Center Foundation. And joining him will be Stephen M. By, U.S. Army War College, Dr. Frank Jones, U.S. Army War College Retired, and Curtis Utt's Naval History and Heritage Command. So please join me in welcoming our panel. Good afternoon and thank you. I'm honored to be here with this group here today. It was a defining moment of the 20th century, a defining moment in the Cold War and a defining moment in the lives of everyone who lived through it. It was a moment when two superpowers grappled with themselves and with each other in an attempt to control the mechanisms they had created. It changed the way everyone understood the world. Staring to the abyss often has that effect. Now Mark Twain supposedly said, history doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes. Less than a year ago it would have been hard to imagine that even as we gathered here to mark the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, that we would once again be contemplating the very real possibility of a nuclear exchange in a conflict between Russia and the West. I'm Jeff Hawks, Director of Education and Veteran Outreach for the Army Heritage Center Foundation, and I'm pleased to see you all here for our presentation, Poise Professionalism and a Little Luck, the Cuban Missile Crisis 1962. Just a show of hands from the audience, how many of you were alive and remember the crisis? Okay, a fair number. I'm pleased to see you here for our presentation. I'm sure that you can attest that the crisis was a critical point in world history, and I'm sure there are many great perspectives in this audience, and I look forward to hearing your questions toward the end of the program. These events then and now are why we preserve history here at the National Archives and at the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center at the Army War College. We preserve documents and artifacts, reports and personal accounts, photographs and monographs so that we can learn from them to understand the rhythms and rhymes of history, to better anticipate events, and to better prepare for the future. This presentation is the result of a collaboration between our hosts, the National Archives, the Army Heritage Center, the Heritage and Education Center, and the Army Heritage Center Foundation, and I'm pleased to introduce our panelists. Dr. Frank Jones, U.S. Army War College, retired. Frank Jones taught for over 14 years in the Department of National Security and Strategy at the U.S. Army War College after retiring from the office of the Secretary of Defense. With over 30 years of military and civil service experience, including tenure as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, he's the author of Blowtorch, Robert Comer, Vietnam, and American Cold War Strategy, and Sam Nunn, statesman of the nuclear age, as well as numerous articles and book chapters. Curtis A. Utz has held several positions in the Navy History and Heritage Command and its predecessor, the Naval Historical Center, including leading the Naval Aviation History and Archives branches from 2003 to 2014. He authored Cordon of Steel, the U.S. Navy and the Cuban Missile Crisis, and Assault from the Sea, the amphibious landing at Inchon. A historian and analyst with the Defense Intelligence Agency from 1994 to 2003, he has lectured in history of the University of Maryland, the Joint Military Intelligence College, and the Joint Military Intelligence Training Center. And Stephen M. By is the reference archivist with the Academic Library Division, Analysis and Research Team of the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center, AKA USAHEC. He has worked as an archivist with the Archives Branch, Military History Institute at USAHEC, Staff Lead of the Circulation Branch, Patron Support Team, Military History Unit. Also at USAHEC, he's held numerous other positions at the U.S. Army War College and Fort Indian Town Gap. Each panelist will make their remarks, and I do remind you that the opinions our speakers express are their own and do not reflect the position of the United States Army, the United States Navy, or the Department of Defense, or any other organization. At the end of their presentations, we'll open the program up, we'll have a few questions for conversation, and then open it up to questions from the floor. For those of you watching from home, please go ahead and type your comments in the comments section of the YouTube channel, and we'll do our best to answer them all. So with that, I'd like to begin, and I will invite Dr. Jones to join us at the podium. Well, good afternoon. It's a pleasure to be here and looking forward to a discussion among ourselves as panelists, but also with you as well, those of you online. Of course, I think it's important to set the stage, if you will. What's the strategic environment? And Dr. Glazer mentioned this when she introduced us a few minutes ago, but what was going on with these two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union? And I think it's good to remember for those who may not be familiar with the crisis itself, to realize that the United States actually had an overwhelming strategic advantage. The nuclear systems that it had were reliable and accurate, and there were more of them than there were of the Soviets. Additionally, the United States had actually in place, it made operational, some medium-range ballistic missiles, Jupiters, in Turkey, which was a really annoying and humiliating for the Soviet Union, and that plays into their thinking. The administration, I think one could say, was obsessed, as one historian said, with the idea that Cuba under Castro was a communist regime in the Western hemisphere, and they're concerned about that as well. Concerned that it would be, as the Joint Chiefs of Staff Historian said, a cancer that would really precipitate revolution throughout the hemisphere. And then, of course, there have been some embarrassing points as well. The botched Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, a humiliation. And in response to that, Operation Mungus, a covert operation against Cuba that started in 1961 and was continuing into 1962. And then there was another friction point. The United States and its NATO allies were concerned about the city of Berlin, and there had been good reason for that. Not only the Berlin Airlift, which you might be familiar with, where the city was isolated, but the Soviets demanded the Western powers leave the city, the three Western powers of the United States, Great Britain and France. That set off a crisis in itself, and in 1961 the Berlin Wall was constructed. So, just to set this a little bit more specific, what's happening in 1962? Well, part of it is this recognition by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the JCS, that there may be come a time when the United States will actually invade Cuba and oppose the Castro regime. And to this point, Cruz Jeff and Castro and his leaders are interested in making sure that they can deter the United States from taking that action. And so it begins, it precipitates a series of indications about Soviet equipment coming into Cuba, then the fact that there are actually some sophisticated weaponry coming in there during the summer, and then in September, President Kennedy releases a statement in which he reveals that surface-to-air missiles and sizable Soviet military presence is in Cuba. A little more than a week later, President Kennedy says in a Nunes conference that the additional Soviet troops that are there do not constitute a serious threat. But he warns that if there are offensive capabilities there, that will change the whole nature. That is not tolerable to the United States. And then over the next three days, you can see in the middle of October, 14th, 15th, and 16th, there's a series of photo reconnaissance flights which have really the recognition and concrete evidence that the Soviet Union is putting offensive weapons into Cuba. And October 16th is where that evidence becomes conclusive as far as the President is concerned, and it starts the famous 13 days. Curtis will talk a lot more about the quarantine, but as you can see within a few days that quarantine will go in effect and it will become really the high point of the actual crisis. So I mentioned there are plans that the Joint Chiefs of Staff actually had started planning for a possible contingency, including an invasion, of Cuba. And they focus on the first one, 312, which is air strikes. And then you'll notice there's two that really talk about airborne operations, airdrops of personnel, and also the direction to go ahead and concentrate on the Plan 316 eventually, where you can see where the three objectives are. Overthrow the regime, occupy Cuba, establish a new government, conduct air force, excuse me, air attacks first, and then an invasion by sea with an airborne landing in western Cuba in five days, and then an amphibious assault thereafter. What's the bottom line? What are American leaders thinking? Two things I think are very important. One, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the military leaders, are interested in an immediate surprise attack and taking out all these offensive weapons. Not only the fighter aircraft, the bombers that are there, that are being uncrated, the missiles in their launches and the surface air missiles, they want to take that out and the tanks to eventually add that to the target list. And the Secretary of McNamara, Robert S. McNamara, is interested in trying to get a sense of what the United States should do militarily. And he often finds himself differing about his views day to day as details become more and more available to these leaders. But, being good secretary, he follows the Commander-in-Chief, backs him up, and certainly as Curtis will talk about, has some friction points with the military over these actual operations. What's the Army mission? Well, the Army mission is really fourfold. First of all, they're going to execute the land invasion. 316 becomes the plan which will be executed if the President should decide so. They have to provide air defense. I'll talk a little bit more about that. Third, they have a continental Army command, which Army units all across the continent are under, but they have to provide logistical support because they're moving Army units from across the United States, as far as ways Fort Lewis will Washington. And they have to also consider the establishment of a special base command in the Peninsula of Florida and other activities, as you can see. Now, the command and control for this looks how would this work out? If this were to take place, 316, you can see, and Curtis will talk about this side, here with the Navy and Marine Corps, but there is a JTF Cuba, that's the commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, those units will be subordinate to him and the Air Force through the tactical air command. And as I mentioned, part of this is there's Havana, the Port of Marial is where the surface echelon will come aboard, come ashore, excuse me, and over here is Tarara, which is about 10 miles east of Havana, and it will be the place where the Marine Corps is supposed to land, but some Army units will land there as well. This is a sticking point. The United States was thinking about how does it defend itself from air attack by the Soviet Union coming over the Arctic Circle, not sending ballistic missiles, medium range or intermediate range from Cuba. And so they basically gerry-rig a set of units from across the United States, and picket ships from the Navy, radars have to be reoriented in order to be able to pick up these signatures of aircraft that might be approaching or missiles. And so there's a vast organization that has to be thought about and defending staging bases where the Air Force will take off and even the true carrier routes that you have to carry people in in terms of the airdrop. The Air Force has, again, wide variety of missions, as you can see there, surveillance flights, reconnaissance flights, targeting for the air attack if it should happen, dropping the airborne forces, and then prepositioning material. And the Air Force in general is heavily involved from everything from aircraft to reconnaissance to tankers, to actually procurement civilian contracts and other types of support systems, including air traffic control and navigational aids. And lastly, just point out the strategic air command. Here is a specified command, meaning it has a specific mission. And part of that is to conduct surveillance eventually. And the other part is deter the Soviet Union and Cuba from attacking the United States. And you can see that the readiness level two DEF CON two means the readiness level is just below going to war. So that's how much the strategic air command is poised in order to act. And as a consequence, they are alerted throughout the world, not just in the United States, but throughout the world. And that, I think, gives you a good overview of what's happening in terms of the military response and the relationship that the military has with its civilian leaders as well. So I'll turn it over to Curtis at this time. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. And thank you for joining us for this presentation. And I'd like to thank my colleagues from Carlisle for inviting me to participate in this panel. So I'm gonna be talking about what is the Navy and the Marine Corps' perspective on the missile crisis and what was going on. Now, one of the things that has to be understood, you're carrying out normal peacetime operations. Well, for the Navy and the Atlantic, that's a pretty broad group. There's regular deployments to the Mediterranean, the Sixth Fleet. There's the deployment of the newly built Polaris-armed, nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, which were on patrol, maintaining anti-submarine warfare patrols in the Atlantic, monitoring Soviet and Eastern block shipping, particularly what's headed to Cuba. Plus, there's a series of regular exercises that are always ongoing. Now, one thing I should mention in the realm of joint cooperation, as far as the monitoring of Soviet and Eastern block shipping, it's not just the Navy and the Marine Corps. The air force is involved, and as you get closer to Cuba with operations out of Florida and Puerto Rico, so is the Coast Guard. So everybody's working in this. Now, as far as the exercises I have listed here, I'll point out two. One is they're doing the annual brigade level, about 5,000 men landing exercise near Puerto Rico. And they're doing it on the island of Vieques, and the objective is to land and remove a fictional dictator named Ortsak. That's Castro spelled backwards. So they're already thinking in terms of these op plans that Frank was talking about. Another thing to note is there was a very large anti-submarine warfare exercise planned with the Canadians for later on October and November. And the Canadians had gone so far as to recall reservists, test bringing a ship out of mothballs to see how fast they could get ready. It was a major, major effort by the Canadian Armed Forces that will have some benefits in a few weeks. Now, as far as Navy missions during the crisis, the primary one is carry out the quarantine. Essentially, it's a blockade to prevent the importation of any other offensive weapons, ballistic missiles, capable of striking the United States or bombers that could carry nuclear devices. There's also the ability to provide low-level photographic reconnaissance, not the high-level strategic U-2s. The guys down on the deck and the Navy excelled at that. But they still needed to maintain their anti-submarine warfare capabilities in the Atlantic, and they also needed to maintain the strategic deterrent patrols. And lastly, if needed, carry out an invasion if order. As to these missions, in enforcing the quarantine, President Kennedy said to CNO, George Anderson, Chief of Naval Operations, it looks as though this is up to the Navy. And Anderson replied, Mr. President, the Navy will not let you down. The Navy essentially assembled two primary task forces to enforce the quarantine, one primarily built around surface assets, and one built around two attack aircraft carriers. And the thing is, it should be understood, both of these organizations could carry out significant anti-submarine warfare operations if required, because submarines are one of your greatest threats. As far as the aerial surveillance in the Atlantic and the Caribbean basis, it continues to be a multi-service effort. And I should also point out that later in the crisis, in addition to the fact that Canadians are involved, several of the South American navies are involved and provide ships to help enforce the blockade near the end. Now, as far as enforcing the blockade, which could mean stopping ships, boarding, searching, that's pretty tricky operation. We only did it once. A single ship was boarded. That was the Lebanese freighter, Marcula, which we knew the Soviets would not put weapons of any type on the ship of a neutral. And so here it is, where it stopped by two US destroyers and a destroyer in the background is the Joseph P. Kennedy, the one named after President Kennedy's brother. So what happens with the quarantine when the Soviets figure out we're being serious about this is they're approaching the quarantine line and the time on 24 October that Kennedy has set. All of a sudden, Soviet ships start stopping dead in the water.  And they're like, okay, what do we do? Eventually they turn around and leave. As far as low-level reconnaissance, Navy Light Photographic Squadron 62 was considered the best low-level reconnaissance unit in the armed forces. That was the assessment of the head of NPIC, Art Lundahl. And the thing is when you're doing low-level work, you're far more susceptible to a lot of things, not just missile defense, but also triple-A, automatic anti-aircraft fire, in some cases even small arms fire. But they used sound tactics. They were shot at near the end of the crisis. They were never hit. And the USMC also provided pilots and aircraft that joined VFP 62. Same aircraft, same training, did very well. To be blunt, the Air Force didn't do so well. The Air Force, the VUDU, is a bad platform for low-level reconnaissance work. It has a tendency to have its nose pitch up, which really isn't good, because that's where your cameras are. They didn't have good cameras. They had poor training. And in fact, Curtis LeMay's chief of staff, the Air Force realizes they need to get new cameras. He goes to the manufacturer, manufacturer said, sold everything in stock to the Navy, go ask them. So George Anderson, the CNO, enjoyed the fact that essentially LeMay had to come to him hat and hand and ask for cameras. But to give you an idea of the capability of that imagery, that's what you could do. And this is amazingly detailed stuff for technology that's 60 years old. Another thing that had to be maintained was the anti-submarine warfare mission. It's not just the problem of the threat of Soviet submarines near Cuba or in the Caribbean to US naval forces. The Soviets have submarines that are capable of launching missiles at the United States, not anywhere the number we have. They have several Zulu-class boats, which have to surface, but have a ballistic missile loaded in their sail. And we actually spotted one of those near the Azores during the crisis. But they also had submarines or equipped with cruise missiles, which again, you need to surface and fire, but all of these missiles could be armed with nuclear weapons. So that needs to be kept track of. Now the US forces are really stretched thin. They're the destroyers, the patrol aircraft. And since the Canadians were already, they're like, okay, the US has dropped out of the exercise, they kept going ahead with the exercise. And Canadian forces took over a large amount of the effort in the North Atlantic, in fact, all the way down as far as the Azores and in some cases off the East coast of the United States. Now, one of the things that has come up over time is the Soviet Foxtrot diesel-electric attack boats, very good submarines in a lot of ways. And they were in fact, each armed with one nuclear armed torpedo. And there's been a lot of things that people have been concerned about what would have happened with that. The problem is we were very good, or the problem for them I should say is, we're very good at anti-submarine warfare. And eventually all four of the Foxtrot's that were in the vicinity of Cuba were eventually forced to the surface and directed to go 090 dead due east and away from the area. The other thing we had to do was assemble an amphibious force in case an invasion was required. The Navy did this and they made sure that they reorganized the leadership in second fleet, the main combatant fleet off the East coast of the United States to make sure qualified amphibious warfare officer was in charge. His previous job, commanding the amphibious forces in the Atlantic, he also got a really good replacement in Horacio Rivera, who was one of the Navy's rising stars. And they are mobilizing the elements of a second Marine expeditionary force. Now, luckily there's part of it already down getting ready for the exercise off Puerto Rico and those forces are actually shifted in to reinforce the garrison at Guantanamo because the US still does have a naval station at Guantanamo at that time and it needs to be reinforced and held. They in the ships that actually took in the first group of Marines evacuated all the civilian dependents out of Guantanamo as well. But the need and requirements potentially for forces, the JCS actually ordered the mobilization of a Marine brigade from the West Coast, from San Diego, which were put on board ship, brought through the Panama Canal and were present by early November in case they were needed. As to the sect deaf and the Navy, McNamara supported the blockade but McNamara really didn't have much of an idea of how Navy organizations worked or operated and he had several issues with Anderson. He was shocked one time when he went down into the CNO flag plot and Anderson wasn't there. Navy officers are used to standing long watches and Anderson knew if I'm down here all the time I will get exhausted and I will be useless. So himself, the VCNO and two of the senior DCNOs, four officers are standing six hour shifts. So that you've got somebody there, none of them are leaving the Pentagon from what I've been able to determine. So it's like we're ready, we're here, whereas McNamara near the end of the conflict or I should say the crisis was basically exhausted because he didn't have a similar type system to work with. Part of the issue is with McNamara, he's tired of these confrontations with Anderson when Anderson is due for reappointment. The next year for a second two year term as CNO he is not renominated. Well, once the Soviets agreed to withdraw the weapons, the offensive weapons, it primarily fell to the Navy to monitor the removal of weapons. Castro did not allow neutral observers to come into Cuba to monitor the removal of weapons. So the US said, okay, all these offensive weapons have to go through designated alongside areas so literally we can count missile bodies and bombers. And so the weapons had to be carried as deck cargo and ships had to go through the alongside areas. However, some Soviet freighter captains attempted to avoid the alongside areas. Sorry, freighters can't run away from destroyers or hide from aircraft. And basically this was one of the guys that tried to run the Vagolas. That's the destroyer Vessel there alongside. Vessel made them roll back the cover so they could confirm that they were in fact medium range missile bodies. But this is 9 November. Everybody's like, oh, the crisis ends after 13 days. Look under the wing of that patrol aircraft, the P2V. Those are 250 pound general purpose bombs. We're still prepared if hostilities are needed to do something. This is still a very serious situation, but we did confirm that all of the missiles were removed and that all of the IL-28 bombers eventually would be removed by December as they were nuclear capable aircraft. That concludes my presentation. Thank you for your time and attention, Stephen. Good afternoon. I'm Stephen Baye. I'm the reference archivist at the Army Heritage and Education Center. I'm here today to talk a little bit about the Army Heritage and Education Center and our holdings that we have that concern the Cuban Missile Crisis. The US Army Heritage and Education Center, also known as USAHEC, makes available contemporary and historical materials related to the strategic leadership, the global application of land power and the heritage of the US Army to inform research, educate international audience and to honor soldiers past and present. The USAHEC vision is to be the nation's best resource for study of strategic leadership, the global application of land power and the heritage of the US Army in honor of soldiers past and present. The United States Army War College and the Army Heritage and Education Center, we used to use these bibliographies. These are no longer considered up to date. However, I put them on here so you can see an idea of the things that we do hold concerning both the Bay of Pigs, which happened before the Missile Crisis and of course the Missile Crisis. Now the Missile Crisis bibliography is about five pages long and the Bay of Pigs is only three pages long. The Army Heritage and Education Center has an archive and this is extensive archive and these are the papers of different players during the Cuban Missile Crisis. You'll see a lot of names that you recognize. Herbert Powell is one that I really wanted to get into his papers and see exactly what he had. It was mentioned to me that he was a very important player during that time, but all of these, we have not only their papers, but also their oral histories. And if you were to come to the Education Center and into our reading room in Ridgway Hall, you could ask for any of these collections and we would actually bring you down the boxes and let you look through them yourself. We also have books. If you were to go on to our online catalog and request these books, these, this is what would pop up and of course these aren't clickable right now so you can't actually see how they come up, but these are the lists that you would print out and bring up and we would be able to pull these books for you. Now among the books, we have several that are critically acclaimed, including the Kennedy tapes inside the White House and 13 Days, a Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis by Bobby Kennedy. These are also books that you can request and you can read them right there in our reading room. We also have audio visuals. This is a DVD on the Missiles of October. It was directed by Anthony Page. This is something that we don't have the ability yet to put these in a machine and watch them there. However, at the War College, you could request that and take it home and watch it and bring it back. We also have student papers. The War College does a student paper that your degree is dependent on your student paper. Well, these are the student papers that were written specifically about the Cuban Missile Crisis and we have the date and the year and the individual who wrote it and of course the title. If you wanted to come into the reading room in Ridgeway Hall, all you would have to do is say, I want to see Keo's paper in 1984 on the explaining the Bay of Pigs and we would actually bring that out to you so you can look through his student paper. You can make a copy of it or send it over to our copy center and have them do it. We also have in the Army War College a department called SSI, Strategic Studies Institute. They do historical writings. These are two of the historical writings that they did on the Cuban Missile Crisis. Also something you could request and see if you came to visit. In 1963, NBC did a white paper, a half an hour show that they put on and in 1970, you'll see the Frederick... What is his last name? Anyway, he was a major at the time. He did a white paper on the Cuban Missile Crisis. He took the video from NBC and he turned it into a training document for classes that he taught. He was a major, he later became a Lieutenant General and this is another item that we have. If this was clickable, you could open it up and read it right here. However, it's something that you can see at the Army War College. This is something that the DOD has put out on Cuba. It was different questions came up on different aspects of Cuba, main thrust on the Cuban Missile Crisis. They put together a little booklet of questions and answers. This is also something you can see and of course it's a good segue into our next segment. I'll turn it back over to Jeff. Thank you very much. We do have some microphones set up so we can take some questions from the audience but I thought we'd start out with trying to get a little conversation going up here and so I guess, thank you all three of you for your fantastic presentations. I guess my first question would be from the perspective of the various military service branches that are responding to this crisis, what is the biggest operational challenge that they each face? Well, I think in certain ways for the Marine Corps, it's being able to get everybody there that they need to get there in a timely manner and make sure that they are logistically backed. I mean, as I mentioned, they could get some reinforcements into Guantanamo from the assets that were available immediately in theater but like the alert battalion at Lejeune had to be flown in by the Air Force. Marine Corps doesn't have that kind of organic capability. As far as the Navy, I'd say we had good command and control but part of the issue is I think the biggest challenge it's like we've got the forces in place, we've thought about this before but how do you deal with how the other guy reacts? I mean, one of the things when the quarantine timeline was set, they were like, what are we gonna do if the Soviet ships keep pushing on?  I think for the Army, the studies that's done a few years after the event, almost 20% of it is dedicated to the problems and deficiencies in the workarounds that they had to do. Probably the largest demand was the fact that it was logistics, supporting all those units that were moving from across the United States as far as Washington State. The other aspect is that they soon learned that because they had some responsibility for ensuring a reinforcement of Europe is some of the divisions that they had planned to use had to be switched out and swapped and the divisions they had replaced them with didn't have all their equipment. The Army's undergoing a force structure change at the time and because of that, it's got this mix that it has to deal with. I would say the other aspect is personnel. They find out that they don't have all the personnel they need, but particularly certain specialties, air defense capabilities, they don't have the specialization there, Spanish speakers become an issue for them, particularly for civil affairs issues where they set up a military government, if you will. So those were the challenges, I think. The Air Force less so, but as you can imagine, transportation, airlift, shipping, landing craft, all of that affected in the Air Force and the Army and you had to have enough space and bases to put all this aircraft. And so you're dispersing some of your aircraft into various areas so that they're not perfect targets and so you have to have the infrastructure and that's something that you also discovered that was a problem. You used the term workarounds which segues perfectly into my next question which is how well prepared were the services for this kind of mission? To what extent were they doing things by the book? To what extent were they rewriting the book? And how far outside their normal scope of what they prepared and trained for, were they operating here? Well, I think Curtis mentioned the Navy would come through for the President. I think the Air Force and particularly the strategic air command came through as well. The after action reports and studies that were done would indicate that they were pretty much what they planned is what they could execute. I think the Army had the biggest challenge and that was because of the changes in those operational plans we mentioned from 314 which was they gave them much more time in order to react to when books truncated, shortened time span and they had to get ready for that and they had to move units that didn't belong because of the command and control relationships that didn't belong to the Atlantic, Commander-in-Chief Atlantic Command and so they were moving units from other commands into the Atlantic Command that had the responsibility for that region, Southeast in the United States just to be able to have sufficient forces on hand. And how about the Navy? I think the Navy, you know, because for lack of a better term, Navy has almost always been forward deployed. You're always carrying out mission, you know, before the middle of the crisis, start chair, we're worrying about ASW and Atlantic, it's everyday work. Okay, we have to shift it further south in some cases and again, one of the reasons we're able to do that is because of what the Canadians provide. But the struggle was gonna be okay, we hadn't done something like a blockade or a quarantine in a while, but as one of the Navy leaders joked he said, you know, the computer actually worked because one of the things they said, any ship that's got a possibility of interacting with a Soviet vessel, we gotta get a Russian linguist on board. And what he meant by the computer worked, they actually identified these people, where they're at pretty quickly and actually all the vessels had at least one Russian speaker on board, which was pretty impressive for the time. And, but yeah, I mean, it basically required a redirection of certain type of efforts. But again, it's just a slight change on what you're doing pretty much most of the time. Okay, so I wanna ask about, again, relative to the individual services, what was the point of greatest danger? And I wanna think about that in two different ways. One is in terms of what was the actual moment of greatest danger during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but what was the greatest concern for each of the services? What was that one thing that could have gone most wrong for them? Well, I think from the Navy's perspective, and this is also true, and unfortunately, the Air Force had to deal with this when the One U Two was shot down, was what happens if they shoot down one of our reconnaissance aircraft? Much greater threat to the lower level aircraft, but again, they had effective tactics and methods that largely precluded that, but as the crisis wore on, they kept response elements, armed fighter and attack planes, immediately outside the 12 mile limit that if something goes wrong, whether it's air defense from the surface or counter air, because the Soviets had gotten MiG-21s, as well as the lower digit fighters into Cubits like we can respond. So that's one danger. Another danger is what happens if we have to have a major confrontation with a vessel? Because the Navy's got a book, it says this is how you carry out a blockade. This was one of the confrontations McNamara had with Anderson and Flagplot, because one of the Soviet ships, it's like, okay, guys not responding, vessel keeps going, okay, fire a couple of star shells across his bow, maybe we'll get the picture. Nope, still keeps going. Admiral Dennis in Lamp Fleet and Sink Lant Commander Norfolk's like load the five inch guns. Live Am, you know, not a star shell and then he kicks it back up to Opnav and says, okay, what do we do? Well, McNamara just happens to be there. He said, what are you gonna do if this vessel doesn't stop?  And McNamara's just appalled. He goes, no, you're not shooting at anybody unless you've got my authorization or the president. Well, of course, if you've ever, anybody in this room ever handled a five inch 38? And thanks, though, you gotta swing that thing around and clear it. It's not like you can, you know, back the round out of it. And so, yeah, after that and all the other stuff, the Soviet captain's like, maybe I should stop. But, and again, and this was the thing, we had very good intelligence operations because we immediately know, oh yeah, he's calling back to Mother Moscow for what are my instructions. And, but yeah, and there was also issues and this has come up, what happens if something goes wrong with one of the submarines? There is a misperception and I've dealt with this for many years. It's like, oh my God, these Soviet submarines are like in the middle of U.S. formations. Well, they're between U.S. formations or not in the middle of them. One's over here about 180 miles away, any other ones over here. It's like, no, it's not like we were that inept with anti-submarine warfare. But it was a challenge of how are we gonna deal with this and how do we get these guys away? Because remember, and I don't think all the operators out at the deck plate level understood this. These Foxtrot boats are carrying a nuclear armed torpedo. And one of the Soviet submarine captains who wrote after the fall of the wall said, if I had been ordered, I would have made my best effort to fire nuclear torpedo into an aircraft carrier. The thing that amazes me though is once the American people found out something was going on down there, there was a bit of a panic. And these gentlemen kept their heads. And if they did not have a cool head, they probably might have fired on a ship or whatever and then there would have been war. But they kept their heads even though everybody around them was losing theirs. Well, I'd like to interject one point with that. For those of you who've got much of a background in naval history, one of the guys who worked for our command for years as an outstanding student of the Cold War was Jeff Barlow. Jeff's a teenager in North Florida during the time of the missile crisis. And his father is the executive officer of heavy eight or heavy 11, one of the Navy nuclear attack squadrons. And he said, I can remember sitting there and watching President Kennedy's speech on Monday the 22nd.  Said, my dad walks up to the television, turns it off. I mean, this man's a senior Navy commander.  He just, that was, you know, and I think that was typical of a fair number of the professionals. Just like, yeah, this will resolve itself. So the Army, now this is gonna be somewhat hypothetical, but what were their great concerns? I think there were two. First of all, putting airborne troops and establishing an airhead in four-year fields in Cuba and getting three hours basically to do that and seize it so they could bring in additional support units as well as infantry and other support units including artillery. That was considered very, very risky. And so there was that risk. The other thing, and part of this is intelligence. How good was the intelligence about where the Soviets were located? Approximately 5,000 troops, couple of motorized tank regiments that are actually only miles away from some of the airfields that they're going to attack. And so General Wheeler, who's the Chief of Staff of the Army, is very concerned about how quickly can I get armored tanks and armored CAV units into the shore so that I can back up or get them on landing on these airfields so they can ensure that these light infantry units have that protection. So again, as you said, this is a lot of planning for the Army. It doesn't hold true that it's executed, but it is something they're concerned about. I would add also that, as Curtis pointed out, the flights that take place in 14, 15, 16, in terms of those, those are strategic air command flights. And he mentioned one of them is shot down. That scenario had been played out. In fact, there's a whole section of scenarios that the Joint Staff actually went through in terms of planning out an air attack and what would happen, they decided not to retaliate. So that is a major concern for them. And for the Air Force, we've also started flying reconnaissance measures in support of the Air Force. Lessons learned, what did the services do differently after the Cuban Missile Crisis? I mean, I think one of the things the Navy did, and again, even though they did it very well during the crisis, is how do we prepare to shift and provide logistics? Because, you know, Navy's got to do all the at sea logistics for the Marine Corps too. And that's something that they needed to look into. And they understood while they had done fairly well with intelligence, is making sure it gets out to the right people in a timely manner. Because there were some things with that that didn't work quite so well. Because, you know, it's critical that the person who's closest to the decision has as much information as they can. There are less changes for the Air Force and Strategic Care Command, which is a major command of the Air Force, but it's also a specified command. The greatest problem, I think, and it's a matter of doctrine and of organization is the fact that the command and control of Army forces. And on Steve's slide, there was a General Powell, you mentioned it particularly. General Powell had four hats that he was wearing during the crisis. He had to be responsible for Continental Army Command. He was the coordinating agency for coordinating the efforts. He was also the Army Component Commander for the Army Component that would go with LANCOM, the Atlantic Command. And he was also the Army Component Commander for STRIKOM, which had to provide some of the air defense systems.  And that becomes part of the problem is why Admiral Dennison, who was the head of the Atlantic Command, begins to drill down and put the 18th Airborne Command Commander, General House, into the role of being in charge of the task force for the landing aspect of the invasion of should it occur. Because they just realized that there's such a fragmentation of authority here and the lines are not clear in who's responding to who and the creation of ad hoc organizations such as Peninsula Command, which had not been envisioned in any of the plans. Okay. So we're in an archives. We have to have a question about archives. In your research, what has been, what have been the challenges? What roadblocks and obstacles do you run into in archival research? Well, when I first started researching my Cuba study, which was 30 years ago. So there's been a lot of changes, particularly with the handling of classified information. I was actually very surprised that the amount of material which had already been declassified when I was working for the Navy. I was even more shocked when some of my colleagues in Canada were able to provide me with information about the Canadian Navy, which the US Navy was still treating as highly classified, but the Canadians declassified it. But the challenge of working with the records, there's no nice way for me to put this. 30 years ago, you had people working with information security who were mostly lifers. They had a lot of experience in it. They'd worked a lot of stuff and the expansion of what we saw with the efforts to do more declassification. Starting with the Clint Neo onto classification. More and more people got brought into the process who, in my mind, knew less and less. And the problem is documents, particularly, one of the things we have to worry about in the Navy are the Kyle Lott amendments about nuclear information, including Navy nuclear repulsion. A lot of things started getting re-controlled. Including some of the documents I used to write the book 30 years ago. They start getting re-controlled 20 years ago. They get referred. Well, how does the referring agency answer this? It's not like we can go out and task them. Although I will say this, with many of the records that were reviewed in the early aughts and in the late 90s, the Army responded independently, came to, I was running the archives at that point, and he said, we understand you get about 900,000 pages of Army equities. We're gonna send people there to take a look at it. And he did, and they did an outstanding and very professional job. But I think even all these years later, the fact that there's not clarity on declassification is a problem. Yeah, there's a lot of material that's declassified and publicly available, but there's a lot that's not available to the public. The Army study, which is more than 300 pages, is declassified but never been publicly acknowledged. There are others that have been declassified. Even since the early 1990s, when a lot of information came out, for instance, the existence of tactical nuclear weapons actually being in Cuba, there is still some of the literature is huge, right? But on the other hand, there's a lot that hasn't been declassified. And of course, mentioned the nuclear, and if you look at some of the documents, as I've done with the strategic air command, they're redacted and the margins, Department of Energy, Department of Energy, Department of Energy. So even some of the ones that have been declassified are not completely available. And some of them, some of the operation plans are not available. They're referred to in studies and after action reports, but they're not readily available. All right. Just one for you if folks want to come and do research here at National Archives or up at USAC. As an archivist, what is your advice to somebody who wants to get started on this? Somebody who doesn't have experience. The first thing that you need to do is pinpoint what it is exactly you're looking for. If you go in with a broad idea of what you want to look at, there's so much that you'll be inundated and you could be there for a month and not get what you're looking for. So if you can pinpoint what it is that you're looking for specifically, what research topic you want to pinpoint and then that's where you see what the different institution would have so you don't waste your time going to NARA if the item's not at NARA, it might be at the Army Heritage and Education Center or come to Army and Heritage and Education Center, excuse me, try them out. If we don't have the document, so you want to know what is where and you want to know what you're looking for specifically first before you make that trip and then once you get there, be confident. I mean, if you know the document is there, ask for it, we'll bring it to you. All right, thank you gentlemen. Do we have any questions from the floor? If you have a question, please come on down and use the microphone. Folks online. I have a couple of questions from the online audience. Oh, fantastic. I'd like to ask a relay. What was the role of Guantanamo Bay during the crisis? Okay, Guantanamo Bay was still an active naval station. It had been maintained even after Castro came to power. It was held by a relatively, essentially it's got a reinforced infantry battalion as a garrison with limited anti-air assets, but during the course of the crisis, they essentially put three more rifle battalions into Guantanamo. Plus there's elements of two CB battalions that are there. And if you've ever looked at a map of Guantanamo, it's really, really small. That's a lot of people to shove in there. But the Cubans also didn't move against it directly, but they assembled militiamen near the area. We'd already prepared for the fact that they could cut electrical and water supplies. But Guantanamo maintained its station, but if it had come to a landing, okay, you've already got a reinforced brigade on the ground. Thank you. The second question. How did they, I assume this means the military, plan to maintain operational secrecy in the 100-mile or so transit from the United States? I don't know that they really, it's like if we're going, we're going, we're not gonna worry about it. I mean, I think if they would be more concerned because the Soviets had placed some anti-ship missiles, the SS2Cs over some of the more obvious landing beaches, I think they would have been more worried about that sort of thing, but as far as the ability of the Cubans or the Soviets to monitor much, I don't think, other than surface radar, they wouldn't have had much that would have worked because any attempt to do that kind of reconnaissance with aviation assets would have been shot down. Yeah, I don't know how much fee they were getting on radio or television broadcasts in the United States, but part of that was, so there were some rather humorous events where exercises were taking place at Hollywood Beach in Florida, and they land military lands to prepare and rehearse for this, and the soldiers who are landing end up fraternizing with the civilians on the beach. So there were moments like that where there was obvious cases of, and you mentioned Puerto Rico and others, where there was a lot of action going on. So I'm not sure there was any attempt to really blind the Cubans and the Soviets from knowing what was happening. Maybe you could comment, but I would assume that really there's no chance of a strategic surprise, and what tactical surprise there would be would come from the airborne landings, at least in terms of where they ended up, but I would imagine the Cubans would see those coming as well. Yeah, I think that's a good position to take. Okay, question of scale. How big was the Navy forces in the Atlantic at the time? We talked about needing Canadians to assist. How big was the Soviet ballistic fleet, missile fleet, or submarine fleet that they had in the Atlantic, and did they get any concerns about Soviet submarines operating off the West Coast? Well, I'll go with the last question first. I've never seen any documentation about concerns over Soviet operations off the West Coast with submarines. They had primarily, at least as far as their strategic assets, they were concentrated in the Northern Fleet out of Murmansk. They had relatively few of the Zulu-class boats that I mentioned earlier that had one or two ballistic missiles in the sail. You had to get them up to the surface to fire them, but they had relatively decent range, something in the vicinity, if I'm remembering correctly, 7,800 nautical miles. The cruise missiles that I mentioned earlier that were on the whiskey-class submarines, they've got a very, it's essentially a turbojet, so it's got about a 300 nautical mile range. They're gonna have to get very close to the US, but that was one of the things we were concerned about. Are there other vessels like this going around? They have to be monitored. The US has significant assets in the Atlantic. Of course, you still have to keep your forward-deployed presence in the Sixth Fleet, which has to stay manned up, but the fact that so many of the anti-submarine and the service assets, particularly destroyers, were needed for both quarantine operations, ASW operations, that's why it was good that the Canadians were able to pick up some of that slack because one of the things you got monitors, not just the submarines, the good old AGI, Soviet intelligence trawlers, which hide in the fishing fleet sometimes. And they had done some very unusual things in the years leading up to this. I recently read an article by one of my colleagues in the Canadian MOD where they actually pulled up an Atlantic cable at one point in 1961. These AGI's also stayed close, or tried to stay close, let me rephrase that, to SOSIS arrays, the underwater sound system and their cables. And so, you know, but it's just having to do so much at one time. Do we have any more questions from the floor from our friends online? All right, I think I'm gonna end with one last question for a brief answer. If there was one popular misconception about the Cuban Missile Crisis, you would like to correct what would it be? No, dear me. One, just one. One. There has been a misperception based on some of the stuff that's come out from Soviet veterans that at one point, one of the Foxtrot captains, tired of being harassed by the U.S. Navy, actively considered shooting his nuclear armed torpedo into the destroyer, which is, and I'm like, okay, if somebody really thinks that's gonna happen without an order from Moscow, if this guy attempts to order it, his political officer is gonna intervene and it will end very badly for the captain. But that's one of those things that keeps reoccurring and I'm like, nobody's gonna fire a nuclear weapon without authorization from Moscow. I would also think a destroyer is kind of a waste of a nuke. Oh, yeah. You can do it fine with a torpedo.  I think it's the factor of time. Time to prepare, time to understand courses of action, time to make good decisions and understanding the risk. I think sometimes the popularization, 13 days of the movie, et cetera, gives the impression about how steady every event was. And yet there's always this conflicting information coming in and even today, when you read the after-action reports in the studies, they're inconsistencies. And so I think the perception that it was a well-oiled machine that came into play is an overstatement. It really is number of meetings and the chronologies of just how much time was taken to go through each of these events. I think it has to be understood that this wasn't just sitting there in the cartoon of Dean Russ, the Secretary of State, or the President, looking at Chris Jeff, the Premier, and staring eyeball to eyeball and they blink. The one thing that comes to my mind is, the title of it is Cuban Missile Crisis, but it was less to do with Cuba as it was more for Russia versus the United States. The missiles, yeah, we're in Cuba, but this was against Russia versus the United States.  But everybody thinks so, the Cuban Missile Crisis. So it was Cuba that was doing, oh no, like Cuba just allowed Russia to put their missiles there. And in fact, in Russia, it's known as the Caribbean Crisis. Gentlemen, thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Thank you.


Hello friends and welcome to another Pokemon video. I hope you're all well, and I've just got to say one thing Happy happy Pokemon day. I hope you've had a great day. I'm super late getting this up And I work like full-time another job Unfortunately means I don't get the time to actually put these up in time, but I did want to put a video up It's Pokemon day I've got to put a video up and there's lots of stuff that we've had going on We've had the new mythical Pokemon announced and revealed in the new cocoa movie Which is pretty exciting and a new grass and dark type Pokemon And I'm not gonna cover that in this video just mention it But the main news because we are all about sword and shield on the channel at the minute. We have got some event Dynamics Pokemon a new event dens that are running right now at the moment So what we'll do first of all is hop over to our trusty source and Sarabee net the link will be down in the description below Let's get rid of that download link, but you can see now We have the new events running at the moment for a very short period only we have Bulbasaur Charmander and Squirtle the Cantal starters are going to be available in the event dens that are running at the minute along with what we're currently running with the the Gigantamax Kingler the Grim snarl and the Toxricity Orbeetle and Hadarine so you've got the prevolutions there But you can see that you can get the the Cantal starters like I said along with the other ones and You can also get Ivy Soul Charmeleon and war total so Ivy Soul and war total and Squirtle and Bulbasaur Previously not available in the games are now available for a short period of time and the big one We'll get into a bit more details in a minute. The big one is going to be Mewtwo So Mewtwo is now available in these events as well The only catch with Mewtwo is you cannot and there's no pun intended there You cannot catch Mewtwo you can only defeat it in the raid dens and you can just reap the wall Rewards that you get for catching Mewtwo, which are pretty pretty good to be honest You get things like Ability capsule which is crazy good considering it costs so much money to get in battle points and battle points are hard to come by in This game You get red candies the big kicker though is the Experience candies that you get so you're guaranteed to always get 20 large experience candies and 20 and 10 Excel candies which is crazy which is really good really really good a bunch of other items as well You're gonna get a giant or a big nugget there You're gonna get the common shard PP ups red candies and psychic is the TR that you get with Mewtwo Like I say the only drawback is you can't catch this Pokemon and it is level 100 and it is Extremely difficult to to defeat. I've been doing a bunch of them on stream tonight We did a bunch of Mewtwo den raids and I would just recommend that you invite others and make sure you When you go into the battle, you've got a bunch of Pokemon You've got it like a full team of people behind you helping you out and make sure that you've got some sort of strategy Things that aren't weak to Mewtwo Resist the psychic typing resist fighting if possible It's hard if you want to play a dark type for sure But I've been speaking to a lot of people They're kind of going along the lines of like if you've got dawn wings the cross more if you've got Lunala They're great Pokemon to bring against me to Grim snarl also really nice If you can fit it in the squad of four people that you've got it provides screen support Taunt as well as a big tip that we picked up on stream tonight to shut down the Mewtwo Nasty plotting bulking up like it likes to do just makes it a little easier for you guys But well worth it for the time period that it is running to do these dens just for the XP candy So you can level up those Pokemon a lot quicker and the items that you're gonna get from the Kanto starters These are the the gems I think honestly from these event Pokemon because you are able finally to get The flame orb and toxicle that were otherwise Really really impossible to get in the games because the only way you could get them was grinding through the the championship in Winden and by chance the ball guy giving you them so and As you can see on your screen will hop back into the game You get a bunch of other nice things TRs and items there the the squirtle of the water It gives you the life orb you get the flame orb from the charm and or a charm million and the Toxic orb from the IV so they've got good rates to pop up in the events But like I say they are only only running from literally today the 27th of February They are running from Pokemon day until this coming Sunday the 1st of March Is when they are gonna end and I would imagine then the dens the event dens will reset to what they were the Giganta max king la the Toxicity the grim snarl had a rain and the all beetle depending on what copy of the game You've got sword or shield and so just make sure if you are wanting to get these Pokemon take advantage of the items That are available in the games. I would definitely recommend getting yourself at least one toxic orb one flame orb If that's the bare minimum that you get just make sure you get those While you've got the chance before this event does shift And if there's any updates with new Pokemon coming in on the 1st of March when or the 2nd of March when these events finish I will surely update you with the news, but we're gonna hop back over into the game now Because I do have a den ready to go it is Well, can you guys guess it's only a full star? So I'm not gonna invite anyone We're gonna just go straight into a catch it see what we get and we'll be able to see I Think it's Ivy so maybe Bulbasaur though. It is Ivy so There we go. And finally in the games Officially not through Pokemon home, which you can get already But it's nice to be able to get these Pokemon in games Especially if you can't access Pokemon home for whatever reason you don't have any of the previous Pokemon titles to get these Pokemon so really nice way for us to get them and we'll just see how we can do and get through this It shouldn't take too long and but quite fitting really Bulbasaur was my first Pokemon that I ever chose When I got my copy of Pokemon red when I was a wee lad.  We are sword and shield probably one of my favorite Pokemon titles since Red blue and yellow and I'm being like deadly serious. I Love and I cannot say how much I have got so much love for sword and shield So I'm quite fitting that we're We're capturing this this Ivy saw as a as our first one in this video example anyway So I hope though that you guys if you get involved with the event raids going on at the minute have a lot of success You'll have a lot of fun. I'm trying to beat the Mewtwo for sure. It's a real challenge and we I was talking on the stream earlier about the Mewtwo raid in particular because we have the The tundra coming out the DLC the second DLC, which is due out. I think November time or late fall There's no exact date yet for when that will be released But that is gonna have a bunch of the legendary Pokemon available to catch in it And they did state that there would be Then's where you'd have to go in with friends to battle the legendary Pokemon now I would imagine From what Mewtwo is like this is gonna be very similar to maybe what the legendaries are gonna be like in the DLC And if they are up to the same part like of difficulty, it's gonna be extremely hard and it makes legendaries Probably for the first time in a Pokemon histories game life span Legendaries are gonna be as hard to get is probably what like that legendary mantle kind of holds for these Pokemon Making them very difficult to capture because in previous games. They're not really that difficult to get a hold of They've not been hard to find not being hard to capture defeat But Mewtwo is certainly a challenge even for the most experienced Pokemon trainer So we've defeated Ivy so do we risk a dive ball? I love a dive ball But for this example will go for a dust ball just to make sure Repeat ball probably gives us a little bit of a better chance, but we will catch this Ivy So see what goodies we get from the rewards and then we can wrap things up But remember it's running from today the 27th of February until the 1st of March So just make sure that you take advantage. I've said this many times through the video So sorry from repeating myself But just to make sure you are aware it is only for a limited time only these events So just I would take advantage of them while you can if you can't for whatever reason and you're watching this video after the 1st of March I'm gonna have a bunch of these Pokemon spare so hit me up in the comment section below Let me know and I'm happy to trade you across some spares that I do have and so yeah That is it you do see the items there very briefly of course and but here we go There's some ones I caught earlier and We can take a look at the Ivy so Just to let you know that these Pokemon do have the the chance to have their hidden abilities as well All the canto starters can have their hidden abilities So just making you aware of that it is really nice as well going forward you can see here The Ivy so actually has chlorophyll, which is its hidden ability, which is amazing Sludge bomb and you go razor leaf and body slam. So very good and super happy with that Enjoy the rest of Pokemon day. I hope you do have a great day I've enjoyed it all the announcements have come out and it's gonna be another great year of Pokemon I feel we've got the DLCs coming out later this year and it's gonna be very exciting And lots of other things going on in the meantime, but I will make sure to cover everything as in when they come out And thanks for tuning in do drop a like subscribe on the channel and leave your comments down below Let me know what your thoughts are about the Mewtwo raid dens if you've had any luck with them How hard you found them and which one of your canto starters is the one that you've went for which ones your favorite? Let me know down in the comment section, but yeah, enjoy Pokemon day. Happy Pokemon day everyone And I'll see you all for the next one. So until then take care and bye. Bye


Rwy'n gwybod cais y gwasanaeth mewn cyfleid ar ôl sydd yn glwyddol i wneud yn gwasanaeth ymlaen chi i'w bod yn ei gweithio, a ddod iawn yn bwysigol i yr bwysigol.  Pwysigol o'r targiadau yn cael 14,000 premisiau oes i ddim yn llwg ffibr o'r rhodol yn y Hylendon i Mor-i regoedd, a'r holl beth oes o'r holl beth o'r holl beth o'r hylendon i'r Hylendon i'r holl beth o'r holl beth o'r holl beth o'r holl beth o'r holl beth o'r The hardest to reach areas community broadband Scotland has helped and rural communities to develop and deliver innovative broadband solutions. Last month I announced a three-year extension and additional funding for community broadband Scotland, taking its total funding to £7.5 million. Gemi MacGregor? Well, I thank her for that. Notwithstanding that reply, what comfort can the minister offer to constituents in communities like White House in North Kintar where there y gweld y blwysig o'r gweithio yng Nghymru, ac mae'n dweud y cyfnodd ddigonwyr i ddweud y gweithiaeth neu'r cyfnodd gyffredinol yn ei ddeithas ei ddrygynnu. Mae gennym ni, ac mae'n parffwysion i ddweud 100 sg per mewn ffwyrau arall, o'r cyffredinol iawn o'r cyffredinol iawn. Mae Cymru fel ygafoddiad yng nghymru yn lenses. Maester Talksfaen yw ddechrau'n rhaid i ddweud ddigonwyr o'r cyffredinol iawn arall broadband to many more households than would have been the case under commercial roll-out. We recognise that, given our geography, there are areas in Scotland that are hard to reach. That is why we have done two things. There is a £2.5 million innovation fund, which has been set up to assess technology options once the fibre backbone has been deployed, and as new, more innovative solutions become available. Secondly, and as I outlined in my answer, we have established Community Broadband Scotland, which is working with communities in the harder-to-reach areas to look at innovative ways of delivering broadband solutions. We have just, as I said, increased the funding available to that. If there are particular areas, Jimmie McGregor wants to write to me about, I am more than happy to ensure that we look and help him and his constituents to look at the options that are available. Question 2, Neil Findlay. To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to privatise NHS services. Cabinet Secretary, Alex Neil. The Scottish Government's vision is for the NHS in Scotland to remain in publicly-owned, publicly-funded service provision, providing care, free at the point of delivery, unlike the Labour Party. We do not believe in privatisation. The cabinet secretary will be aware that NHS in Scotland is fully devolved, and whether services in England are procured publicly or privately, Scotland still gets our full share as it is still public money. We know that procurement in the private sector is usually more expensive. On top of that, the NHS in Scotland can only be privatised if this Parliament votes for it. Something that we know no party or no individual in this Parliament is advocating. Given the facts on what credible basis it is, can it be argued that Scotland's NHS will be privatised in the event that Scotland rejects separation? I will deal with the facts. The fact is that the UK Government has estimated the impact of privatisation will be to reduce the health budget in England by £1 billion a year within the next two or three years. If that happens, it means a knock-on impact in the Barnett consequentials, which clearly Mr Finlay does not understand, will be a loss of £100 million a year to the national health service in Scotland. Unlike Mr Finlay, I do not believe that we should put the future of the NHS in Scotland in Tory hands in London. In relation to the change fund, cabinet secretary, which is accessed by NHS and local authorities, and accesses home care provided by local authorities and third sector providers, the cabinet secretary will be aware, from his recent visit to Heir Myers hospital, about discharge delays because of home care packages not being put in place timeously. Can I ask whether the cabinet secretary has had any further thoughts about a potential solution to this following his visit? Ms Fabiani, it is surely quite wide of the mark when we are talking about privatisation, but if the cabinet secretary wishes to briefly answer it. I will as always briefly answer it, Presiding Officer. I have this morning announced £5 million to deal with the issue of delayed discharges, and I am glad to say that the allocation to deal with the issue in South Lanarkshire is £400,000, and that will be used to maximum effect to reduce delayed discharges particularly in relation to Heir Myers hospital. To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with the newly appointed Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The cabinet secretary has written to Liz Truss, the new DEFRA Secretary of State, twice since her appointment, to congratulate her on her new post, and to finalise the details for notifying Scotland's voluntary couple support schemes to the European Commission. In the first letter, he also took the opportunity to ask her to reconsider the appalling convergence allocation decision made by her predecessor, which will shortchange Scotland's farmers to the tune of around €187 million between 2015 and 2020. Bearing in mind that Ms Truss will be the fifth DEFRA Secretary of State that the cabinet secretary has worked with during his time in office, he suggested an early meeting to discuss the need for Scottish and devolved ministers' involvement in important rural and marine issues. I hope that the new Secretary of State will look more favourably on and indeed show greater respect for the needs of Scotland's farmers, fishermen and other rural industries than her immediate predecessor. Angus MacDonald I thank the minister for his reply. I think it's fair to say that the previous Secretary of State, Don Patterson, has not exactly left behind a legacy to be proud of. Failure to repatriate the red meat leveo to Scotland, failure to repatriate the convergence uplift funding from the EU to Scotland's farmers and crofters, and failure to represent Scotland properly at EU level during cap negotiations. Does the minister agree with me that it's imperative for Scotland to have a seat at the top table in Europe prior to the next round of cap negotiations starting in 2017, and the only way to ensure that is a yes vote on the 18th of September? Michael Matheson Minister Yes, I do agree with that assessment. I would say about the need for us to be at the top table is that we need to have direct representation in European Union and the ability to negotiate our own priorities and avoid the situation, unfortunately, to be filled. Mr Patterson, he forgot to raise the very red line issue that the Scottish Government had raised with him prior to entering those discussions. We need to achieve more cap funding clearly from Europe. We need to have the opportunity to use the full fiscal powers of an independent country to encourage farm tenancies and new entrants to farming, and we need to ensure that Scotland's agricultural leveys support Scottish produce. Finally, just to ensure that we have overseas representation dedicated to promoting Scotland's food and drink sector and to avoid the ludicrous situation where we have had a challenge getting beef imports to Japan, something because the UK did not prioritise that in their negotiations with the Japanese Government. Question 4, Margaret McDougall. To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of taxation in an independent Scotland. In Scotland's future, we have set out our plans to build a simple Scottish tax system after independence, which stimulates Scotland's economy, builds social cohesion and sustains our public services. The UK tax system is complex and inefficient. By designing a simple tax system based on a clear set of principles with few reliefs and exemptions, Scotland could reduce opportunities for avoidance and so generate additional revenues without increasing tax rates. As Scotland's public finances are healthier than those of the UK as a whole, there will be no requirement to raise the general rate of taxation to fund existing levels of spending after independence. I thank the cabinet secretary for that answer. Just before recess, the First Minister claimed that in an independent Scotland, the council tax would be replaced with a local income tax. Spice calculated that such a move could cost the average family with two earners £550 more a year. Increasingly, it appears that under SNP proposals in the event of a yes vote, big business will profit while ordinary workers will suffer. Why is the white paper so light on taxation and is it not the case that taxes will have to go up to achieve what is being promised with a yes vote? If not, how exactly are you paying for it? When Mrs MacDougall's last point, the answer is no, taxes will not have to go up to pay for independence. What independence will give us the opportunity to do is to change our spending priorities. One of the spending priorities that we will change is the ludicrous amount of money that Mrs MacDougall and her colleagues seemed prepared after yesterday's vote to do to spend vast amounts of money on weapons of mass destruction rather than spending the money on tackling child poverty and the issues that I thought used to matter to the Labour Party in Scotland. On the issue about local taxation, the Scottish Government has a commitment during this Parliament to work with others to discuss the future of local taxation and to introduce a system based on the ability to pay. That is the Government's commitment and that is what we will fulfil during this time of Parliament. The finance secretary will be aware that Opposition parties have failed to agree proposals for devolving further tax powers in the event of a no vote, as evidenced by the vague declaration earlier this week, in which Alasdair Darlane has completed an ability to detail these on Tuesday night. Does the cabinet secretary agree that the only guaranteed way to see this Parliament being full taxation powers is to see this as a referendum? When people are entitled to know exactly what proposition will be put forward by the Opposition parties, there was absolutely no clarity on Tuesday at the declaration from all the party. Leaders nor has there been any occasion in the past and there certainly wasn't any clarity from Alasdair Darlane in the television debate on Tuesday night. So let's be absolutely clear, if people want to control their tax in Scotland, they've got to vote for independence. Thank you, Presiding Officer. In the latest Scottish Government mailing, it says, we would increase tax allowances in line with the cost of living. Will that apply to every single tax allowance and, if so, what is the approximate cost? Well, clearly, yes, the commitment extends towards the relevant taxes and, of course, all of the issues would be set out in the budget of an independent Scotland on the issues taken forward by the finance minister at that time. That is what is set out in the Government's document. That is the commitment that we make to the people of Scotland. To ask the Scottish Government for what reason the decision to arm police officers on routine duties was regarded as an operational matter and not scrutinised by the Parliament. Over 98 per cent of police officers in Scotland are unarmed, and we've clearly stated on a number of occasions that decisions on the deployment of police officers, including the small number of armed police officers, are a matter for the chief constable of the Police Service of Scotland. That freedom from political interference reflects the position of all parts of the chamber when we debated the Police and Fire Reform Scotland Bill in the Parliament. That legislation made sure that we also have the appropriate checks and balances in place, including scrutiny roles for the Scottish Police Authority, the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner and Her Majesty's Inspector of Constability for Scotland. Furthermore, the Parliament's sub-committee in policing exists in order to scrutinise all aspects of policing in Scotland. This whole issue lays bare the Achilles heel of a single police force, with no meaningful public accountability to local areas. A threat about which my party repeatedly warned the cabinet secretary, does he now concede that this policy regrettably confirms that vital checks and balances have been lost by the rolling out of a uniform police culture across all of Scotland, regardless of need or appropriateness? No, I don't. I believe that there are now significantly more checks and balances and safeguards than existed under the former regime. We now have, in particular, a Scottish Police Authority that I think is greater statured than the previous individual constable's authorities. We have, as I say, an existence to that. We also have the parliamentary sub-committee that did not exist. We now also have three particular matters relating to armed policing. We have the PIRC that did not exist before, and the Investigations and Review Commissioner is there and was not previously with the same power of authority. HMICS has a particular role and enhanced role, doubtless because of the single service. Equally, we have the commitment that standing firearms authority is reviewed on a three-monthly basis. That is a far greater amount of safeguards and checks and balances that ever existed under the old regime. Presiding Officer, to ask the Scottish Government what steps have been taken to tackle antisocial behaviour in Glasgow province. The Scottish Government is committed to tackling antisocial behaviour, our 2009 strategy promoting positive outcomes marked a significant shift in policy recognising that prevention, early intervention and diversion should be at the heart of approaches to tackle antisocial behaviour. The number of reported antisocial behaviour related crimes in Scotland has fallen by 38 per cent over the period 2009-10 to 2012-13. Of course, there are also more police now in Scotland than there have ever been. Both Police Scotland and Community Safety Glasgow confirm an overall reduction in antisocial behaviour in the proven area. Diversionary activities are a key contributor to that, and local partners are working to ensure that there are appropriate activities available for young people in the area. The Cashback for Communities programme also provides a range of sporting, cultural and youth work opportunities for young people in Glasgow province. The Scottish Government is also currently consulting on a number of potential legislative changes to the antisocial behaviour, etc. Scotland Act 2004, which will help to improve the response to antisocial behaviour. Paul Marston? Perhaps the reduction in the reporting of crimes has come down for the very fact that members of the public have been charged for calling the 101 service. Will the minister advise me if there are any plans to ensure that that service is a free phone service to ensure that people are encouraged to report antisocial crime in the first place? Thank you for the promotion. The introduction of the 101 service was designed to ensure that the 99 service worked as efficiently as it could in connection with serious reports of crime. At the moment, I am not aware of any intention to change the proposals in respect of the 101 service, but I am sure that the member will want to make representations not just here in the chamber but directly to the justice ministers in that particular regard. To ask the Scottish Government what action it will take to address income poverty. The Government takes low pay very seriously, and we are leading the way by doing all that we can to ensure that as many people as possible benefit from the living wage. Our commitment to support the Scottish living wage for the duration of this Parliament is a decisive long-term commitment to those on the lowest incomes. We want to encourage others to follow the example that we have set. That is why we have funded a pilot for the poverty alliance to deliver a living wage accreditation scheme, which aims to increase the number of employers paying the living wage in all sectors in Scotland to make decent pay the norm in our country. In Scotland's future, we have set out information on our plan to set up a fair work commission and guarantee that the minimum wage will rise at least in line with inflation. Over the last five years, that would have improved the annual earnings of some of the lowest-paid Scots by over 600 pounds. Christina McKelvie I thank the cabinet secretary for that very welcome announcement. The cabinet secretary will be aware that, over the last decade, more and more people are being pushed into poverty pay and reliance on and work benefits because of UK pay policy. Does the cabinet secretary agree with me that the only way to ensure that Scotland workers are lifted out of poverty pay is a yes vote six weeks from today? When we look at the erosion of the value and the significance of the minimum wage, because of the failure to increase the minimum wage with the cost of living every year since 2008, we can see the real effects, the realities of Westminster Government in Scotland. What independence provides us with the opportunity to do is to ensure that, in line with the commitments that we have set out, the minimum wage rises at the very least in line with inflation, which the Government gives to the people of Scotland. As the Scottish Government has, it is improving access to justice for rape victims. Rape and sexual assault are among the most distressing crimes in our society, and they are totally unacceptable. The Scottish Government is working with its key partners to ensure that perpetrators are held to account and that victims have access to appropriate support. We have and continue to strengthen the law in relation to rape and sexual assault that includes strengthening the law around sexual crime through the sexual offences Scotland Act 2009, giving victims of sexual offences automatic access to measures such as screens and video links when giving evidence, and Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Scotland's creation of the national specialist as sexual crimes unit to prosecute serious sexual offences. I thank the cabinet secretary for that answer. The cabinet secretary will be aware of a recent BBC survey regarding regional variation in the practice of marking police reports no crime, covering a four-year period, whereas Police Scotland has only been in existence since 1 April 2013. However, how can consistency across Scotland be achieved without compromising operational independence? I am grateful for the question, and I think that I should make clear that there are long-standing rules that the police follow in deciding whether to record a report as a no crime. Those apply to all offences where a crime originally been recorded and include situations where credible information emerges after the recording of a crime, which indicates that a crime has not been committed. Those rules predate the creation of Police Scotland, and nothing has changed since the establishment of the single service. The single service has allowed for greater consistency, improved national standards and procedures, and indeed the establishment of a national unit, as has been referred to. That ends General Questions time. We now move to First Minister's question.


Due to gender inequality in our communities, women are the most left out in the digital space. To seek to break this gender divide, it is important that we support women-focused initiatives that seek to provide digital inclusion of women either through training or providing devices or internet connectivity for them. Building the capacity of such initiatives will ensure that they get to reach out to more women and they are able to have access to the digital world.