Following nearly destroying our planet, the families are friends’: the thrilling podcast from John F. Kennedy & Nikita Khrushchev’s descendants.

During October 1962, the world came closer to annihilation than at any other point during modern times. This occurred following the discovery that an American surveillance aircraft identified the fact that Russian nuclear weapon sites were being built on the island of Cuba, a mere 160 kilometers from the United States. Reacting to this, U.S. President JFK ordered the US Navy’s Sixth Fleet to establish a naval quarantine encircling Cuba. The next phase was nearly 14 days filled with extreme stress.

The Unthinkable Threat

The peril was clear. Should Kennedy, or else the Russian opposite, Premier Khrushchev, had fired on the other side, a cascade involving global nuclear strikes followed by retaliatory strikes would have followed, casting mankind into total oblivion.

The Cuban missile crisis has been documented extensively, in books, films, and TV documentaries. But, for its third season, a prominent BBC World Service podcast The Bomb introduces a completely new dimension to the story. The series is jointly hosted featuring Kennedy's relative alongside Nina Khrushcheva, family members of the men that, over two tense weeks, controlled the destiny of the world within their grasp.

"What were the Russians planning? What was the American side considering?" questions Nina Khrushcheva, Khrushchev’s descendant and an academic specializing in global relations.

In her view, the beauty of the show is its attempt to objectively ask: "How can people detest each other and go against each other?"

"I am acutely aware how profound the fact that individuals have the potential to be friends or else can become total enemies," states Max Kennedy, the son of Robert Kennedy, nephew of the late president and currently an author as well as lawyer. "We see this over and over in instances where nations enter into conflict, and it just illustrates the profound irrationality it is to fight."

A Brink Towards Catastrophe

What is striking about the Cuban missile crisis was that, because it unfolded so publicly, individuals worldwide could watch nearly as it happened while it moved closer to disaster. Even so, the danger of annihilation came closer than what most people realised.

"Virtually everyone among Kennedy's advisors wanted a military strike and a ground invasion," says Max Kennedy. "If we had attacked the Cubans using the Sixth Fleet, there is no question Soviet forces stationed there would have deployed a nuclear warhead against the US Sixth Fleet, and that would've destroyed our naval vessels and sunk America's primary fleet. And, the U.S. would have retaliated with an overwhelming counterattack that would have eradicated all life on the planet."

The reality this did not occur highlights the composure of Kennedy and Khrushchev, who managed to keep their heads while calmly negotiate when many advisors around them demanded military action. As a result, The Soviet premier removed the nuclear weapons from Cuba while Kennedy (a fact not publicly disclosed at the time) withdrew his similar weapons from Turkey. The relief was immense, as was the sense of optimism.

The Divergent Viewpoint

Still, during those two weeks of October 1962, the fear was felt globally. The Bomb’s presenters came into the world in the years following these events, with Nina being taught about it through the USSR's education system, which portrayed an alternative narrative of what happened.

"You said your father remembers it, and it was a frightening time," Khrushcheva notes. "But for Soviet citizens, the public really didn’t know that much about it, because it was a tense situation, whereas under the Soviet system we were told that everything was constantly fine or sunny."

Within Khrushchev’s family, however, the perspective was different. "I was informed what a great occasion for the USSR, because it represented eyeball to eyeball. The leaders managed to find a solution, thus avoided a global war, seen as a wonderful outcome," she adds. In the years to come, however, that view would not be shared by all Russians. "For a long time in Russian politics, the crisis was viewed as a defeat for the Soviet leader, because he refrained from destroying America."

An Unprecedented Collaboration

This podcast is remarkably balanced and well produced so much so that Khrushcheva quips she nearly forgot she already knew the ending. This is, in part, thanks to the participation of renowned scholars. Yet, truly, the most significant thing is the participation of the hosts themselves. Even within living memory, it would be inconceivable for descendants of the heads of state of the United States and Soviet Union to appear side by side. That Max Kennedy and Nina Khrushcheva can do that, and exhibit such warmth with each other, has to be a sign of hope.

"We are not the first," smiles Khrushcheva. "After the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, my uncle Sergey Khrushchev’s son where he became great friends with the former president's family."

"However we had never met prior to this project," adds Kennedy. "That is a shame since we connected immediately and now we’re friends, something that is really great. Finally, after almost six decades since almost destroying the planet, our families have become friends, suggesting global relations is more secure, somewhat."

Contemporary Echoes and Current Dangers

Or is it? One reason the reason The Bomb seems so urgent is that we once again find ourselves in a perilous era. The Doomsday Clock is closer to catastrophe in its history, in part because today's statesmen don’t seem to have the capacity to grasp