The Cuban missile crisis became a turning point in the relationship between Soviet Russia and the United States. The historical event which made the whole world shudder from the danger of destruction caused the beginning of Détente. There are lots of interpretations that describe the event-form from different angles.
The book by Graham Allison and Philip Zelikow is dedicated to the problem of defining the cause which led the USSR to place missiles in Cuba and withdraw them within several weeks. The authors highlight the even though there are several interpretations of the historical event, none of them can fully describe and state real reasons and answers to the questions: “Why did the Soviet Union place strategic offensive missiles in Cuba? Why did the United States respond with a naval quarantine of Soviet shipments to Cuba?” (Allison, and Zelikow 1), and “Why were the missiles withdrawn?” (Allison, and Zelikow 2).
Allison and Zelikow offer readers three different interpretations of the same event. The authors argue that one event can be investigated and seen through a different lens and from different angles. Allison and Zelikow suggest such models: the rational actor model, the bureaucratic model, and the organizational one. Each of the models reveals different motivations and behavior of the leaders during the Cuban missile crisis.
The first model, the rational actor one, depicts the development during the crisis from the point of view of national purpose. In this aspect, the government may be compared with an individual who acts according to the national goals. The model I describes actions as the most expected. In other words, the rational actor model, or the classic one, helps to predict what might happen in this or that situation. The assumption in such type of model is usually based on specified objectives (Allison, and Zelikow 5). The strongest aspect of the rational actor model is the power of explanation.
The second model reveals another aspect of the event, unlike the one mentioned above the organizational model depicts the reasons for the Cuban missile crisis from the point of view of the organization rather than an individual. “Predictions identify trends that reflect established organizations and their fixed procedures and programs” (Allison, and Zelikow 6). Allison and Zelikow show that the second model depicts events the crisis and withdraw of the missile by the Soviet Union as the choice of an alternative variant considering the organizational behavior paradigm.
The third model, the governmental one, depicts the events during the Cuban missile crisis as the game, and its output as nothing but a result of bargaining.
All in all Allison and Zelikow conclude that all three models of behavior and motivation can be considered in isolation. The fact is that the models offer three viewpoints on one problem from different angles. That is why they cannot be compared: they offer different answers because they ask a different questions. That is why all three models should be taken into account as three sides of the same phenomenon; Model I reveals the national context of the event in Cuba, the Model II depicts the Cuban missile crisis from the form the point f view of organizational pattern; finally, the Model III represents the crisis is concentrated on the individuals who constitute the national governments (Allison, and Zelikow 392).
Work Cited
Allison, Graham, and Zelikow, Philip. Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis. London: Longman, 1999. Print.