"HE WROTE HIS FULL NAME--JOHN FITZGERALD KENNEDY--WITH A SMOOTH FLOURISH"

JFK SIGNS BLOCKADE PROCLAMATION

Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) At 7 p.m. Eastern time, October 23, 1962, President John F. Kennedy signed Proclamation 3504 authorizing a naval quarantine* of Cuba to take effect at 10 a.m.,October 24, 1962.

Michael Dobbs writes...

"The flashbulbs popped in the Oval Office as Kennedy signed the two-page proclamation authorizing the U.S. Navy to intercept and if necessary 'to take into custody,' Soviet ships bound for Cuba with 'offensive weapons.'

He wrote his full name--John Fitzgerald Kennedy--with a smooth flourish.

Seated behind the Resolute desk...he was the image of presidential determination.  But that was not how he felt.  He had been questioning his advisers all day about what would happen when U.S. warships came head to head with Soviet vessels, and was disturbed by the thought of everything that could go wrong."

JFK had announced both the presence of the Soviet missiles in Cuba, as well as his decision to set up a naval blockade of the island, in a nationally televised address to the Nation the previous evening. 

*quarantine is defined as a restriction in the movement of people & goods, usually in reference to prevention of the spread of disease.  In this case, JFK & his advisers chose the word in place of blockade purposefully.

SOURCES

"One Minute to Midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev & Castro on the Brink of Nuclear War," by Michael Dobbs, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2008.

"TWE Remembers: The OAS Endorses a Quarantine of Cuba (Cuban Missile Crisis, Day 8)," by James M. Lindsay, www.blogs.cfr.org.

   JFK Signs Quarantine Proclamation

                  October 23, 1962

              Photo by Abbie Rowe

                 JFK Library Image