Who was the leader of the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis?

The leader of the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis was Nikita Khrushchev. He held the position of First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and was in power during the critical period of the Cold War when the Cuban Missile Crisis occurred in October 1962.

Khrushchev's leadership is significant in this context because he made the decision to place Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba, which brought the U.S. and the Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war. His actions, driven by the intention to protect Cuba and level the strategic playing field with the United States, were pivotal in escalating tensions during the Cold War. The crisis ultimately led to a confrontation between Khrushchev and U.S. President John F. Kennedy, highlighting the intense rivalry and dangerous stakes of the era.

The other individuals listed were not in power during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Joseph Stalin had died in 1953, Leon Trotsky was assassinated in 1940 and was never a leader of the Soviet Union in a formal sense, and Mikhail Gorbachev came to power much later, in the mid-1980s, long after the crisis had passed.