In 1959, Fidel Castro led a revolution against Fulgencio Batista. Castro took power in Cuba with Che Guevara from Argentina, his brother Raul, and others who fought against Batista. Castro made many changes to Cuba. He ended American ownership of Cuban businesses. This made Castro unpopular in America and the United States banned all contact with Cuba. Many Cubans went to America because of this. In 1961, the Americans helped some of these Cubans to attack Cuba and try to remove Castro, but they failed. Castro then asked the Soviet Union to help defend them from the Americans, which they did. The Soviet Union put nuclear weapons in Cuba and aimed them at the United States. American President Kennedy demanded that they be removed or a new war would begin. This was known as the "Cuban Missile Crisis". The Soviet Union removed the missiles when the United States agreed to not continue attacking Cuba and to remove missiles from Turkey.