Cuban Missile Crisis into Cuba. On October 13, Dobrynin was questioned by former Undersecretary of State Chester Bowles about whether the Soviets planned to put offensive weapons in Cuba. He denied any such plans. On October 17, Soviet embassy official Georgy Bolshakov brought President Kennedy a personal message from Khrushchev reassuring him that "under no circumstances would surface-to-surface missiles be sent to Cuba." As early as August 1962, the US suspected the Soviets of building missile facilities in Cuba. During that month, its intelligence services gathered information about sightings by ground observers of Russian-built MiG-21 fighters and Il-28 light bombers. U-2 spyplanes found
Cuban Missile Crisis and Secretary-General of the Organization of American States, José Antonio Mora to brief them on the US intelligence and their proposed response. All were supportive of the US position, except Macmillan who advocated appeasement. Shortly before his speech, Kennedy called former President Dwight Eisenhower. Kennedy's conversation with the former President also revealed that the two were conspiring during the Cuban Missile Crisis. The two also anticipated that Khruschev would respond to the Western world in a matter that was similar to his response during the Suez Crisis and would possibly wind up trading off Berlin. On October 22 at 7:00