In tracing the developments of the Cuban Missile Crisis and beyond, this book presents and interprets a heretofore unavailable (and largely unknown) secret speech that Castro delivered to the Cuban leadership in 1968. Blight and Brenner shed new light on Cuban-Soviet relations making Sad and Luminous Days essential not only for Cold-War scholars and historians, but also for anyone intrigued by the drama of the thirteen momentous days in October 1962.