The main theme of this book is the events associated with the creation of our country's nuclear missile potential and the confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union, which culminated in the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Documents recently declassified both in the United States and in Russia, the stories of Nikita Sergeevich and other eyewitnesses, as well as the personal impressions of the author who participated in the work on the creation of missiles, reproduce in detail the history of achieving strategic parity, which pushed back the threat of a third world war.