| Preface | |
| Abbreviations | |
| Ch. 1 | Introduction | 3 |
| Pt. 1 | The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962 | |
| Ch. 2 | Missiles to Cuba: Foreign-Policy Motives | 19 |
| Ch. 3 | Missiles to Cuba: Domestic Politics | 51 |
| Ch. 4 | Why Did Khrushchev Miscalculate? | 67 |
| Ch. 5 | Why Did the Missiles Provoke a Crisis? | 94 |
| Ch. 6 | The Crisis and Its Resolution | 110 |
| Pt. 2 | The Crisis in the Middle East, October 1973 | |
| Ch. 7 | The Failure to Prevent War, October 1973 | 149 |
| Ch. 8 | The Failure to Limit the War: The Soviet and American Airlifts | 182 |
| Ch. 9 | The Failure to Stop the Fighting | 198 |
| Ch. 10 | The Failure to Avoid Confrontation | 226 |
| Ch. 11 | The Crisis and Its Resolution | 261 |
| Pt. 3 | Deterrence, Compellence, and the Cold War | |
| Ch. 12 | How Crises Are Resolved | 291 |
| Ch. 13 | Deterrence and Crisis Management | 324 |
| Ch. 14 | Nuclear Threats and Nuclear Weapons | 348 |
| Postscript. Deterrence and the End of the Cold War | 369 |
| Notes | 377 |
| Appendix | 523 |
| Name Index | 527 |
| General Index | 535 |
