Cuban Missile Crisis Cartoon

Recently, we read two articles about the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis. While I was doing some background research on these two events, a political cartoon caught my attention. This cartoon was drawn for the Washington Post on November 1, 1962 shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis. It was drawn by a famous political cartoonist named Herblock (short for Herbert Block), who won three Pulitzer prizes. This cartoon depicts John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev trying to contain nuclear war, which is in the form of an angry beast trying to escape. Kennedy and Khrushchev are the protagonists, working together to stop the evils of nuclear war. The caption "lets get a lock for this thing" tells readers that neither the US nor the Soviet Union wanted to face the devastating consequences of nuclear war. Both men are sweating as they try to lock the box, implying that nuclear war is hard to "lock away," because nuclear weapons are becoming more present as science improves.
While this cartoon may be specifically about the Cuban Missile Crisis, I believe it sends a very important message that is applicable to all wars. Once the beast of nuclear war is unleashed, it is powerful and hard to contain.