Thirteen Days Essay

The one thing that everyone in this world has in common is communication. Without effective communication the world wouldn’t be able to function. An important aspect of communication, which is highly displayed in the movie Thirteen Days, is the ability to resolve conflicts. Throughout the movie, Thirteen Days, the characters work through the process of mediation, negotiation and arbitration to develop a plan for dealing with the possibility or World War 3. Throughout this paper I will discuss the ideas of mediation, negotiation, and arbitration as well as how they are prominently displayed. I will begin by analyzing Kenny O’Donnell and his uses of mediation, negotiation and arbitration.
Kenny O’Donnell, portrayed by actor Kevin Costner, deals
Kennedy deals with a lot of issues such as negotiating. One of the scenes that I enjoyed the most with negotiating was when the men decided to accept the first offer and pretend that the second offer was a mistake or that it never happened. I place this as negotiation because in this scene all of the men are brainstorming their ideas and ultimately they want an integrative form of negotiation. The men look at the interest of both countries, The United States wanting the missiles removed from Cuba and Cuba wanting the United States’ missiles removed from Turkey. With this they were anticipating the needs of the other party and learning more of their interests. Their main interest was to relieve the threat on the United States for a nuclear attack and that was by getting rid of the missiles. In this form of negotiation the men used an agent which would be the President of the United States. Ultimately the president has final say for the situation because he acts as a mediator between the United States and the Soviet Union because he wants to retain the relationship with the Soviets but he also needs to make sure that his country is safe and that the welfare of his citizens is of upmost importance. By using negotiation the president is retaining the relationship with the Soviet Union instead of jumping to adjudication and jeopardizing that full relationship. The third style that the president uses to resolve issues is mediation which will be summed up in the next