There’s no subreddit better suited for this type of question (and I will now proceed to prove this statement).

At the time of the Cuban Crisis in October 1962 the core of the Strategic Air Command’s airpower was formed by the B-52 Stratofortress. The B-47E Stratojet was still present in the USAF in the bomber role, and would be for a few more years to come, but at this time they were already being phased out. The B-52, on the other hand, had just barely passed the pinnacle of its career as a strategic bomber. After all, we’re already in the age of the nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Nevertheless, the B-52 was still very much in its prime. In mid-1962 there were 33 B-52 squadrons operational. The number decreased, as units were re-organized, but still at the end of 1965 there were ca. 600 operational B-52s.

At this time the B-52 fleet was also being upgraded with what’s called pyrotechnic cartridge starters. To quote: ‘These allowed all eight engines to be started simultaneously, thus dramatically reducing the time it took to get airborne. This innovation was accompanied by new procedures, such as the “Minimum Interval Take-Off” (MITO), which saw aircraft getting airborne in the minimum possible time in clouds of black smoke.’^[1]

Seeing as an attack by Soviet ICBMs would give the Americans very little time to react, SAC envisaged a scheme by which a number of B-52s was kept in the air at all time, safe from the nuclear blasts of warheads which would inevitably hit their bases. The scheme was complex and expensive (I was unable to find precise numbers, unfortunately), but during the Crisis it was expanded beyond anything seen up until that point. ‘Some 70 sorties a day maintained the airborne alert at a high level for about a month, while those units which were not on “airborne alert” went on to a higher posture on the ground’.^[2] Post-Crisis the number of B-52s kept in the air was reduced to 12.

Had the B-52s been directed to attack Russia, they would have used mainly B28 hydrogen bombs, but also B41 (maximum yield of 25 megatons) and B53 bombs. Normally, one bomber would carry four such bombs, but it could carry up to eight. Early B-52s (A through D) were able to fly for 6000 miles with four bombs.^[3] In 1959, the B-52s were also provided with what’s called a stand-off weapon, or a weapon which allows you to engage your target without being engaged by the target’s defenses. It was the GAM-77 Hound Dog, which could deliver a one megaton explosion. A B-52 could carry two Hound Dogs, one under each wing.

There was also one more bomber: the Convair B-58 Hustler, introduced in March 1960. It was a much smaller aircraft, but also much faster, capable of Mach 2 speeds. The B-58 was, in fact, the successor of the B-47, but it was a problematic design, not well liked within the USAF. For example, even though it theoretically should have been able to fly at twice the speed of sound, it required extensive modification of its electronics to be able to reach just Mach 1.65. Its bombing and navigation system also caused the USAF a hell of a headache^[4] Nevertheless, in an all out war every capable bomber would have been scrambled.

Now, as for the escort part of your question, you might be surprised to see that the answer is: none. There would have been no escort fighters to assist the bombers in penetrating Soviet airspace. Why? Because there were no fighters that would have been able to fulfill this role. The distance was simply too great. And on top of that, the threat from surface to air missiles was considered too high when compared to the threat of enemy interceptors, therefore no need existed for such machines. Escort fighters as companions for strategic bombers generally disappeared altogether early in the Cold War.

The B-52 wasn’t completely defenseless, though, and wouldn’t have had to depend only on dumb luck. In its tail it had a quadruple mount of .50 machine guns, which might seems like a World War II-inspired nostalgia trip, but the Vietnam war actually saw B-52s shoot down two MiG-21s by means of these very machine guns. Moreover, the bombers were equipped with the McDonnell ADM-20 Quail: an air-launched decoy missile. It was designed to simulate the heat and radar signatures of the actual bomber and thus deceive ground based radar stations and Soviet interceptors.

Here is a photo of a Quail dropped from a B-52; if you look closely, you’ll also see the four guns in the lower protrusion of the bomber’s tail.

I need to get going now. If you have any follow-up questions, I’ll be happy to answer them in about 10 hours or so.

Notes

[1] Jon Lake, B-52 Stratofortress Units in Combat, 1955–73, Osprey 2004, p. 17.

[2] Ibidem, pp. 17–18.

[3] S.L. Rearden, US Strategic Bombing Doctrine, in: Case Studies in Strategic Bombardment, R. Cargill Hall, ed., 1998.

[4] Marcelle Size Knack, Encyclopedia of USAF Aircraft and Missile Systems: Vol 2: Post World War II Bombers, 1945-1973, Office of Air Force History, 1988.

Edit: Minor proofreading.