# Living through the Cold War - were you afraid of nuclear war? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 17, 2026, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976 "2026-06-17T15:45:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/61 "2026-06-18T12:30:56Z")
Born in '77, and while I grew up very near a [Nike Missile Base](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nike_missile_sites) in northern NJ, and _understood_ the words ‘nuclear war’, I was too young to understand what they really meant. I do remember a lot of the events @HMS_Irruncible listed from the nightly news, along with Tom Brokaw, live on scene, at the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, coverage of Desert Storm, and all of the later events that I was around for. Then I went off into the world . . . Right now, knowing what I know/see, I am \ ***still** afraid of nuclear war, and think we’re just half a step behind the Cuban Missile Crisis. Tripler The Cold War never ended, it just got ignored (by us Americans) for awhile. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/62 "2026-06-18T12:52:25Z")
> [@penultima\_thule](#): > > Even now the estimates of range for silo based missile launches are “capable of reaching northern Australia” which puts a couple of thousand miles between us. Since the middle of the last century, the range for silo based missile launches has been “anywhere on the planet”. You’re right that nobody’s likely to target Australia (much), but they absolutely could if they wanted to. And with as many thousands of warheads as Russia has, in an all-out war, they just might have decided that they might as well toss a few southwards, too. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/63 "2026-06-18T13:22:34Z")
Yeah, 1972 here. It wasn’t a constant thing, but there were definitely spikes of fright, and it seemed like the Cold War and awareness of nuclear war sort of ramped up in the latter part of childhood, right up through my third year of high school (1989) when the Berlin Wall fell. Even then, there was some concern that a weakened/collapsing Soviet Union might lash out in unpredictable ways. I was a kid. I don’t know that my parents were particularly worried; my dad was a particularly clear-headed thinker about this sort of thing, and was probably only concerned about accidents and miscommunications, not deliberate acts by the politicians. > [@Chronos](#): > > …I don’t get it. Let’s say that, say, India and Pakistan do “heave a few bombs at each other”. What happens after that? If other nations respond by taking sides, it quickly becomes a World War. And if other nations don’t respond by taking sides, then everyone else with nukes will get the message that it’s OK for them to start heaving them, too, and instead of one big war, we get fifty small ones. But either way, inevitably, everyone gets involved. Why do people keep saying that? What evidence is there that if India and Pakistan have a limited exchange, that it’ll become _anything_ other than that? It strikes me that the nations of the world will be more eager NOT to become involved than the opposite, for the very reasons you state. MAD was a very specific state between two specific actors. It was never, and is not a general state of affairs in what they call “great power” competition, or a multi-polar world. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/64 "2026-06-18T13:33:59Z")
The reason why Russia is not currently using nukes against Ukraine is because they assume that if they do, other countries will nuke them. If India and Pakistan have a nuclear exchange and nobody else gets involved, that assumption will be shown to be false. Therefore, in that situation, Russia would nuke Ukraine. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/65 "2026-06-18T13:34:44Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Since the middle of the last century, the range for silo based missile launches has been “anywhere on the planet”. You’re right that nobody’s likely to target Australia (much), but they absolutely could if they wanted to. And with as many thousands of warheads as Russia has, in an all-out war, they just might have decided that they might as well toss a few southwards, too. Yeah. I recall back during the Cold War it just seemed taken as a given by a lot of people that both sides would between them nuke basically every nation on the planet. The ideological nature of the Cold War meant that nations would be targeted for their ideological alignment, not their military significance. “Better Dead Than Red”, therefore it’s best to nuke anyone Left leaning to ensure they don’t move into the post nuclear power vacuum and impose the Ultimate Evil of Communism on the world. Presumably the USSR would be nuking all the capitalistic nations for the same (mirrored) reasoning. The Cold War was a Holy War in all but name, on both sides. As if somebody during the height of the Catholic/Protestant conflicts had handed both sides in Europe nuclear weapons. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/66 "2026-06-18T13:59:15Z")
I think the assumption that Russia isn’t using nukes out of fear of being nuked themselves is the flaw in your argument. I’m not convinced that’s why they’re not using them at all. There is an 80 year taboo, for lack of a better word, against the use of nuclear weapons. Not because of some kind of MAD, but because that’s wholly uncharted territory. Nobody knows what other countries’ nuclear policies are, and obviously nobody wants to find out. That’s a lot different than “Everyone will nuke each other, because the seal has been broken”. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/67 "2026-06-18T14:03:43Z")
That sounds like just a restatement of what I just said. Right now, nobody wants to find out what would happen, and it’s uncharted territory, and so there’s a taboo. But as soon as you get one use, it’s not uncharted any more, and you know what happens. What stops Russia then? ---
**Author:** ![Thumper668](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thumper668/32/20803_2.png) [@Thumper668](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thumper668)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/68 "2026-06-18T14:15:46Z")
In the opinion of this former cold war analyst, Russia will not nuke Ukraine because Russia wants it to be part of Russia. I also believe that one of Putin’s strategic goals in invading Ukraine was to touch off a war with NATO (in which he absolutely would nuke western Europe), but that didn’t go as planned. In general terms though, another reason Russia is reluctant to use nuclear weapons is that much of their arsenal is unuseable. Putin rattles the nuclear saber because it worked for the USSR. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/69 "2026-06-18T14:17:12Z")
And never forget, Russia is directly downwind from Ukraine. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/70 "2026-06-18T14:38:38Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > The ideological nature of the Cold War meant that nations would be targeted for their ideological alignment, not their military significance. It was never about that. It was always about primarily about military significance, it’s just that this often happened to coincide with political alignment. The US had military assets pretty much everywhere in the northern hemisphere, so obviously the USSR would be targeting that. The wildcard is third-party deterrence, coercion, and permission structures. There’s an unconfirmed story that when China and the USSR were having their flare-ups, China was considering a first strike on Russia, but Nixon informed China that he’d nuke China if they did so. Nobody really knows what a Trump or Biden would’ve done there. If India and Pakistan start trading blows, Israel might just throw up their hands and say if everyone else is doing it, we may as well take care of Tehran in the chaos. Or North Korea could get a wild hair. Nobody can guess what the escalation spirals would look like, but there are a lot of them. Based on Russia’s conduct over the past 4 years, I’m actually less worried about them than anyone else. They’re incredibly dangerous but they’ve repeatedly signalled more willingness to back down than their public statements would suggest. Of course that shouldn’t be taken as a given, and things could deteriorate quickly with little warning, but at the moment Russia seems more reliably predictable than pretty much every other nuclear power except France and the UK. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/71 "2026-06-18T14:53:22Z")
When my family lived in Germany, we had all gotten dressed to go out for dinner, a rare event in those days, and right as we were leaving the phone rang. “Don’t you dare answer that phone,” my mother said. Dad answered and after finishing a very brief conversation he put on his uniform and left. Dinner was canceled. I can’t say I was ever afraid of nuclear war, I was too young to full appreciate the ramifications, but even as a wee lad I understood the possibility of a war between the USSR and the United States. My father would occasionally get phone calls out of the blue and he’d have to go do soldier stuff. I lived on a military base and even off base in Germany, I’d occasionally see tanks, artillery, and other military vehicles. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/72 "2026-06-18T19:19:26Z")
I was too young to worry about nuclear war, Dad would take care of it. The closest I came was at my Grandfather’s small farm near Jacksonville AFB in Arkansas. I saw a B-52 fly West with a weapons pod. Another flew East without a pod a few minutes later. I asked Dad if we were at war. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/73 "2026-06-18T19:22:30Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > If India and Pakistan start trading blows, Israel might just throw up their hands and say if everyone else is doing it, we may as well take care of Tehran in the chaos. Or North Korea could get a wild hair. Nobody can guess what the escalation spirals would look like, but there are a lot of them. I mean, one historical example is the 1973 war between Israel and Egypt and Syria, which somehow ended up with Soviet tactical nukes shipped to Egypt and the US going to DEFCON 3. You might say that other powers would not intervene in an Israeli-Arab war, or India versus Pakistan, but that is not how it works. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/74 "2026-06-18T19:32:15Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > I mean, one historical example is the 1973 war between Israel and Egypt and Syria, which somehow ended up with Soviet tactical nukes shipped to Egypt and the US going to DEFCON 3. I’d read that the US went to DEFCON 3 in that situation, but I wasn’t aware that it was because of live nukes in Egypt. It just goes to show, the number and variety of escalation paths is greater than is known even to people who try to stay informed about this kind of thing. Not that I’m any kind of expert but I make more of an effort than the general public. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/75 "2026-06-18T21:31:32Z")
I lived through the Cold War. I never thought much about Nuclear bombs. I was aware it meant mutual destruction. I didn’t think the Soviets wanted to die too. It is a situation that I couldn’t change and it is pointless to ruin my life worrying. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/76 "2026-06-18T22:25:44Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > I didn’t think the Soviets wanted to die too. Yes, but as the wars of the last few decades have shown, it’s amazing how delusional some of the decision-makers can be about the results of their decisions. I can easily see a couple of our current leaders deciding that America would win a nuclear war with few or no significant hits. In the past, there was always a cooler head in the room. One never knows about the future. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/77 "2026-06-18T22:31:47Z")
I grew up during the Cold War. References to the destruction of all of human civilization showed up everywhere in pop culture - you could be watching silly Gordon Jump on Night Court and suddenly he’s talking about his dread of WWIII, or listening to the radio only to hear “99 Luftballons” ---
**Author:** ![Cryptoterestrial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Cryptoterestrial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cryptoterestrial)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/78 "2026-06-18T22:35:37Z")
I through about it all the time. at least where I lived (east coat US) we had a cultural preoccupation with it during the mid-'80s largely forgotten about today. it didn’t help that I read a lot of science fiction and that our high school showed us the infamous _The War Game_. with that said, I sneaked in to see that twice. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/79 "2026-06-18T22:44:07Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > or listening to the radio only to hear “99 Luftballons” Or Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s “Two Tribes” or Sting’s “Russians”. There were plenty of cold war songs. ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2026, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976/80 "2026-06-18T22:46:59Z")
I was born in 1960. We saw a few of those “duck and cover” type movies but the teacher that showed them said they were ridiculous and in case of nuclear war we’d have nothing to worry about. Because we’d be ash. The municipal airport where we lived had a National Guard base with a “hardened runway”, whatever that meant, and would be no less than a secondary target, along with the large metro city 37 miles away (all according to that teacher). In a nuke war we’d have just enough time to catch the current episode of Dick Van Dyke and then die. I wasn’t worried. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/living-through-the-cold-war-were-you-afraid-of-nuclear-war/1030976.md?page=5)