Mutual assured Destruction or MAD, was a strategies of the militaries consisting in the Cold War. The Americans as well as the Soviet Union decided that because they had begun to create so many nuclear missiles if one side decided to take the first shot the world would be an utter annihilation in a matter of days. The two sides believed that because they were so heavily armed there was no reward for beginning any sort of combat. In the early 1960s both the Soviets and the Americans developed anti ballistic missiles which could essentially impede one missile being shot at someone in mid air. These Anti Ballistic Missile's however would weaken the MAD agreement the two countries had
come to. Ultimately the United States came up with MIRVs which are US had 5 nuclear warheads on one missile. They were able to stagnate the Russians ABM's by attaching more that one nuclear warhead on a missile.
I think it's pretty scary to think that both sides were ready to kill tens of millions of civilians in order to prevent an attack. Just imagining the damage MIRVs can cause gives me the willies.
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