Following the Cuban Missile Crisis, and new type of danger was looming over the human race: Nuclear Holocaust. With both sides of the Cold War having the ability of a first strike, the press of a button could kill millions. It was from this fear of a surprise first strike that the idea of Mutually Assured Destruction, also known as MAD, was formed. Simply put, MAD is the idea that if you can guarantee death to anyone trying to kill you, even if they can kill you they won't sacrifice themselves doing it, and thus a conflict never arises. In the Cold War, MAD was built upon the ability of a massive response with nuclear weapons in the event of the enemy initiating a first strike. This guaranteed nuclear response was made possible by 3 key weapons: Submarines, Bombers, and Missiles. Both the USA and the USSR had many nuclear submarines lurking by the enemy's coasts. If the order was given, any one of these subs could launch up to 24 nuclear missiles at the enemy without even surfacing. ICBMs were also key in MAD. In the event of an attack, ICBMs (inter-continental ballistic missiles) could be launched at enemy cities. In addition, both sides used long-ranged bombers equipped with nuclear bombs. Both sides guaranteed that there would be bombers in the air at all times, so that if they were attacked these bombers would be able to fly to the enemy and drop the bombs. Overall, using these weapons allowed each side to guarantee that they could kill 25% to 50% of the enemy's population if they were attacked. These unacceptable losses were the foundation of Mutually Assured Destruction in the cold war, because it assured both the USA and the USSR that nuclear war would be nuclear suicide.
Works cited:
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It is funny how two super powers when paired against each other their technology advances significantly.The space race came along they did everything they could to out do each other resulting in advancement in both math and science in both super powers. Imagine if they had worked together and not having any difference between each other we could have had a different world where technology could have advanced even more, but like always super powers tend to be lone wolves only caring about their own safety and nothing else besides money.
ReplyDeleteGood Job Citing your source. Way to include information about every exact weapon used. It insane to think we could wipe out almost 50 percent of another power's population. You clearly have a solid understanding of MAD.
ReplyDeleteI think it's amazing how this conflict caused such an advance in technology. Both of the super powers dedicated so much spending to researching and developing new weapons that were before unimaginable. The thought of being able to kill nearly half of the population of Russia or the US was unthinkable before the Cold War.
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