Development of the Cold War to 1968, including:

– superpower rivalry: the arms race

The arms raceDuring the fifties and sixties, the two superpowers came to accept the idea of co-existence, and, by and large, eschewed meddling in each other’s sphere of interest. However, they competed in every other conceivable way, and any part of the world not already within either’s sphere of interest was fair game. The superpowers would even wage deadly proxy wars and export their weapons and arms all over planet, while still not upsetting their overall approach of co- existence. In addition, the cost of keeping the status quo between the two superpowers was eternal vigilance, as any weakness or lack of resolve by one side threatened a major upheaval in the geopolitical balance.

In 1952 the United States detonated the first hydrogen bomb. This was an even more powerful version of the nuclear bomb. The Soviets followed up by

exploding their first hydrogen bomb in 1953. 

During the Cold War the United States and the Soviet Union became engaged in a nuclear arms race.

In this context, the arms race became an area of intense competition in the make-up of, and the quantity and quality of, their arsenals. Each side was always on the lookout for the latest innovation or new weapon to give them the technological edge. However, the arms race was immensely complicated due to the interrelationship between nuclear and conventional arms.The idea that nuclear weapons were just another weapon and could be used in conjunction with a nation’s overall armed forces became increasingly harder to accept over the two decades following Hiroshima. However, despite the fact that most leaders and military experts eventually came to the same conclusion, that is, that nuclear weapons cannot actually be used, they remained an integral part of the entire Cold War.

The idea of launching a first strike on one’s enemy was certainly flirted with by the United States, especially in the late 1940s and 1950s, when it had nuclear supremacy. However, the United States baulked when it had the opportunity in the Korean War. The US military concluded that there were no useful military targets left in North Korea (after widespread conventional bombing). But there was something else at work, the nuclear taboo.

Nuclear taboo the use of nuclear weapons for any purpose has become practically unthinkable

The Atomic Bomb : The United States was the first to develop  nuclear weapons through the Manhattan Project during World War II when the 2 Atomic bombs were developed and dropped

on Japan. 

Start of the Arms Race : On August 29, 1949 the Soviet Union successfully tested its first atomic bomb. The world was shocked. They did not think the Soviet Union was this far along in their

nuclear development. The Arms Race had begun. 

Despite the desire of a number of Cold War leaders to use nuclear weapons to resolve particular situations or to deal with potential future threats, they soon came to see nuclear weapons as being in a class of their own. From the time of the atomic use by the US in attacks on Japan in 1945, a nuclear taboo had developed around this weapon. Nuclear weapons had come to be viewed with horror by the general public from the time of Hiroshima, but this idea was strengthened by the massive size of the H-Bomb nuclear tests of the fifties. So, the idea developed that the Bomb was in a special class and that there was a clear distinction between ‘conventional’ and ‘nuclear’ forces. To use nuclear weapons would mean breaking the taboo that surrounded its use and that once that threshold was crossed there may be no turning back from an all-out nuclear war. However, even without the threat of retaliation, the nuclear taboo remained.

Truman could have used atomic bombs in Korea without Soviet retaliation, as they were two years away from having an operational nuclear strike capability. President Johnson refused to use nuclear weapons in Vietnam not because of feared Soviet retaliation but because of the moral taboo and a likely backlash from the American public. (However, Johnson had no qualms about throwing every conceivable type of conventional weaponry that the US possessed into the Vietnam War.)

Even though the actual use of nuclear weapons was unthinkable due to the moral taboo and the threat of retaliation, they nevertheless remained the central focus throughout the Cold War. Despite the ongoing realisation over the Cold War that any significant use of nuclear weapons would have a devastating impact on the entire planet, the nuclear forces of both sides grew to outlandish proportions, fueling existing fears which led to further additions and expansions of their nuclear arsenals. Elaborate plans were also developed to wage war using a combination of conventional and nuclear forces and these plans would be implemented by command and control systems with one leader at the head of each superpower making the ultimate decision on whether to unleash Nuclear Armageddon.

Nuclear war thinkingAt first, President Truman sought to maximise the psychological impact of nuclear weapons in his dealings with the Soviets after the war. In his 9 August radio address, President Truman talked about the ‘awful responsibility which has come to us’ but that we ‘thank God that it has come to us, instead of to our enemies.’ Despite flirting with the idea of international control of nuclear weapons Truman set the United States on a path to use their nuclear monopoly to their advantage in post-war negotiations with the Soviets, believing that a Soviet-produced atomic bomb would be many years off. However, this had the opposite effect on Stalin who from the end of 1945 adopted a policy of ‘tenacity and steadfastness’ in which the Soviets took a tough stand on all issues out of fear of seeming weak and encouraging the Americans to exert more pressure. Truman also hoped to use the atomic bomb to make up for Soviet superiority in conventional forces.

In the 1950s, though the USSR had nuclear weapons, the United States still had clear superiority. President Eisenhower did not believe that the US could sustain the vastly increased military budget that Truman administration had implemented. So, Eisenhower cut back on conventional forces and placed a greater emphasis on nuclear forces, which were cheaper. The President knew that the Soviet’s superiority in conventional forces meant that Western Europe could be overwhelmed quickly by the Red Army led by their massive tank regiments. Eisenhower therefore threatened ‘massive retaliation’ with nuclear weapons in response to any Soviet attack using nuclear or conventional forces.

In his 2012 book, Ike’s Bluff: President Eisenhower’s Secret Battle to Save the World, Evan Thomas admired how Eisenhower handled his role at the head of a massive nuclear arsenal:

‘Eisenhower managed cleverness, indirection, subtlety, and downright deviousness – and by embracing the very thing he could never use – to safeguard his country and possibly the rest of mankind from annihilation.’ (p.15) ‘It is easy to forget that Eisenhower was the first person in history to have the means to wreck civilisation. Eisenhower did not shy from power. He used it. But he did so in a way that is still little understood. (p.16)

In the 1960s, Soviet missile technology improved. However, the United States developed the nuclear triad, which was the ability to deliver a nuclear attack from B-52 bombers, ICBMs from land-based silos, and SLBMs from submarines. Defence Secretary Robert McNamara talked of ‘assured destruction’ if the Soviets did launch a first-strike attack because there was no way they could destroy all of the US nuclear forces, especially the submarines, so they could be ‘assured’ that the Soviet’s own destruction would surely follow if they tried a surprise nuclear attack

ICBMs : In the 1950s both countries worked on developing Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles or ICBMs. These missiles could be launched from long range,

as far away as 3,500 miles. 

By the late sixties, it became apparent that ‘assured destruction’ could work the other way due to the massive increase in the Soviet ICBM arsenal. So, if the US was to attack the USSR they could be assured of massive retaliatory attack. One nuclear analyst put an ‘M’ in front ‘assured destruction’ so that it was now ‘Mutual Assured Destruction,’ or MAD for short, to make for a more apt description of the situation. Also, by the late sixties, the ‘balance of terror’ led the two superpowers to explore avenues of cooperation. This evolved into an interest in treaties and the policy known as détente. Another factor at play was the fact that they were no longer alone in the nuclear arms race. Britain had developed the atomic bomb in 1952, followed by France in 1960 and China in 1964. More nations would follow if the USA and USSR failed to act. Though this led to a series of treaties, the Mutual Assured Destruction doctrine survived.

As both sides continued to develop new and more powerful weapons, the fear of what would happen if war broke out spread throughout the world.

Militaries began to work on defences such as large radar arrays to tell if a missile had been launched. They also worked on defence missiles that could

shoot down ICBMs.

At the same time people built bomb shelters and underground bunkers where they could hide in the case of nuclear attack. Deep underground facilities were

built for high ranking government officials where they could reside safely. 

Mutual Assured Destruction : One of the major factors in the Cold War was termed Mutual Assured Destruction or MAD.

This meant that both countries could destroy the other country in the case of attack. It wouldn't matter how successful the first

strike was, the other side could still retaliate and destroy the country which first attacked. For this reason, neither side ever

used nuclear weapons. The cost was too high. 

Fighting a nuclear warBoth sides drew up plans for fighting a war using a mix of conventional and nuclear weapons. Due to the superiority in conventional forces of the Warsaw Pact, NATO made it abundantly clear that any conventional attack would be countered with nuclear weapons. There were many types of nuclear weapons, but two main classes, strategic and tactical. Tactical nuclear weapons were smaller and designed to be used on the battlefield against enemy military formations. NATO made it clear that any conventional attack may be met with tactical nuclear weapons and this was made clear in all of their military plans up into the 1980s. Of course, any war in Europe, even if it started as a conventionalone,couldturnglobaloncethenuclearthresholdwascrossed.Thiswouldmeanthatstrategic nuclear weapons would also be used. These are larger warheads designed for destroying cities or large urban or industrial areas.

PALSThe vast array of tactical nuclear weapons available for NATO to use to repel a Soviet conventional attack is quite astounding. Also astounding is that none of these weapons went astray, went off by accident, or were taken over by a terrorist group or rogue commander. During the 1960s Permissive Action Links, or PALs, were installed on tactical nuclear weapons to prevent unauthorised use. PALs were originally created to guard against the possibility of a rogue US commander.

The main problem with tactical nuclear weapons was that, even though they were smaller and designed for the battlefield, the use of just one of these would involve crossing the nuclear threshold, which would mean all nuclear weapons could be used. So in the end, the effort to make nuclear weapons more useful, by making smaller tactical weapons for use on the battlefield, was futile. In the ‘use or lose it’ mindset of the time, any use of a nuclear weapon was likely to trigger a massive response from the enemy. Fortunately, no tactical nuclear weapons was ever used in anger throughout the entire Cold War, though on a few occasions they came close to doing so