Purpelia wrote:SD_Film Artists wrote:That's not what MAD is. MAD is deterring the enemy by ensuring that if they attack you with nuclear weapons (as in a Defcon 1 event) then you will destroy them. If Canada sends some APCs to conquer Detroit then MAD will not be applicable as it's not a nuclear threat.
MAD is not a strategy people created deliberately. It's just the end result of multiple sides all simultaneously saying: "If you attack me I'll nuke you." The conversation in the 50's was something like:
evil empire of america: Don't you dare do anything to oppose us soviets or we'll nuke you.
soviet union: We'll we'll just nuke you!
Both sides: O_o
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50 years of ...
Actually, the Soviet Union had a severe missile gap right up until the end of the Cold War.
The US could have annihilated the USSR atomically during the Cuban Crisis, but not the other way around (Granted, millions of US and Western European civilians would have died regardless)