nav[aria-label="Primary Navigation"] { padding: 0; & ul { list-style: none; width: 100%; display: flex; flex-direction: row; justify-content: start; align-items: start; gap: 30px; padding: 0; & li { margin: 0; } & ul li { list-style: none; } } }

Child Item

The Cold War

KingOfFairview

Judging by the age profiles I've seen, a lot here probably wont even remember it. I was born in 1980, so I wasnt really aware of the worst part of it, 80-85, but I can remember my Da telling me that Ronald Reagan was an evil man and I knew if there was a war it could be the end of the world. as I've got a bit older and know more about it, the sheer terror of it is mind-boggling.

I cant imagine how frightening it must have been to know there was a reasonaly good chance that in effect all humanity could easily be wiped out with no warning whatsoever. My Mrs. is from London and says she wasnt really aware of it, this just astonishes me, seening as if a war had happened she would have been incinerated witin 3 minustes of kick off. If you've ever seen the TV show Threads from 1984 you will see what I mean. Petrifying. Does any of the older posters here remeber being frightened of it, any general Cold War memories?

Find more posts tagged with

Quick Links

Comments

kaimera

It was cold

Stephen

Dr. Strangelove ftw.

Dyr

when the wind blows

What bastard decided kids needed to see that, we had enough to worry about what with all the goth music we were listening to.

Latchy

I do remember seening the threads programme back then and it was quite frighting indeed becasuse it was based sort of on a virtual reality of what would happen should the nukes be launched .I think it brought home to us the whole horror of it all then.Around the same time ther was the frankie goes to hollywood video of ' when two tribes go to war ' which featured to actors resembling Reagen and Yeltsin in a boxing ring punching daylights out of each other , winner takes all.

Living in fear of the bomb since the end of WW2 is nothing new , the cuban missle crisis of 1962 was an even closer shave than the cold war of the 80s ,Kennedys military advisers wanted him to attack the russian missles based in cuba and we could have had a WW3 scenario then ,but he resisted the pressure to do so and he was proved right, but in doing so made himself and enemy of some of the top military brass of the US .

marcsignal

Born 1967, can remember seeing big Russian Military Parades on the news every night, scary stuff alright.

THREADS was the best movie of the time, and When the Wind Blows

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1srPXafaT0

KingOfFairview

I do remember seening the threads programme back then and it was quite frighting indeed becasuse it was based sort of on a virtual reality of what would happen should the nukes be launched .I think it brought home to us the whole horror of it all then.Around the same time ther was the frankie goes to hollywood video of ' when two tribes go to war ' which featured to actors resembling Reagen and Yeltsin in a boxing ring punching daylights out of each other , winner takes all.

Yeah, thats a good one (It was Konstantin Chernenko, not Yeltsin)

Living in fear of the bomb since the end of WW2 is nothing new , the cuban missle crisis of 1962 was an even closer shave than the cold war of the 80s ,Kennedys military advisers wanted him to attack the russian missles based in cuba and we could have had a WW3 scenario then ,but he resisted the pressure to do so and he was proved right, but in doing so made himself and enemy of some of the top military brass of the US .

Not true, terrifyingly. Look up "Stanislav Petrov" and "Able Archer 83" on Wikipedia.

Plus a war in the 60s would have led to horrendous casualties, but by the 80s it would literally have been game over for humans.

peasant

My experiences:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=53379194&postcount=45
+
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=53379269&postcount=47

taken from this recent thread
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055102887&highlight=pershing

ejmaztec

When I lived in the UK during the Cold War, I couldn't help but be amused at the instructions given to ordinary members of the public as to what to do in the event of an imminent nuclear attack. Things like painting your windows white, sticking labels on your nearest and dearest's body-bag and heaving them out of the front door. Another method of survival was to remove one of your interior doors, lean it up against one of your walls, and pile a few sand-bags on it. You were then guaranteed to survive even a direct hit from a nuclear weapon.

Meanwhile, the politicians and military, who probably caused the war, were sitting miles below ground in some top-secret bunker, hoping that they would live to be a hundred so that they could eventually go outside.

How we laughed:D

KingOfFairview

Peaseant, thats must have been petrifying... I think living in London, Moscow, Washington, etc must have been frightening... irnoically Berlin wouldnt have been attacked in all likelyhood because one side couldnt attack without hitting their own men

cjt156

I was born in 1970 and spent my pre-teen and teen years in the very clear knowledge that the superpowers were a trigger-finger away from ending the life of the population of just about the whole planet.
Kinda puts global-toastiness and Osama Bin-Hiding into perspective; you don't scare us, muthafuggas!

Pompey Magnus

I was born in 1984, all I can remember if vague recollections of news reports of massive queues for food in Moscow as the USSR was in its death throes.

Fratton Fred

KingOfFairview wrote: »

Peaseant, thats must have been petrifying... I think living in London, Moscow, Washington, etc must have been frightening... irnoically Berlin wouldnt have been attacked in all likelyhood because one side couldnt attack without hitting their own men

Add to all that the odd car bomb, Tube stations being evacuated every time someone left their shopping bags on the platform and Thatcher, London was a great place to be.:(

Latchy

Quote =KingOfFairview;54637016]Yeah, thats a good one (It was Konstantin Chernenko, not Yeltsin)

Yeah thanks comrade i couldent think of chernenko so stuck yelstin in instead

Not true, terrifyingly. Look up "Stanislav Petrov" and "Able Archer 83" on Wikipedia.

Plus a war in the 60s would have led to horrendous casualties, but by the 80s it would literally have been game over for humans.

There is no real way of knowing how the cuban missle crisis would have panned out if Kennedy had took the other options available ,i mean in terms of how russia would have reacted ,would it have escalated ? Game over in the 80s ,we were living in nervous times then and we are to an extent now .

marcsignal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntI-7vR2zRs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQLLLAExsMo

Scary to think this was the only course of action :eek:

Hope you all still have your Iodine Tablets if it kicks off for real this time

ejmaztec

cjt156 wrote: »

I was born in 1970 and spent my pre-teen and teen years in the very clear knowledge that the superpowers were a trigger-finger away from ending the life of the population of just about the whole planet.
Kinda puts global-toastiness and Osama Bin-Hiding into perspective; you don't scare us, muthafuggas!

In the good old days of the Cold War, there was less chance of a nuclear attack than there is now were Osama and his pals to get their hands on nuclear weapons.

KingOfFairview

latchyco wrote: »

There is no real way of knowing how the cuban missle crisis would have panned out if Kennedy had took the other options available ,i mean in terms of how russia would have reacted ,would it have escalated ? Game over in the 80s ,we were living in nervous times then and we are to an extent now .

Of course it would have reacted, but the fact is only the US East Coast would have been hit by soviet missiles, the USSR would have literally been anihilated, London Paris and a few other European capitals bu the USSR didnt have the retaliatory capacity they did by the 80s. they would have been able to kill 30m americans tops, but the american would have been able to kill every single person in the USSR.

Brings to mind a quote form Dr. Strangelove "dont get me wrong, I'm not saying we wouldnt get our hair mussed. but were talking 100m deaths, tops":D

KingOfFairview

ejmaztec wrote: »

In the good old days of the Cold War, there was less chance of a nuclear attack than there is now were Osama and his pals to get their hands on nuclear weapons.

not true, but even if it was, bin Laden could get his hands on one max, would have no way of delivering it. the USSR had 17,000 nuclear warheads, the US 11,000 by the end. and the finest delivery systems money could buy.

Morlar

Yep - we were all brought up to hate the godless ruskies & I remember the parades oin tv too. Actually kind of miss seeing them to be honest. Apparently in Soviet Russia their tv was full of footage of decadent americans alongisde black american inner city riots poverty and chaos. So the propaganda wars were a 2 way street. I also remember afghanistan invasion and the americans cheering for the mujahadeen and arming them to the gills while they slaughtered russian soldiers. Back then you also had wierd things like russian leaders dying mysteriously and their replacements dying a day later (Yuri Andropov anyone ?). Also rememmber being shown videos in school about nuclear fallout too. I was reminded of it living in portsmouth a few years ago near a naval nuclear facility - if you live within 2 miles of one you get a special info pack on what to do in the event of an 'incident'. Back in the 80s a big conversation topic was what you want to be doing when the bomb drops (not if - when). One of the most popular ones was 'drunk and standing in the middle of the street' the logic being no one wants to survive an atomic war to be the equivalent of a leper surrounded by big rats and millions of corpses, blind and dying people etc.
Its hard to describe but the fear at the time was real and ingrained -the thing is theres probably more of a risk of that happening nowadays than there ever was back then. Then the nuclear powers were russia v america & uk, now you also have china, israel, north korea, india and so on.

Latchy

The ol black and white 60s footage of the house disentergrating after a nuclear attack was scary then ,we now have the virtual reality version but would anybody want to be around after it ?

peasant

One thing was positive about the cold war though, at least in Germany.

It focussed people's minds. The general public was far more politically aware and active than it is now. All the time there were discussions, rallies, demonstrations.

On one day (22.10.83), over one million people went out on the streets, 200.000 of them (me included) formed a human chain for 100 kilometers

http://www.udo-leuschner.de/nachruestung/831022.htm

Not that that changed much ...but at least people got involved. These days we just seem to take everything unquestioned.

KingOfFairview

you may get your wish peaseant ;-) Supposedly Russia and Belarus may well announces a union in the next months, with Kazahstan to follow in a few years. the Poles wont be happy.

Latchy

Morlar;54637293]Yep - we were all brought up to hate the godless Apparently in Soviet Russia their tv was full of footage of decadent americans alongisde black american inner city riots poverty and chaos. So the propaganda wars were a 2 way street.

I remember as a kid watching on black and white tv the news reports on rte about the viet nam war and hearing '' american soldiers encountered fierce resistence from viet cong gurrilas today '' and thinking (as only a child would ) why are the americans fighting Gorrillas ?

such innocence

mike65

God bless the Cold War, you knew exactly who was who and what was what.

I don't ever recall thinking we were about to get incinerated at any particular moment, the nearest Cold War became a hot one was in the far east not Europe, in 1979 when Vietnam invaded "Kampuchea" to remove Pol Pot. It caused a fair bit of regional tension esp with China who effectivly back the Khmer Rouge.

The best about the era was it gave us the voice of the 4 minute warning as featured on Two Tribes - Patrick Allen

The last voice you will hear is mine

Mike.

marcsignal

Not the Nine O Clock News had a few topical Gems on the Cold War too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f41TzAa9loM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASlqgWXPAQ4

ejmaztec

KingOfFairview wrote: »

not true, but even if it was, bin Laden could get his hands on one max, would have no way of delivering it. the USSR had 17,000 nuclear warheads, the US 11,000 by the end. and the finest delivery systems money could buy.

Of course it's true. With the direct presidential communication link between Washington and Moscow, there was restraint built in to the system. Neither side wanted nuclear war, because the consequences of such a war were known.

Osama has enough funds to finance the building and delivery of a nuclear weapon. He would have no qualms whatsoever in carrying out an attack. The fact that the US has thousands of nuclear weapons at its disposal is irrelevant. Where would they send them?

arybvtcw0eolkf

kaimera wrote: »

It was cold

But the summer's were longer and warmer.

KingOfFairview

ejmaztec wrote: »

Of course it's true. With the direct presidential communication link between Washington and Moscow, there was restraint built in to the system. Neither side wanted nuclear war, because the consequences of such a war were known.

Osama has enough funds to finance the building and delivery of a nuclear weapon. He would have no qualms whatsoever in carrying out an attack. The fact that the US has thousands of nuclear weapons at its disposal is irrelevant. Where would they send them?

But the point I'm making is it isnt comparable. bin Laden couldn, in theory detonate one nuke, but it wouldnt start a nuclear war. One accidental launch during the cold war... seriously, look up Stanislav Petrov on wiki. this man literally saved the world, we would all be dead if not for him. someone a bit more hot headed...

Morlar

ejmaztec wrote: »

Of course it's true. With the direct presidential communication link between Washington and Moscow, there was restraint built in to the system. Neither side wanted nuclear war, because the consequences of such a war were known.

Osama has enough funds to finance the building and delivery of a nuclear weapon. He would have no qualms whatsoever in carrying out an attack. The fact that the US has thousands of nuclear weapons at its disposal is irrelevant. Where would they send them?

This quote from a former us sec def says it all imo.

I want to say, and this is very important: at the end we lucked out. It was luck that prevented nuclear war. We came that close to nuclear war at the end. Rational individuals: Kennedy was rational; Khrushchev was rational; Castro was rational. Rational individuals came that close to total destruction of their societies. And that danger exists today.

They were on a hair trigger for decades - back then if you flew a few miles out of civilian airspace you were liable to be blown out of the sky. Both sides accidentally blew jumbo jets out of the sky fearing bomber attacks (Russia a korean one thinking it was an american bomber and america an iranian one also thinking it was a bomber).

arybvtcw0eolkf

marcsignal wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQLLLAExsMo

I remember that one on TV and being very scared.

But you don't have to have lived through those times to be scared of WWIII.

I was just back from serving in Lebanon with 9/11 happened. When my son seen it (he was ten at the time) he burst out crying and asked had WWIII started and did I have to go to fight in it.

Anyone remember the ads on TV and the papers telling us what to do in the event of car bombs in Irish towns and cities?.

Or when parking was restricted on Talbot St. O'Connell St & Henry St at Christmas because it was considered a high risk time for car bombers?.

Latchy

=Morlar;
I want to say, and this is very important: at the end we lucked out. It was luck that prevented nuclear war. We came that close to nuclear war at the end. Rational individuals: Kennedy was rational; Khrushchev was rational; Castro was rational. Rational individuals came that close to total destruction of their societies. And that danger exists today

Would bush or does bush have the same rational as those people ? then again the political map has changed since those people were in power (castro excluded )