World War III-How Nuclear War With Russia Became More Likely
Read Time:2 Minute, 45 Second
We rarely hear mention of ‘nuclear war’ anymore. I remember during the 60’s that subject monopolized conversations as schoolchildren were taught to ‘duck and cover’ in the eventuality of war.
Then “detente” and “Mutually Assured Destruction” became part of the vocabulary and the world sighed with relief. It seems, however, these particular words and phrases no longer carry the significance they once did.
The U.S. government and mainstream media are swaggering toward a possible nuclear confrontation with Russia over Ukraine without any of the seriousness that has informed this sort of decision-making throughout the nuclear age. Instead, official Washington seems possessed by a self-righteous approach that could be the prelude to the end of life on this planet.
Across the U.S. political spectrum, “there is a pugnacious ‘group think’ which has transformed what should have been a manageable political dispute in Ukraine into some morality play where U.S. politicians and pundits blather on about how the nearly year-old coup regime in Kiev ‘shares our values’ and how America must be prepared to defend this regime militarily.” Unfortunately this pseudo-morality means both Russia and the United States are once again flirting with the unthinkable prospect of a nuclear holocaust.
by Max Fisher on June 29, 2015
It was in August 2014 that the real danger began, and that we heard the first warnings of war. That month, unmarked Russian troops covertly invaded eastern Ukraine, where the separatist conflict had grown out of its control. The Russian air force began harassing the neighboring Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which are members of NATO. The US pledged that it would uphold its commitment to defend those countries as if they were American soil, and later staged military exercises a few hundred yards from Russia’s border.
Both sides came to believe that the other had more drastic intentions. Moscow is convinced the West is bent on isolating, subjugating, or outright destroying Russia. One in threeRussians now believe the US may invade. Western nations worry, with reason, that Russia could use the threat of war, or provoke an actual conflict, to fracture NATO and its commitment to defend Eastern Europe. This would break the status quo order that has peacefully unified Europe under Western leadership, and kept out Russian influence, for 25 years.
Fearing the worst of one another, the US and Russia have pledged to go to war, if necessary, to defend their interests in the Eastern European borderlands. They have positioned military forces and conducted chest-thumping exercises, hoping to scare one another down. Putin, warning repeatedly that he would use nuclear weapons in a conflict, began forward-deploying nuclear-capable missiles and bombers.
Europe today looks disturbingly similar to the Europe of just over 100 years ago, on the eve of World War I. It is a tangle of military commitments and defense pledges, some of them unclear and thus easier to trigger. Its leaders have given vague signals for what would and would not lead to war. Its political tensions have become military buildups. Its nations are teetering on an unstable balance of power, barely held together by a Cold War–era alliance that no longer quite applies.
Additional contributions by Robert Parry of Oriental Review.
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Bit like a plane crash isn’t it? Put your head between you knees and kiss your ass goodbye.
T’ra then!
Take a look at the movie, “Missiles of October” if you want a picture of how close the real thing came to happening. October, 1962, if memory serves me right, on a quiet peaceful Caribbean night Marines were shaken from their sleep in Puerto Rico by non Coms about 3:00 AM and told to get to their flight line immediately. Upon arrival the ammunition for the 20mm guns on the F8 Crusaders is not the practice rounds but HEI (high explosive incendiary) rounds and the dummy Sidewinder missiles have been replaced with live ones. All of the planes have their practice Ammo removed and replaced with the warhead ammo. Less than an hour later they were gone and the Marines were on transport planes headed somewhere but no one is told where until they land and a gunnery sergeant says, “Welcome to Cuba, boys.” As the Marines leave the plane they go by a large truck and handed there infantry gear including there M14 rifle and live ammunition. At the flight line the F8’s are refueled and all of the ordnance checked. A skeleton crew is kept there and the rest sent to “the fence line.” The line that separates the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba from the rest of Cuba.
Though the Marines did not know it a fleet of U.S. warships were sitting off the coast of Cuba and had established an embargo line. Heading toward that embargo line were Russian Cargo ships escorted by Russian warships. Beneath the water level there were U.S. and Russian nuclear submarines ready to spring into action. The message from President Kennedy to the Russians, “If your ships carrying missiles to Cuba cross this line we will consider it an act of war against the United States and we will act accordingly. In Europe battle lines were being drawn while in the U. S. planes and troops were being moved South for an immediate launch on Cuba. By now there were 7,000 Marines on the base at Gitmo.
As the Russian ships neared the embargo line the tension began to rise until, with one of the cargo ships within 500 yards of the embargo line, Nikita Khruschev and President Kennedy reached an agreement and the Russians recalled their ships. One of the cargo ships, however, had lost its communication and did not get the return command and kept moving forward. In a last ditch effort to stop the ship and a Russian warship fired a shot over the bow of the cargo ship and used flags to signal it to turn around.
Roughly 300 yards stood between world war three happening or not.
I loved that movie. Scary as hell but one you will never forget.
Reminds me of 1964 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Another good movie with some decidedly comedic overtones. I like that it didn’t take itself too seriously. The TV miniseries “The Day After” starring Jason Robards, is one that is hard to forget.
Frightening.