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Originally Posted by Walking Shadow
I don't EVER recallANYONE fearing or thinking or saying that the missles were going to be flying anytime soon. The world was much, much, much, much, much closer to a nuclear war during the Cuban Missle Crisis then we ever were during the 1980's.
The closest we ever came was some halfass remark Reagan made before his weekly radio broadcast when he thought the mic was turned off: "My fellow Americans, I've just signed legislation that will solve our problems with the Soviets forever. We beging bombing in five minutes."
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While that remark was certainly unhelpful, it wasn't anything likely to provoke nuclear war on its own. However, the world DID come close during the early 1980's, although not as close as during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The Soviet leadership came down with a severe case of paranoia during Reagan's first term, to such an extent that they instructed their agents in the West to undertake an all-out monitoring campaign to look for signs of an impending Western first strike. This Soviet intelligence operation was code-named RYAN. They believed that things like an increase in the number of lights on at night in Western defence departments would be tell-tale signs of an impending attack. At the same time there was a major NATO exercise that included a test of their nuclear command and control systems that nearly did push the Russians over the edge. I've read reports that, had this exercise continued just three or four days longer than it did, the Soviets would have concluded that it was in fact a prelude to war and reacted accordingly.
Apparently there was so much hype in the USSR about the threat of an impending NATO first strike that the Soviet leadership actually took steps to try to reassure their public that they would not be forced back onto a six-day work week. Things only calmed down when Margaret Thatcher told Reagan to cool it a bit, as the Russians were getting jittery.