What If We Had Lost The Cold War?

[Eric]

What if the West had lost the Cold War? How would it have happened? Would have to have been due to the loss of a war, or could we have just fizzled out, like the Sovs did?

 

What would the world look like today? What would America look like? I used to be preoccupied with the subject of the Cold War, as a child. It was hard not to, with all the Cold Warrior teaches that were in the system back then. I remember it being a topic they talked at us about a lot. I used to wonder what would happen to America if we lost. So, what do you think would have happened?

[tadbart]

Great topic.

 

Reagan- "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall."

Gorby- "Nope."

 

I can't imagine us losing, but I can imagine a pretty nasty tie.

 

Europe would be vastly different. Not necessarily worse, though probably worse off financially. There would be two Germanys, but only one of which would be overrun by muslims. I think I'd take my chances with the Commies, given the choice.

 

Aside from the Krauts, Europe would be bristling with implements of war. We'd probably have a whole fleet of brand new A-10s (or their newest iteration).

 

Cuba would look like a porcupine with so many missiles sticking out of it.

 

I recently re-read Alas, Babylon. That level of fear and dread would almost be palpable, waiting for something to set off the powderkeg.

[TBO]

I think it would be from backing down from the USSR and our presence on the world stage eroding while the USSR gobbled up resources of countries through puppet countries, and eventually actual overtaking of countries.

 

Regan did as much as anyone to push the USSR to the brink ($$$) of non sustainable build up (his "Star Wars" defense system, they couldn't build enough nuke/rockets to overcome it, but spent heavily in trying).

 

I don't think it would have been from face to face conflict.

[Huaco Kid]

Rationed government vodka.

 

For breakfast, lunch and dinner.

[Bruce]

Maybe something like Red Dawn with some Cubans and Soviets and maybe from a South American country or two invading us.

[Eric]

Maybe something like Red Dawn with some Cubans and Soviets and maybe from a South American country or two invading us.

 

That movie had a strong impact on me and my friends, back when it came out. It wasn't a very realistic movie, even then, but it was chilling nonetheless. I'll never forget seeing it in the theaters. It PISSED ME OFF!

[TBO]

 

That movie had a strong impact on me and my friends, back when it came out. It wasn't a very realistic movie, even then, but it was chilling nonetheless. I'll never forget seeing it in the theaters. It PISSED ME OFF!

 

<-----got a feeling there was a time when Eric and I wore the same shirt

 

 

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"451","width":"600","src":"http:\/\/thepeoplescube.com\/images\/various_uploads\/Kill_a_commie_for_mommy.jpg"}[/img2]

[Eric]

 

<-----got a feeling there was a time when Eric and I wore the same shirt

 

 

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"451","width":"600","src":"http:\/\/thepeoplescube.com\/images\/various_uploads\/Kill_a_commie_for_mommy.jpg"}[/img2]

 

Never had that, but I had a ' Happiness is a Confirmed Kill' bumper sticker that I bought at a PX, at Bragg. I also had a 'I'd Kill Flipper For A Tunafish Sandwich' bumper sticker, at the same time. I used to get a lot of honks and hand gestures, driving around the Washington DC area, back then. :supergrin:

[NPTim]

In a sense, didn't we lose? Ask the members here from former communist countries. I've read, from several former communist bloc citizens that we are heading down that road.

[Foxterriermom]

I can remember doing duck and cover drills when I was in elementary school which was during the height of the cold war. Like hiding under your desk was going to do anything to protect you in the even of a nuclear bomb...

 

My parents also had gas masks for the entire family that I think were distributed by the county. We lived not too far from the Sampson ordinance depot in upstate New York and Dad always said it would be a target and the last thing we would see would be a very bright flash. As a child, it was very scary.

 

[SarahMcGlocklan]

I was still in elementary school when the Cold War ended. I barely remember it. There's an interesting show on Amazon called "the man on high tower" about how America would be if we had lost WWII. It's very interesting.

[deputy tom]

Pittsburgh PA was on the map for nukes. I'm glad we made it thru that scary time. tom. :phew:

[deputy tom]

 

That movie had a strong impact on me and my friends, back when it came out. It wasn't a very realistic movie, even then, but it was chilling nonetheless. I'll never forget seeing it in the theaters. It PISSED ME OFF!

 

<-----got a feeling there was a time when Eric and I wore the same shirt

 

 

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"451","width":"600","src":"http:\/\/thepeoplescube.com\/images\/various_uploads\/Kill_a_commie_for_mommy.jpg"}[/img2]

We sold those shirts at the gunshop I worked at. tom. ;)

[Old School]

My son and I talk about this from time to time (he's in college, I'm not lecturing to a 9 year old). America's biggest tangible value is in it's economic might. One that is so big that our military spending in dollars dwarfs most other countries, but as a % of GDP we're pretty close to others.

 

So the challenge to a victorious country would be to "integrate the brands without damaging the assets". I suppose the commies could let the corporations take over the role of the government with a proxy controlling the corporations. That said, the concept of corporations running a country has been covered in Sci-Fiction and it usually doesn't end well.

[janice6]

I worked in Physics Research with a very large military contractor from 1960's, till 40 years later.

 

I watched the economic and science race from a good vantage point, and from the start it was not a military contest, but an economic one. The real "Cold War" was Capitalism versus Communism.

 

Early on my co-workers and I would discuss the relative standings of the U.S. and the Soviet Union in the field of scientific weapons development. We did agree that scientific weapon improvement was pretty much a matter of who had the greatest economy, that was producing the greatest amount of money, to pour into the greatest diversity of weapon improvements, with the greatest manufacturing base to supply the military.

 

Aside from the threat that at any moment, some crazy on either side might launch Nuclear Weapons. and cause the mutual destruction of both our societies, the real contest fell to who had the largest industrial base from which to draw the quantity and quality necessary to overwhelm the other.

 

It was readily apparent early on, that the money advantage went to the USA. Capitalism has produced an economy the was driven by the demands of each and every citizen to have the latest and the greatest. This resulted in the most incredible diversity of manufacturing and innovation the world has ever seen. A very large relatively isolated continent, and a well distributed population, was a significant advantage also.

 

Very early on our Military decided that in order to win battles we needed precision and versatility over large cumbersome wholesale means of wiping out large areas. We needed the precision to be able to use the minimal number of assets, to guarantee accomplishing the goal of eliminating the target. This was the same Capitalistic philosophy our civilian economy functioned with, of maximizing the profit from a minimum of investment.

 

We needed miniaturization and precision in our weapons arsenal. This would mean that the fewest forces could accomplish the greatest effect with the least expenditure of "capitol" ( military platforms) investment. The effort that took the greatest financial commitment from our military wasn't the Nuclear weapons development, it was the development of the Integrated Circuit Large Scale Array. I have posted before that the Navy had stability problems in ships with the mechanical crap on top of the masts and it was reaching a critical point. This precision and size reduction across the whole weapons board was our goal.

 

Anyway, the United States industrial capability was so spread out and had so many independent and capable companies, that we (the government), through our very robust economy, poured many Billions each year into each and all of the Semiconductor industry, to create the integrated circuit, by funding a multitude of different independent development programs, each with the same goal of Integrated circuits. This wasn't a contest of who was "smarter", it was a contest of who could create the manufacturing process that would ensure an overwhelming quantity of "smart" semiconductors to increase weapon efficiency. Example: My company alone, had a military budget of $1Billion each year, just for small electronics parts. Money was the solution.

 

The problem the communism governments had was one of a singular focus in their economy. All development was directly controlled and dependent on the central agency which dictated the approach. There was little quantity of industrial manufacturing, variety and redundancy, in their society. Their manufacturing and development was so concentrated and controlled, that in order to innovate, they had to focus on each technique in turn, and depend on having the time to go through all the variations in development, to find the ones that ultimately worked. That's not meant to demean their research ability. They had excellent well qualified experts in many fields of science and mathematics.

 

In contrast, the U.S. had many existing companies, each trying different development programs, all at the same time. We had the advantage of superior numbers of manufacturers each trying different methodologies simultaneously, to achieve the desired goal. The Soviet Union had no real chance of beating our Capitalistic economy to the solution. Even after the war the Russians were still using tubes and relays, since they had no real semiconductor base to work with. Their first satellite, Sputnik" was tubes and relays. There subsequently was a big black market to supply the Russian military with integrated circuits since they couldn't manufacture any quantity of their own.

 

The result of all this was seen in great improvements in miniaturization and "smarts" in all weapons even up to increased accuracy of ICBM's and smart bombs, through integrated circuits.

 

So my point is that short of an idiot launch from either side, the Soviet Union had no chance of ultimately beating the United States manufacturing base in any contest involving weapons development and improvement. We were economically destined to win all the time.

 

Capitalism's greatest virtue is that money makes the world go around, while dictators have to respond rather than innovate, because they can't compete simply on forcing their citizens to do things. Creativity towards the solution is our key, not dictatorial force mandating solutions.

 

However, if you look at the recent developments in our society, we are more and more moving towards the method of forcing people to do things, rather than allowing individual creativity to solve problems. More laws don't make a better society, better people do.

 

 

[Walt Longmire]

Hiding under our desks in the 60's. Navy Base 2 miles from the school. one mile from our house. Weird times for a kid. JFK getting killed. An uncertain world for sure. Still is I guess. Except I haven't hid under a desk for a long time.

[Eric]

I worked in Physics Research with a very large military contractor from 1960's, till 40 years later.

 

I watched the economic and science race from a good vantage point, and from the start it was not a military contest, but an economic one. The real "Cold War" was Capitalism versus Communism.

 

Early on my co-workers and I would discuss the relative standings of the U.S. and the Soviet Union in the field of scientific weapons development. We did agree that scientific weapon improvement was pretty much a matter of who had the greatest economy, that was producing the greatest amount of money, to pour into the greatest diversity of weapon improvements, with the greatest manufacturing base to supply the military.

 

Aside from the threat that at any moment, some crazy on either side might launch Nuclear Weapons. and cause the mutual destruction of both our societies, the real contest fell to who had the largest industrial base from which to draw the quantity and quality necessary to overwhelm the other.

 

It was readily apparent early on, that the money advantage went to the USA. Capitalism has produced an economy the was driven by the demands of each and every citizen to have the latest and the greatest. This resulted in the most incredible diversity of manufacturing and innovation the world has ever seen. A very large relatively isolated continent, and a well distributed population, was a significant advantage also.

 

Very early on our Military decided that in order to win battles we needed precision and versatility over large cumbersome wholesale means of wiping out large areas. We needed the precision to be able to use the minimal number of assets, to guarantee accomplishing the goal of eliminating the target. This was the same Capitalistic philosophy our civilian economy functioned with, of maximizing the profit from a minimum of investment.

 

We needed miniaturization and precision in our weapons arsenal. This would mean that the fewest forces could accomplish the greatest effect with the least expenditure of "capitol" ( military platforms) investment. The effort that took the greatest financial commitment from our military wasn't the Nuclear weapons development, it was the development of the Integrated Circuit Large Scale Array. I have posted before that the Navy had stability problems in ships with the mechanical crap on top of the masts and it was reaching a critical point. This precision and size reduction across the whole weapons board was our goal.

 

Anyway, the United States industrial capability was so spread out and had so many independent and capable companies, that we (the government), through our very robust economy, poured many Billions each year into each and all of the Semiconductor industry, to create the integrated circuit, by funding a multitude of different independent development programs, each with the same goal of Integrated circuits. This wasn't a contest of who was "smarter", it was a contest of who could create the manufacturing process that would ensure an overwhelming quantity of "smart" semiconductors to increase weapon efficiency. Example: My company alone, had a military budget of $1Billion each year, just for small electronics parts. Money was the solution.

 

The problem the communism governments had was one of a singular focus in their economy. All development was directly controlled and dependent on the central agency which dictated the approach. There was little quantity of industrial manufacturing, variety and redundancy, in their society. Their manufacturing and development was so concentrated and controlled, that in order to innovate, they had to focus on each technique in turn, and depend on having the time to go through all the variations in development, to find the ones that ultimately worked. That's not meant to demean their research ability. They had excellent well qualified experts in many fields of science and mathematics.

 

In contrast, the U.S. had many existing companies, each trying different development programs, all at the same time. We had the advantage of superior numbers of manufacturers each trying different methodologies simultaneously, to achieve the desired goal. The Soviet Union had no real chance of beating our Capitalistic economy to the solution. Even after the war the Russians were still using tubes and relays, since they had no real semiconductor base to work with. Their first satellite, Sputnik" was tubes and relays. There subsequently was a big black market to supply the Russian military with integrated circuits since they couldn't manufacture any quantity of their own.

 

The result of all this was seen in great improvements in miniaturization and "smarts" in all weapons even up to increased accuracy of ICBM's and smart bombs, through integrated circuits.

 

So my point is that short of an idiot launch from either side, the Soviet Union had no chance of ultimately beating the United States manufacturing base in any contest involving weapons development and improvement. We were economically destined to win all the time.

 

Capitalism's greatest virtue is that money makes the world go around, while dictators have to respond rather than innovate, because they can't compete simply on forcing their citizens to do things. Creativity towards the solution is our key, not dictatorial force mandating solutions.

 

However, if you look at the recent developments in our society, we are more and more moving towards the method of forcing people to do things, rather than allowing individual creativity to solve problems. More laws don't make a better society, better people do.

 

 

Oh, they had a chance. I remember what was going on in this country, under Carter's presidency and into the early eighties. I remember all the talk of Arms Gap, missile gap, etc. I remember the left trying to convince the rest of us that we had already lost. I was just a kid then, but what was happening was so blatant and so egregious that it left an impression even on me.

 

I remember crap movies like The Day After coming out, that painted such a bleak picture of the Cold War, of our capabilities and of the Soviets' strength. We were being groomed for defeat back then. Even back then, I remember wondering how much traction that garbage propaganda would have gotten, if Reagan didn't get elected. Yeah, we could have lost that war without a shot being fired.

[janice6]

 

Oh, they had a chance. I remember what was going on in this country, under Carter's presidency and into the early eighties. I remember all the talk of Arms Gap, missile gap, etc. I remember the left trying to convince the rest of us that we had already lost. I was just a kid then, but what was happening was so blatant and so egregious that it left an impression even on me.

 

I remember crap movies like The Day After coming out, that painted such a bleak picture of the Cold War, of our capabilities and of the Soviets' strength. We were being groomed for defeat back then. Even back then, I remember wondering how much traction that garbage propaganda would have gotten, if Reagan didn't get elected. Yeah, we could have lost that war without a shot being fired.

 

I agree that our leaders were willing to accept defeat if it meant they didn't have to make a decision. for the most part that existed throughout Obama's reign too. In much of our "political history" the ingrained professional politicians were the biggest threat to the nation rather than foreign governments. I believe they still are our greatest enemies.

 

But I was looking at the physical and economic differences between the superpowers, and how oversold the threat was, by not considering the economic base of the country. Remember, I didn't discount some idiot firing ICBM's on the spur of the moment from either side.

 

This reference below, states that the Soviet Union defeated itself by not providing the population the benefits they saw from Capitalism. When the people got pissed, the Soviet Union defeated itself in the face of Capitalism.

 

"....By the time of the 1985 rise to power of Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union’s last leader, the country was in a situation of severe stagnation, with deep economic and political problems which sorely needed to be addressed and overcome. Recognizing this, Gorbachev introduced a two-tiered policy of reform. On one level, he initiated a policy of glasnost, or freedom of speech. On the other level, he began a program of economic reform known as perestroika, or rebuilding. What Gorbachev did not realize was that by giving people complete freedom of expression, he was unwittingly unleashing emotions and political feelings that had been pent up for decades, and which proved to be extremely powerful when brought out into the open. Moreover, his policy of economic reform did not have the immediate results he had hoped for and had publicly predicted. The Soviet people consequently used their newly allotted freedom of speech to criticize Gorbachev for his failure to improve the economy....".

 

http://www.coldwar.org/articles/90s/fall_of_the_soviet_union.asp

[TBO]

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"475","width":"293","src":"https:\/\/images.gr-assets.com\/books\/1344669419l\/34570.jpg"}[/img2]

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Yankee

[Dave514]

We may think the Cold War is over but I have the feeling Russia believes they are just taking a break.

[Bren]

 

<-----got a feeling there was a time when Eric and I wore the same shirt

 

 

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"451","width":"600","src":"http:\/\/thepeoplescube.com\/images\/various_uploads\/Kill_a_commie_for_mommy.jpg"}[/img2]

 

Been looking for one of those shirts, as made famous by the late Johnny Ramone.

[Bren]

[h=2]What If We Had Lost The Cold War?[/h]

What makes you think we didn't? The cold war was basically American ideals of freedom vs. communist authoritarianism.

 

Have you been paying attention lately?

 

Austin, Texas:

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"11-10-16-commies.jpg","data-attachmentid":4100}[/ATTACH]

 

New York communists:

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"flag-burning.jpg","data-attachmentid":4101}[/ATTACH]

 

Chicago communists:

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"120316flag.jpg","data-attachmentid":4102}[/ATTACH]

 

St. Louis area communists:

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"Ferguson-Protesters-Communist-Revolution-Posted-to-Twitter-by-Breaking911.jpg","data-attachmentid":4103}[/ATTACH]

[janice6]

We may think the Cold War is over but I have the feeling Russia believes they are just taking a break.

 

 

 

I'm sure that some Russians in charge really miss the absolute power.

[TBO]

 

<-----got a feeling there was a time when Eric and I wore the same shirt

 

 

[img2=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","height":"451","width":"600","src":"http:\/\/thepeoplescube.com\/images\/various_uploads\/Kill_a_commie_for_mommy.jpg"}[/img2]

 

Been looking for one of those shirts, as made famous by the late Johnny Ramone.