Alternate History 198X World War IIIs

[Coiler]

I figured I'd see how many published (even self-published counts) novels there were that...

1: Featured a mostly conventional World War III
2: Took place in an alternate history and not in a contemporary setting when the books were written. (And followed this unambiguously-I don't want to wiggle books in)
3: Had a POD/setting date after 1980. (They're in a different setting from the "Just After WWII" types of WW3 AH)

I'm going by series and not individual books (to prevent one with lots of entries skewing)

-Harvey Black's "Effect" series
-William Stroock's World War 1990 series
-The Bear's Claws by Russell Phillips
-Northern Fury H Hour by Bart Gauvin and Joel Radunzel
-John Agnew's Operation Zhukov
-Brad Smith's World War III 1985
-Martin Archer's War Breaks Out
-James Burke's The Weekend Warriors
-John Schettler's Kirov series.
-Mark Walker's Dark War series

There's undoubtedly ones that I've missed, and this isn't meant to be an exhaustive list. But still, only ten entries.

 

[Lalli]

Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising.

 

[Coiler]

Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising.

That, Team Yankee, Red Army, and the like are in the "contemporary to the time of the book being written" category, not alternate history.

 

[Resurgam]

Warday by Whitney Strieber is not conventional - in fact, it's nothing but nukes - but it's a limited exchange between the US and USSR that cripples both without destroying the whole of both countries or spreading to the rest of the world. It also indulges in quite a bit of world-building.

Not quite what you're looking for, but it is set in an alternate 1980s (written in '84 and set in '88) and the world survives to go on.

 

[nik2016]

Future War 198X https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_War_198X