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We all know how this one event in which was a mere exercise by NATO in 1983 convinced the Soviets that it was a ruse for an invasion by NATO and ironically invaded much of NATO and some neutral countries in the process, thus kicking off the 5 year long Third World War and we all know how devastating that was (especially in regards to White Tuesday and the Red Holocaust*). Yet evidence from the days of the Politiburo suggested that the leadership could have held off from launching the Red Dawn attacks by that time, perhaps if someone were to show them evidence that the Able Archer exercise is just an exercise and nothing else. But knowing how deranged the Soviets were, I really find that unlikely, but let's say this happens sometime before November 9th, and the Soviets held off on the attacks and just let the exercise continue peacefully. How would this effect the state of things in the West as well as the entire world? would this Cold War still have lasted to this day? I'm really curious.

OOC: I'm pretty sure you get the idea of how this ALT world came to be, but yet I like to try my hand on this DWBI thing.

*And in case people ask, White Tuesday is when the nuking part happens but is limited in scale but still devastating and the Red Holocaust can be summed up as what it is to the Soviets and the Holocaust is to the Nazis, i.e. the moral event horizon of the USSR.
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