I decided to start a new thread for this (rather than work this into the current thread re Soviet Bombers and Submarines in Cuba.)
What if the US had finalized plans to attack approximately 88 "Designated Ground Zeros" (some of which apparently encompassed more than one target) in the USSR, mostly or exclusively via bomber delivered nuclear weapons in the early 1960's (with an apparent goal of degrading their ability to strike the US) and carried out such an attack (as opposed to a larger SIOP attack.)
The reason might be for any of the various early 1960's cold war goes hot scenarios that come up from time to time. I suppose a bolt out of the blue attack (perhaps during a period of tension) might have yielded different results than an attack during a major conventional conflict, or an attack launched by the US if the US had clear indications that the USSR was about to launch a nuclear strike, but perhaps this attack option (if the plans had actually been completed and all the decision makers had signed off on them, which isn't entirely clear to me..) might have at least been considered as a US response to a severe Soviet Provocation in the early 1960's ?
See:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/10/jfks-first-strike-plan/376432/
for some background and context.
Apparently at least some US decision makers believed the US didn't have enough target data. See https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB56/BerlinC4.pdf for a bit of insight re this and perhaps some key Soviet Targets might have been missed and the US may have sustained a considerable amount of damage ? I suspect the political consequences of the US launching a nuclear first strike would likely be massive even if the US more or less survived and was able to impose a settlement on the Soviets ?
I also wonder if the Soviets might also have struck targets in western Europe and other areas near the Soviet Union with tactical forces that might not have been covered by the the notional list of "Designated Ground Zeros" contemplated by this plan ?
I believe in practice it was incredibly unlikely that the US would actually have launched such an attack, I also have my doubts that the USSR would have simply rolled over and agreed to US imposed settlement if the US had done such a thing. I also believe it was a very good thing that such an attack was never launched.
Thoughts ?
What if the US had finalized plans to attack approximately 88 "Designated Ground Zeros" (some of which apparently encompassed more than one target) in the USSR, mostly or exclusively via bomber delivered nuclear weapons in the early 1960's (with an apparent goal of degrading their ability to strike the US) and carried out such an attack (as opposed to a larger SIOP attack.)
The reason might be for any of the various early 1960's cold war goes hot scenarios that come up from time to time. I suppose a bolt out of the blue attack (perhaps during a period of tension) might have yielded different results than an attack during a major conventional conflict, or an attack launched by the US if the US had clear indications that the USSR was about to launch a nuclear strike, but perhaps this attack option (if the plans had actually been completed and all the decision makers had signed off on them, which isn't entirely clear to me..) might have at least been considered as a US response to a severe Soviet Provocation in the early 1960's ?
See:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/10/jfks-first-strike-plan/376432/
for some background and context.
Apparently at least some US decision makers believed the US didn't have enough target data. See https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB56/BerlinC4.pdf for a bit of insight re this and perhaps some key Soviet Targets might have been missed and the US may have sustained a considerable amount of damage ? I suspect the political consequences of the US launching a nuclear first strike would likely be massive even if the US more or less survived and was able to impose a settlement on the Soviets ?
I also wonder if the Soviets might also have struck targets in western Europe and other areas near the Soviet Union with tactical forces that might not have been covered by the the notional list of "Designated Ground Zeros" contemplated by this plan ?
I believe in practice it was incredibly unlikely that the US would actually have launched such an attack, I also have my doubts that the USSR would have simply rolled over and agreed to US imposed settlement if the US had done such a thing. I also believe it was a very good thing that such an attack was never launched.
Thoughts ?
Last edited:
