Talk:1961: Berlin Crisis

Interesting premise. But at this point in the Cold War, the USA can't lose. It has about 1,000 nukes... the USSR has just 50. Europe will get plonkered by Soviet bombs and missiles but mainland America is completely safe except for a couple of bombers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_and_USSR_nuclear_stockpiles.svg

That link demonstrates my point. It does give entirely different numbers to what I've heard (and looking around the internet, the majority of links do... another I'm looking at says the USA has 25,000 nukes by 1961!) but the point is clear: America has far more nukes and is in striking distance of the Soviet Union. The USSR is in exactly the opposite position.

There's also the factor that some warheads would be in a state of dismantlement and replacement. Back in the 60s, the time it took for that cycle to complete is about four weeks reassembly in the US, six weeks in the USSR. Again America has the advantage in a longer-term war.

So you're looking at something that isn't a brief war of destruction at all, you're looking at a longer and more destructive war, which includes conventional battles and which the USA is pretty much guaranteed to emerge victorious.

Which could make for a very interesting timeline indeed. Good luck! Fegaxeyl 09:22, February 26, 2012 (UTC)