| abstract
| - During the Cold War (and even since), fiction has made some inaccurate assumptions about nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons policy. Also, it made for more exciting drama when writers could pretend that it was easy for some American or Soviet General Ripper type to get control of his country's nukes. However, as the comments below indicate, actual policies changed quite a bit during the Cold War depending on which side one is talking about, so there can be a lot of factual leeway in such situations, especially since many of the facts below have come out only since the 1990s. Types:
* Counter-city policies (Fail Safe): When early basic plans involved "throw everything we've got at the commies", later American nuclear policy during the Cold War was to focus on military targets. Population centers like Moscow still would have been bombed, true, but only as leadership targets (and probably with smaller warheads). Industrial targets in cities were last-resort targets. The Soviets did target civilian populations, but not to a massive extent while it was in fact the British who carried over WWII Bomber Command doctrine of area bombing cities due to the smaller number of warheads in stock.
* A Soviet first strike (Threads): the Soviet Union had a "No First Use" policy (= only use nuclear weapons if first attacked with nuclear weapons) in the 1980s. Before then, there were plans for first use, but only in response to an imminent Western attack. War Games is correct in its usage, as there never was an actual first launch (it was all the military's computer playing a game of Global Thermonuclear War, with the first strike being made by a teenage hacker, unaware he's actually making the US think they're under attack).
* During the Cold War and post-Cold War analysis of East German, Czech and Polish documents, many people confused the term "pre-emption" with "first strike". Pre-emption is like this: it is considered self-defense to draw and shoot if the other guy starts to draw his gun first.
* The rogue launch:
* In general, Soviet Cold War weapons had coded locks, requiring authorisation from the top commanders to be armed. During the Cuban missile crisis however, there were missile carriers capable of independent launch of armed missiles.
* On the US side, until the 1990s, it would have required at least three people to launch an armed attack from a submarine (and a missile launch from a submarine would be damned near impossible without the full support of the crew). Other launch methods had the coded locks. This system, however, only really existed after 1962.
* In the UK, on the other hand, until 1998 the RAF's nuclear missiles were secured with nothing more than a cylindrical bicycle lock key. Royal Navy Trident submarines are still able to launch without a code since a mere ten minute warning meant that if a nuclear war had broken out, it is unlikely that there would be time to issue relevant orders to their submarine captains. Plus, no officer of the Royal Navy would ever consider acting without orders or the proper cirumstances. It just wouldn't be cricket.
* France faced the same issues, yet they figured they weren't worth the potential risks of starting World War III. They installed the same kind of locks the US and USSR used. They are also less fond of cricket.
* The nuclear button (Eagle Strike): Neither side in the Cold War had nor has a nuclear launch button, even in their "nuclear footballs". The nuclear footballs contain information about nuclear stategy, and equipment for the leader to communicate with, and authenticate himself to, the military personnel in individual silos (etc) who would actually carry out a launch.
* Presidential power: The US President cannot launch a nuclear first strike without the cooperation of the Secretary of Defense or any other administrative official that's been appointed/approved by Congress (e.g., CIA director, most of the Presidential Cabinet...). Ordering a retaliatory strike was something a number of people had authority to do. The plane known as "Looking Glass" had authority to do so in the event that the National Command Authority was killed or out of contact. Were DEFCON to reach level 2, both pilot and co-pilot would be required to wear eye-patches in case a nuclear explosion render their exposed eye either momentarily or permanently blind, but nowadays they use goggles. While current policies are classified, it can be assumed that after a major strike on the USA, remaining weapons would be released, with or without higher command. For the Soviets, supposedly, the semi-automatic Perimetr system had three human operators who were able to give the order to launch all remaining warheads in case when on-site seismic detectors detected multiple nuclear explosions on Russian soil and high command is inaccessible. It is unknown if the system is still in use today.
* Using a missile warhead as a stand-still bomb: Since the Cuban Missile Crisis, virtually all nuclear warheads are designed so that they will only go off after being exposed to certain environmental conditions- as in the large numbers of Gs associated with a missile launch.
* Most films behave as if only the USA and USSR had nukes. In reality, the UK, France, China were also nuclear powers before the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Later, India and South Africa produced weapons before the end of the Cold War. In an open secret, Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons since the 60's or 70's. Several European countries had American bombs stationed there too. South Africa disarmed in 1990; Pakistan joined the club in 1998 followed by North Korea in 2006. Iran and Syria are suspected by some of having nuclear weapons programmes also. Many European countries still have American nuclear gravity bombs stationed there - the Netherlands, Germany and Turkey among others. Their pilots train to use them; in the event of war, the US bombs would be turned over to local NATO forces.
* In fact, it's widely suspected that the Vela Incident was a joint Israeli/South African nuclear test, as S. Africa was being subjected to multiple embargoes and sanctions due to Apartheid, and Israel was looking for a nation to help them gain nuclear capability because they were being embargoed by some nations in the West.
* Disarming a ICBM Post-Launch: Deployed strategic ballistic missiles do not have any mechanisms for the attacker to remotely disarm or destroy the weapons after launch. For all intents and purposes once the missile has been fired it can only be stopped either by mechanical malfunction or interception. Missiles which are used for testing are modified with a self-destruct mechanism in case something goes wrong, but live warheads are not used for testing the missiles. See You Fail Nuclear Physics Forever for errors involving nuclear technology. Examples of A Nuclear Error include:
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