The Nuclear War Ep. 4 Pushing All The Chips Forward

We all know Khrushchev has been fibbing big time but in 1961 it was big news. For eight years the world believed that the USSR had an arsenal so big that could demolish mankind in a matter of minutes. But what? What’s this? He’s been bluffing?! What would you do in his shoes? I know, let’s build a bomb so big that the mushroom cloud reaches 40 miles into the stratosphere and were it to be detonated in New York, windows in Montreal would be shattered and then… provoke a war in Berlin. Next… attempt to sneak 162 nuclear missiles just 90 miles away from the U.S. in Cuba. What could go wrong? Finally, let’s take a look under the hood of the U.S war plan SIOP 62. What did it actually call for? How was dropping over 600,000 Hiroshima bombs in an afternoon even possible? Can this brand new President John F. Kennedy cope with the cagey Khrushchev?  Who will win? How close will the world come to unthinkable disaster?