Original subtitles

(airplane engine rumbling)

- [Ustinov] At any moment, the armed forces

of East and West are ready for war.

(aircraft engine whining)

- Transmission rotary switch?

- Cable.

- How about slot PLCA selector switches?

- Zero-seven.

- [Ustinov] Should our grudging peace ever falter,

today's warriors can stage a battle far worse

than anything our bloodstained world has ever seen.

(aircraft engine roaring)

(tanks rumbling)

After all, it takes less than a minute

to launch the missiles that could bring

our civilization to a catastrophic end.

- Bravo.

- Charlie? - Charlie.

- [Ustinov] The missiles must never be unleashed;

we can all agree on that.

So we'd better search out the roots

that might lead to nuclear war.

- U-turn commit time.

- Three, two, one: mark.

(missile roars)

(missiles hissing)

- The long range missiles

of the opposing sides can dispatch nuclear warheads

to 10,000 different targets.

Unless mutual terror or good sense keep them in check,

they may rise out of holes all across our northern lands

and come bursting from the sea.

(missile rumbling)

(missile rumbling) And where would these missiles go?

And where would these missiles go?

Well...the obvious targets are where people are.

In cities.

So the city dwellers have become the hostages

of the threat and counter- threat of nuclear war.

And our nuclear nightmares begin

with the destruction of lively and lovely cities

like Paris, an emblem of civilization itself,

and heaven knows where the nightmares end.

A single nuclear bomb, easily spared

from out of the huge arsenal of these things,

could lay the whole of central Paris to waste

in an explosion much greater than that

of Nagasaki or Hiroshima.

(slides clicking)

(slides clicking)

(slides clicking)

(slides clicking)

(slides clicking)

The cosmic lunacy which produces such horror

is not, as you might expect, the affliction

of irredeemably wicked men.

No, it's palliative, carefully worked out

and considered government policy.

In the meanwhile, military accountants are working out

how big a bang they can get for a buck,

how much rubble for a ruble.

Our dreams might be untroubled if this mutual terror

had really managed to abolish war altogether,

but unfortunately the mutual nervousness

causes the armed forces of all sides

to jostle and probe each other

and to shadow box within sight

of their potential adversaries.

(aircraft humming)

Although the crew of a Soviet bomber

acknowledges a point scored by the western interceptor,

the sparring would scarcely be keener

if war had already begun.

(aircraft whooshing)

A British aircraft and a Russian warship;

Today they shoot only with cameras.

(camera clicking)

(camera clicking)

While the western submarine hunters

play catch as catch can, for the Soviet boats

it's follow the leader.

(helicopter whirring)

A helicopter from the cruiser Leningrad

teases the American admiral who's sizing them up

at unusually close quarters.

(helicopter whirring)

Only the law of the high seas

restrains this unfriendly game,

and also, I trust, a healthy fear of the consequences

if encounters should ever become conflict.

Will the Americans refrain from meeting taunt with taunt?

Ah no, you see; they stage their little fly past, too.

(helicopter whirring)

And it's in the same forceful spirit

that a United States helicopter

patrols the border of East Germany,

the frontline ally of the Soviet Union.

The white posts mark the end of the western world

and the army pilot has been specially coached

to fly within a few feet of them.

(helicopter whirring)

It doesn't look like the most dangerous place on Earth,

but all the outlandish firepower

that's concentrated here - Russian, American, and British -

could touch off a nuclear volcano at any time.

(helicopter whirring)

The East German fences, set back a little

from the border, delineate in suitably ugly fashion

the geopolitical rift that runs right across Europe.

(helicopter whirring)

If I negligently drop my keys over here

I couldn't just run down and pick them up

because they will have fallen

into the other side of the world into East Germany;

I might as well throw them into the ocean.

And this is how close the American cavalry is

to this demarcation line

at this observation post called Alpha.

In front of here and behind great armies lie in wait

for the war that must never happen.

The new European war which could so easily

get out of hand involving not only

thousands of tanks and planes,

but eventually thousands of nuclear weapons.

And this sinister arsenal is dedicated

to the perpetuation of the ugly rift...

across which young men in good health

watch each other so warily.

- What's that you've seen over there?

Our mission here is basically to overwatch

the East German border.

It is to observe, record, and report all actions,

whether it's an East German patrol walking past

or walking right along the border

or whether it's a work force on the border.

My personal feelings are that I like it here.

If there's any place in Europe that I want to be,

it's right here on the border.

(birds chirping)

- [Ustinov] Europe has a grim reputation

for turning its pleasant hills into battlefields.

If that ever happens again,

these troops will take the first shot.

(birds chirping)

It's been all quiet on the Central Front

for most of the past 30 years.

But all along the rift, the West Germans,

the British, and other troops

of the North Atlantic Alliance, NATO,

face powerful opponents from the Soviet Union

and Eastern Europe.

(vehicle idling)

In this sector where the East German border

juts nearest to the Rhine, it's the Americans

who stand at what soldiers call the "Sharp End"

as the West's most forward defenders in case of trouble.

(vehicle idling)

- It's...kinda strange lookin' out there

and have them lookin' back at you,

wonderin' what they're thinking and...

what they're doing and everything.

They've got a job just like we do.

- I don't know, there's times I'd like

to talk to them, but we can't...

I don't know...

They just sit around and watch us when they see us.

They go hide from us and stuff.

- I have talked to a few of the East German guards.

Most of 'em are just soldiers like we are.

(men chattering)

- You got that right? - Got it.

- [Ustinov] The Americans are crack troops, all set to jump

into their battle tanks and oppose any breach

of the fateful frontier.

(birds chirping)

- We're always ready for a surprise attack.

I have a unit that's always positioned on the border.

It's always manned; it can respond within

less than 15 minutes.

And all they have to do is call back here

and the rest of us will respond very quickly.

(tank idling)

I've got 250 different combat systems here.

They consist of tanks for my cavalry troops

and my tank company.

Scout vehicles mounted with the Dragon weapon systems.

Ammunition trucks, jeeps, command and control vehicles.

We pack one heck of a big punch,

much larger punch than any other unit

in the United States Army.

(tank rumbling)

- So, these are 155 millimeter Howitzers.

They're capable of indirect fire support for the squadron.

We have different types of munitions, high explosive.

We have the rounds that will lay minefields

and drop bomblets and they're also dual capable.

They have a nuclear capability.

(tank roaring)

I think that the nuclear weapon is a great deterrent

in the political scene today.

I think that you can see in the newspaper

and in the news how much it plays an important part

in everything that is done with governments.

I think that us knowing that the other side has them

and them knowing that we have them

is a deterrent that is possibly one

that will keep us from another wartime.

(loud click)

- [Ustinov] Apart from the guns that can fire nuclear shells,

bombs of much greater power can be delivered out of the sky.

Supersonic strike aircraft, stationed in England

for instance, are fully prepared for that dismal task.

(aircraft engine idling)

The crew can take their nuclear weapons

to destinations anywhere in Europe,

on the battlefield or far beyond it.

(aircraft engine idling)

The leaders of NATO see themselves

increasingly outnumbered in planes and tanks.

They doubt their ability to win

a war in Europe by ordinary means.

(ladder clattering)

So, as their current statement of strategy declares,

if NATO's conventional forces were in danger of defeat,

selective and limited use of nuclear weapons

could not be deferred.

(aircraft engine idling)

(aircraft roaring)

But to postpone for as long as possible

any need to "go nuclear" as they say,

NATO looks to its conventional forces in Germany.

The snag is, of course, is that the Russians

have nuclear weapons, too.

So aircraft specially built for fighting tanks

might seem a more prudent defense than atomic artillery.

(aircraft rumbling)

The fighting men who profit from technology

are liable to perish by it, too.

Even non-nuclear weapons are now so powerful

that any war in Europe would be a competition in slaughter,

swift and terrible to contemplate.

(helicopter rumbling)

Who would want to meet a helicopter gun ship

Who would want to meet a helicopter gun ship leaping up before him?

leaping up before him?

(helicopter whirring)

It's chockfull of gadgets for dealing out death.

(helicopter whirring)

The predictable violence of modern war

drives the generals and their headquarters underground.

The command bunkers are dotted

all around Europe in unlikely places.

For instance, at an American football stadium

just west of the Rhine.

Beneath the terraces, the staff officers

secure themselves against chemical weapons

and nuclear fallout.

So it would, as it were, be a fight

between one team of moles and another.

(door slams)

(indistinct chatter & control room sounds)

They're sending off strike aircraft

to help the ground troops.

Thank goodness it's only an exercise.

- In the event there is a war here in Europe,

the primary mission of ATOC Sembach

will be to task and coordinate offensive support,

air support, for the U.S. and German Army Corps

within the central region.

- Four oscar nine zero two is airborne, 1232.

- Roger that, sir. Juliet charlie here at the ATOC.

- One fox six zero two romeo.

He was successful on target number three victor 901.

- Five two three will also file the full profile.

- [Ustinov] If the battle is going badly

and if the political leaders of the West consent,

the commanders can replace their ordinary weapons

with nuclear bombs...

a contingency that is familiar to scholars of war.

- A nuclear war could arise in the first place

from a Soviet attack on Western Europe.

And indeed...NATO defenses quite deliberately

have this nuclear risk built in as part of the deterrent.

It is made clear to the Soviet Union

that we cannot defend ourselves...for very long

without initiating the use of nuclear weapons.

Initially, hopefully on a small and local scale,

but with every possibility that this would escalate

to ultimately a major nuclear exchange

in which the territory of the Soviet Union itself

should be at risk.

Well, this is quite deliberate.

It is part of the deterrent posture.

- If NATO fires any nuclear weapon, however small,

then the Russians will almost certainly respond

with nuclear weapons because

their nuclear weapons by and large are rather vulnerable

and therefore have to be used very early on

in a nuclear or even conventional war.

And therefore, the risk of escalation is enormous;

I would say inevitable, and the escalation

would be very rapid.

And this would certainly lead

to the total destruction of both sides.

- The buildup in the Eastern side of Europe

is a serious one...both in the purely conventional field

and in the nuclear field.

Perhaps one of the most serious aspects of it

is that it doesn't seem to stop...in spite

of the fact that you've had in the last decade

a very tangible improvement of political relations.

The Soviet military effort has not been affected by it.

- On the surface it does appear

that there's an enormous preponderance

of Soviet forces in Europe... and one of the arguments,

of course, advanced is that these forces

are too large for defensive purposes.

That of course is a statement from the Western side

and it doesn't really take into account

Soviet prescriptions.

The Soviet argument is that they have

a large and legitimate defensive task

to carry out in Europe as a whole.

They have the defense of their own alliance system

and of course their own perimeter.

Europe is very large, north, central and south.

And they must also face a complexity of problems.

From the Soviet point of view,

they have not to deal only with a NATO alliance,

but there's always been the problem of the local adversary,

something with which we have not had to deal.

So therefore, from the Soviet side

they would argue that their forces are tailored exactly

to discharge its defensive task.

(tanks rumbling)

- [Ustinov] But it's the powerful attack of those Soviet

missiles and of armies

much stronger than their own that perturbs

the generals of NATO.

(tanks rumbling)

They picture the Russian tanks bursting across the border

and charging through West Germany,

unstoppable by conventional forces.

It's not at all obvious how such an attack

could be in the Soviet interest,

yet among the Western allies the troubling vision persists.

(tanks rumbling)

The NATO general on the Central Front

happens, himself, to be a German.

And in this nightmare, he might then see his own country

turned into a radioactive battleground

in the desperate bid to make the invaders go home

before they reached the Rhine.

(tank rumbling & water splashing)

Just let the unwholesome brew of tanks and bombs

work on your imagination and you may feel it closing in;

the first of our nuclear nightmares.

To me, one possible sequence of events seems all too clear.

They had to try and stop the advance somehow,

you understand that I hope.

This is the last of the coffee, I'm afraid.

Who would've thought that the fallout

would keep us down here for so long.

Now...there's something that I want you to believe.

Nobody actually intended your families to die like that,

or your school friends for that matter.

The German general in question, well...he was...

Put yourself in his shoes if you will for a moment.

He was always opposed to the use of nuclear weapons.

In fact he said, "Do you want me to be tried

like a war criminal like others were before me?"

But, on the first day...Soviet armor

had advanced 40 miles into West Germany.

On the second day, 80 miles.

And it was then that the American supreme commander

told the German general, "We are going to stop

this war with nuclear weapons.

Your chancellor and my president

are in full agreement about this."

"So it's come to this," said the German general.

"Well, at least, thank God, it won't be my decision."

"Oh, but it will my friend.

We want you to select the targets."

"There must be some other way...

If I could swing the Netherland corps around

onto the flank..." but the subordinates

were getting impatient,

although the British general was stiff lipped.

"There's quite a lot of blood flowing up here.

Although we've managed to nudge his armor

into a nuclear fire zone quite effectively,

put in a good word for us.

There's a good chap."

A nuclear fire zone including villages,

farms, people, civilians.

The American commander was adamant.

"We are going to accomplish eight nuclear strikes

on armored spearheads of your choice

and we are going to send eight missions in the rear

in Czechoslovakia and East Germany."

You see, the Americans calculated

that they could smash the Soviet armor

at the same time saving New York and Chicago,

not Cologne and Munich unfortunately.

You remember the postcard I showed you

of Cologne cathedral. A very beautiful one, it was.

A German corps commander, almost surrounded,

added his voice to the rest.

(speaking in German)

"Why am I being abandoned like von Paulus in Stalingrad?

Where are the nuclear weapons?"

So, at length, the German general consented.

"Very well, although may my tongue rot for saying so."

"Oh, you know.

You know the targets in any case."

And so...the Germans and the Americans were in full accord

and on the morning of the third day,

the first bombs lit up the skyline like a false dawn.

Although as the German general had said all along,

why on Earth would the Russians back down

when they're winning?

And of course, when the Russians didn't back down...

there was no logical time or place

for the nuclear exchanges to cease.

Would there be any European cities exempt from devastation?

Well some nations believed that the possession

of a nuclear force of their own makes them safer

and that the hostage cities could in some sense hit back.

The French, for instance, hope that the possession

of such a nuclear force exempts Paris,

makes it immune from the nuclear epidemic.

But have things changed so much

since the Élysée Palace here was occupied

by Louis XV's mistress, Madame de Pompadour,

whose contemporary, Voltaire, wrote so scathingly

about the heroic butchery of war?

Well, I wonder what Voltaire might have thought

of the president of the French Republic

who now lives in the Élysée, controlling from his basement

enough nuclear power to carry destruction

thousands of miles away.

In the most elegant of headquarters,

he has enough power at his beck and call

to make the war of the Austrian Succession

seem like an outing, like a picnic.

(button clicks)

(button clicks)

And because an enemy might have similar power,

France puts her command posts underground, too.

(phone buttons clicking)

You don't have to be a superpower to build nuclear bombs,

but you'd be well-advised to assemble

the computerized paraphernalia of modern war,

as France has done, and guard your bombs with care.

(key clattering into hole & lock clicking)

(lock clicking)

(door opens)

A nuclear weapon, author of nightmares,

and, so the French hope, a discouragement

and, so the French hope, a discouragement to potential enemies.

to potential enemies.

It's hard to grasp that the gleaming object

has so much death in it to be scattered indiscriminately

by heat, blast, fire, and atomic radiation.

(footsteps)

But we'd deceive ourselves if we didn't see

that the French are really rather proud

of the standing attached to the possession of the bomb.

After all, who isn't?

(airplane engine accelerating)

Their supersonic bombers represent only one

of the methods that the French employ

for fighting or threatening to fight a nuclear war.

They have ballistic missiles, too, entirely homemade,

here going by road under plain cover

to a base in the south of the country.

(trucks rumbling)

The missiles a la maison are capable

of hurling H-bombs as far as Moscow, for instance,

or over any lesser distance.

The key that could do it makes an unusual halter.

- Bonjour. - Bonjour.

(speaking in French)

- The weapons are meant to deter

any nuclear attack and warn all comers

that the French won't be walked over next time.

(speaking in French)

They could also help to shield Western Europe...

so the French spare no expense in keeping

their missiles up to scratch.

But they don't want all the rest of the world

joining the nuclear club.

(speaking in French)

Their tour de force you'll find at rest.

The submarines that skulk under the sea,

each carrying 16 missiles.

They could easily obliterate the chief cities

of any enemy.

(speaking in French)

But if the French think they need them, why not everyone?

Why not Brazilian missiles and submarines

or Korean nuclear bombers?

(water splashing)

The United States first made the bomb for fear of Hitler.

Then Russia fearing the Americans.

Next came the British, their nuclear submarines

and bombers now loyally assigned to NATO.

Then France, firmly asserting her independence.

The Chinese, who followed, think that nuclear war

is bound to come.

Inevitably perhaps, it was India's bomb next.

By all accounts, Israel now possesses the bomb

and perhaps South Africa, too,

while Pakistan is striving to follow suit.

So the bomb is proliferating through the hotter regions

of the world, despite all the efforts

of the diplomats to prevent it.

Will the seven or eight who have it so far

soon be 18 and then 80?

There's a new form of racism which suggests

that nuclear weapons are respectable,

but only for rich, predominantly white countries.

After all, it's rather grand to be a superpower.

You can continue to improve your weapons

while preaching piously about peace.

If you are a smaller nation with only a very few

nuclear weapons, then I'm afraid this is irresponsible,

nuclear weapons, then I'm afraid this is irresponsible, if not criminal.

if not criminal.

Well, whether there is or not any wisdom at all

in this hypocrisy, proliferation would seem

to point a second way towards a holocaust,

this time through the less affluent parts of the world.

And the greatest danger of all lies here

in the narrow streets of the Middle East

where modern technology serves ancient bitterness.

(indistinct chatter)

The global bazaar for nuclear merchandise

is not easy to police and anyone can

equip himself for making bombs.

- We and the Soviets...

have set a very bad example to the rest of the world in

essentially demonstrating that nuclear weapons...

are the main instrument of our foreign policy.

And essentially are the main support

of our status as a superpower.

That being the case, it's awfully difficult

to convince anybody else not to have them.

- All these countries that are interested

in the acquisition of nuclear weapons

have generally hostile neighbors

and you have what you call "odd couples" in country A

and country B, and you have some examples.

For example, in South Asia, that are very hostile

and are both interested in nuclear weapons.

It's quite clear that if country A decides

to acquire nuclear weapons,

country B will follow the example.

And so very dangerous nuclear arms threats

would be triggered.

- I was astounded that the United States governement

has declassified so much information,

it's available at places here like the Library of Congress,

that a single competent individual could easily

design fission bombs and I think carry them

through to construction.

There's no doubt in my mind that a small group

of motivated organized people, even perhaps people

not very highly technically trained

such as terrorists, could conceive and bring to fruition,

a nuclear weapons construction project.

- Any country to date

that has decided to develop a bomb,

a crude, maybe crude fission bomb,

has been successful on the first try.

So looking in the future,

I don't expect to see countries actually detonate

their first weapon.

I think that they will know whether or not

they are in a position to have a weapon.

Clearly the collected wisdom of the world

is that Israelis, Israel has a bomb,

but they've never tested it.

And I think that's what you're going to see in the future.

- [Ustinov] Spies and nuclear experts seem to agree

it's at Dimona that Israel makes her bombs.

Even though the signs would have it otherwise.

(truck rumbling past)

The plant itself has been kept from prying eyes for years.

But won't Israel's nuclear efforts

simply spur her enemies along the same road?

The holy city of Christians, Jews, and Muslims;

the order is strictly alphabetical.

It has been the focal point for conflict

for thousands of years.

Jerusalem is at this time in Israeli hands,

but you can look north towards the Soviet Union,

with its Muslim minorities and affiliations,

east towards a patchwork of Muslim states,

patient yet unforgiving,

south towards Mecca, the power of religion and of oil,

and west towards America, Israel's powerful friend.

It is hard to see how an eventual nuclear anarchy

can be avoided in this area.

Already in very few years several states

could have bombs of their own,

to say nothing of certain minority groups.

Even with a bomb smaller than that of Hiroshima,

maddened men could be responsible

for hundreds and thousands of deaths,

a tragedy which would be attributable to man's folly,

or here, to the wrath of God.

I don't suppose we'll ever really know

who blew up Jerusalem.

Nowadays it seems as long ago

as the fall of Babylon, doesn't it?

At the time it perplexed and alarmed

the Israeli prime minister and horrified him,

as it did everyone else.

Oh I wish people wouldn't cut up newspapers.

You know they're relics for students of history,

even for amateurs like myself who are trying

to...imagine how this war began.

Oh talking about amateurs, the Israeli Secret Service

was very active at the time that the amateurs

first got hold of the bomb.

Just after those first two...hideous explosions...

bungled explosions at Belfast and at Lisbon,

the Israelis...where is it?

Oh yes...an Israeli government spokesman said,

"We warned the British and Portuguese authorities

that nuclear weapons were now circulating

among unofficial groups."

Well, Israel's own problems were about to start

on that Sunday, or...

No, it must've been the Monday

when two El Al airliners were shot down by missiles

and Ben Gurion Airport was subsequently closed.

The secretary of state remonstrated,

"The Soviets are supplying Middle Eastern countries

with surface to air missiles

of unnecessary sophistication."

And the Israelis immediately plunged

into the Lebanon for the umpteenth time.

But now, to report catastrophic losses

to their prime minister and the fact that they

had lost control of the air.

"There will be a time for mourning later,"

said the Israeli prime minister to the Knesset.

He didn't know how much mourning.

Or on the Wednesday, a small nuclear device

blew up the ancient walled city of Jerusalem

with its predominantly Arabic population

and all its holy places.

While the news of this act of folly

was still reverberating around the world,

it could be supposed that the Israeli prime minister

was saying, "How do we retaliate?

Who do I hit?"

But, his advisors were as baffled as he.

The next day on television the Palestinian leader,

in tears, said "Why should we destroy our national home?

The place that we have cherished

and suffered for so long.

We are not mad!"

But of course there were those that did

claim responsibility for this hideous act...

...various groups.

The Lisbon Red Heroes, Dark December,

others too numerous and too psychotic to mention.

The American and the Soviet fleets converged

on the coast while their governments remained in contact,

attempting to, as they said, "defuse" the Middle East.

The Israeli prime minister protested...

"The superpowers are trying to take

even our tragedies out of our hands...

...and what's this you tell me about Saudi Arabian bombers

on Amman Airfield?

I want an Entebbe-like raid!

I want you to seize all the nuclear devices they have."

But...the commanders were blown out of the air.

The prime minister saw the net closing.

"What?

The Libyans have agreed to give nuclear bombs

to the Lebanese?

The Pakistanis have already done so to the Syrians?"

Trembling for his cities, the Israeli prime minister

authorized nuclear strikes against Amman, Damascus.

"Yes, and Beirut!" he cried.

And so...on the eve of sabbath in that subcontinent

of prophets, cataclysms began to rival...

the Book of Revelations.

And since the superpowers were unable

to disentangle themselves, the madness

eventually engulfed us all.

The Americans and the Russians are at pains

to avoid war by mishap, and for this

they employ military intelligence,

high speed communication, and very complicated systems

of what they call command and control.

Any loss of control would automatically

entail a third route into a nuclear war.

These controls are, of course, very highly guarded secrets.

But what is fairly obvious is that the systems themselves

would come under immediate attack

in the event of hostilities.

And here, Fylingdales Moor in the north of England,

would probably be hit in the first few minutes.

Why?

Because it has become one of the nostrils

of the American high command,

endlessly sniffing the air for signs of danger.

And inside those round objects are radars

which warn of the approach of ballistic missiles.

Meanwhile, high above the Earth, there are satellites

looking out for the first glow of rocket engines.

And it's in the frozen north that the other

early warning outposts stand.

That's because the missile flight paths

between the superpowers would mainly pass this way.

The giant radars never rest in Greenland or here in Alaska.

(wind howling)

The military planners believe, or pretend to believe,

that a missile attack might burst

upon the United States at any time.

In that event, they'd have less than half an hour's notice

before the nuclear warheads arrived at their targets.

(machine humming & footsteps down ladder)

So the news from the big radars

goes straight to Colorado and the chief defenders

of a continent who man their headquarters

at Cheyenne Mountain day and night;

the North American Air Defense Command,

usually known as NORAD.

(vehicle engine rumbling)

Because they're so vital for command and control,

the NORAD staff put 1400 feet of granite between themselves

and the fragile world outside.

(phone rings)

And NORAD's computers would announce

any massive attack, where it's coming from...

and what's more to the point, where the missiles

can be expected to fall.

- The detection would be almost instantaneous.

The reliability is very high.

The warning time, of course, would depend

on where the missile was launched from

since it's a matter of flight time of the missile.

And the same way with a submarine.

The warning time then would depend

on where the submarine was when it launched.

Attacks upon the sensors could make us blind and deaf...

but we have overlapping and redundant systems

and to knock them all out would be a sizable effort,

and to do so would be considered an act of war.

- [Ustinov] Even in peacetime the radar outposts

have plenty to do, reporting to NORAD

on all the satellites that circle the Earth.

Most of them have war-like functions

and some could make mischief.

The watchers see the superpowers using spacecraft

more and more for military command and control.

They rely on them for spying, for early warning,

for their world-wide communications.

They are tempting targets indeed.

(machine clicking loudly)

And from time to time NORAD spots

anti-satellite devices under test.

- 10382, the kernel set is 485. (machine clicking loudly)

- Every medium that man has entered before

he has found ultimately some way to conduct warfare in it.

Now, whether or not there's going to be warfare

in space I think is more a matter for mankind to decide.

- [Ustinov] For those of us still stranded

on this planet, the chain of command comes

to its bitter end with the missile crews.

On the windy plains of North Dakota

they never know that the president's order

won't come today to fire their missiles in anger.

But how can anyone make certain

that they'll never shoot without authority

and yet never fail to shoot if their nation requires it?

When the crews change their shifts,

the brother officers are cool and punctilious.

- You ready to brief our status?

- Okay.

LCB status is normal.

- Very good.

Communications status?

- The radios are all operational.

- Okay.

Launch switches?

Check the launch switch first over here.

- Launch switch...

- [Ustinov] The new commander won't take charge

of the missiles until he's given

the control capsule a thorough inspection.

There must be no funny business down here

with our world at stake.

- [Officer] It's good.

- Okay.

Did you check the keys already?

- Yeah.

- Okay, you want check our locks and make sure they're on?

(locks rattling)

Well, there's your lock. - Okay.

- You guys have a good one. - Okay, have a good one.

- Safe trip back.

- Take care. - See you tomorrow.

- Well, let's go on our inspections.

- [Ustinov] On these young men falls direct responsibility

for 30 H-bombs, the warheads of 10 Minuteman missiles

of intercontinental range.

(machine beeping)

Once the missiles have gone, they can't be called back.

- This is the missile launch checklist.

Step one, launch keys inserted.

(seatbelts clattering)

- [Ustinov] Even here, presumably safe from all intruders,

the keys that can unlock death for millions of people

are not left lying around.

And to launch the missiles, two are not enough.

- Inserted commander. - Inserted deputy.

- The four key system is a system used

to ensure the correct launch and authorized launch

of the Minuteman missile force.

Four keys is the minimum amount required

to launch any Minuteman missile.

Two keys are in each capsule, one for the deputy

and one for myself, the commander.

When we turn our keys together,

we constitute one launch vote.

Our one launch vote combined with the one launch vote

of another launch control center

to which we are electrically connected

allows the four key system to come into effect

and constitutes an authorized launch command.

In the event an unauthorized command is sent,

we have what we call an inhibit launch command

which is used to cancel out the unauthorized order.

- Enable.

(indistinct conversation)

- Depress illuminated.

- [Radio] Charlie, Bravo, Echo.

- Launcher, this is Alpha and we need

a key turn in five seconds.

- [Radio] Bravo.

Charlie, Delta, Echo.

- Okay launch switch, hands on keys.

- Hands on.

- Three, two, one, mark.

(key clicks)

- Key turn.

(machine buzzing)

I have one gone, two is missile away.

Four is gone.

- In order to become a missileer,

you have to be very carefully screened.

Any person who exhibits unstable behavior

such as a heavy drinking problem

or develops a serious marital problem

or something more personal, he would be removed from duty.

Only the most mentally fit and prepared people

are permitted to pull missile alert duty

and SAC bomber duty.

- [Ustinov] The missiles and bombers of SAC,

Strategic Air Command, are controlled

from an underground command post here at Omaha, Nebraska.

Launching the missiles usually requires proper orders

relayed from the highest in the land,

but the SAC command post may not be buried

deep enough to escape destruction.

Indeed, attacks on key headquarters

might leave the superpower like a beheaded dragon

unable to strike back.

An unusual aircraft tries to avoid that outcome.

(plane roaring)

Anticipating the chaos of nuclear war,

the generals of SAC take turns in providing another channel

of command in the comparative safety of the air.

It has a codename, Looking Glass.

- This airborne command post, which has been flying,

or an airplane similar to this, for the past 17 years,

offers our commander in chief and the national

command authorities a method to maintain connectivity

or communications with all the organizations

that we are responsible for

within the Strategic Air Command.

We will never be caught unawares.

We'll always be able to maintain communications

between the national command authorities

and the Strategic Air Command forces.

Aboard several of our airplanes,

including this particular airplane,

we have the ability to launch the Minuteman missiles

if in fact circumstances on the ground

would prevent them from being launched

under execution orders

from the national command authorities.

(buttons clicking & computers humming)

(paper rustling)

(buttons clicking & computers humming)

- The reasoning is straightforward.

In this Looking Glass, stranger far than Alice's,

we see a disturbing sight; the pilots looking down

on ruination, on incinerated cities,

military targets crushed.

An airborne general awaiting orders

from the senior surviving member of the government.

Orders to wreak similar havoc on the enemy.

It is very images of horror such as these

that the superpowers seek to deter each other,

but the very fact of the existence of headquarters

in the sky like these acknowledges the frailty

of other elements in command and control.

And the frailest of all these elements are human beings.

(indistinct conversation)

- [Ustinov] Looking Glass itself might lack authority

if no word came from the president,

so he too has an emergency command post,

a jumbo jet with the improbable name of "Kneecap."

It can whisk the president and his military chiefs

out of harm's way IF they make it to the airfield in time.

- The command system,

because it depends upon fragile communication assets

and a very few people, is extremely vulnerable

itself to attack.

So, a first strike on a command system

gives the probability of seriously degrading

the military capability of the force that is attacked.

Modern command systems understand that fact.

Given all this, in the midst of a crisis

in which military commanders believe that a war

can no longer be avoided because the preparations

have gone too far, there would be extreme pressures

to go the full way and to get in,

if not the first attack,

certainly to establish basic military plans

and bring their forces right up to the actual brink of war.

(bootsteps marching in snow)

- [Ustinov] The same knotty issues of command and control

beset the Soviet Union's strategic rocket force.

(footsteps down stairs)

Anyone who might find himself at the receiving end

of a Russian missile would naturally hope

their precautions against any unauthorized launch

are at least as strict as the Americans.

But Soviet missile officers,

like their American counterparts,

know that in a nuclear war their systems

of command and control would be targets

of the highest priority.

(machines humming)

They're quite aware that communications can fail,

headquarters can be atomized, political leaders

and generals can perish.

(switch popping)

(platform rumbling)

Soviet anxieties mirror those of the United States.

The need to avoid being caught unawares

in a surprise attack, to be sure of getting

the big missiles away before the chain of command snaps.

But how do they arrange these matters

on the other side of the balance of terror?

- I don't know if there is a difference in vulnerability

between the United States and the Soviet Union,

but there certainly is a difference

in their style of operation

with respect to command and control.

The difference has to do with the basic nature

of these two societies.

The United States is a highly decentralized society

and so are its military forces.

A great deal of dependence upon the initiative

of low level commanders under actual operations

of military forces.

Soviet Union is a highly centralized society

and so are its military forces.

They have gone to extraordinary effort

as far as we can tell to maintain that central authority,

even to the point of trading off against the vulnerability

of their actual force elements.

(water churning & seagulls squawking)

- [Ustinov] The trickiest of all forces

to control are the submarines, whose missiles

are the superpower's last resort.

But in time of war, will the commands ever reach them?

The American sailors casting off

from Holy Loch in Scotland won't see

daylight again for two months.

And communicating with submarines under water

is difficult enough in peacetime.

- [John] I really do not know what kind of orders

the United States missile submarines operate under.

However, we can realize that the vulnerability

of their communication links require that

a great deal of authority be vested

in the submarine commander and the officers

and men serving underneath him.

In circumstances in which it became apparent

that the United States had been attacked massively

and their communication links had been broken

and could not be reestablished, the submarine commander

would have to decide whether to execute the missions

for which he had been prepared

despite the lack of formal authority to do so,

or whether he should fail to do so

and possibly degrade the retaliatory capability

of the United States.

I don't think it's predictable in advance

how a submarine commander would resolve this problem,

but everybody recognizes that there are circumstances

in which he would virtually have to do so

and some of them undoubtedly would.

(water churning)

I think the same logic does apply to the Soviet submarines,

but I personally believe that they do not operate

under quite the extension of authority

that is characteristic of the United States force.

Indeed I believe that's why there are

observable operational restrictions on Soviet submarines.

At any given time they have many fewer of them at sea

and they do not operate quite as far

from the Soviet Union as the United States submarines

do from the United States.

I simply believe they've solved

the problem in a different way.

They are willing to accept some greater vulnerability

of their submarines in order to achieve

tighter operational control.

- I know very little about submarines,

but I imagine that their crews

are as cramped and as isolated as we are here...cut off.

I'm thinking in particular of the captain

of a Soviet submarine selected for a long range mission

in the Pacific because of his proven loyalty

to the party, and also because of his quality as a seaman.

Now, he had lost touch with his base for days.

His second in command told him

nothing from the shore transmitter,

nothing from the emergency aircraft.

The captain addressed the crew:

"Comrades...perhaps our Mother Russia

has been burnt to a cinder already

and we're the only ones left to avenge her.

But my orders are specific.

I must have proof that nuclear war has broken out

before I take any initiative.

We should surface, sample the atmosphere,

listen for news broadcasts."

But...

there were three unidentified ships

bearing down on him already.

"Three destroyers, Comrade Captain,

and a possible submarine."

"If they sink us we shall have the proof we need,"

grunted the captain.

"And if I launch my missiles the chances are

"they'll sink us anyway."

"But why should they provoke us like this

if they have not attacked the Soviet Union?"

"Oh...we provoke each other all the time

in this war of nerves; that's nothing."

"But Comrade Captain, (speaking in foreign language)?

The emergency aircraft?"

The captain took his decision.

"I will launch two missiles.

In this way if it's a terrible mistake

the party chairman can always say

to the American president: "That stupid captain,

we've punished him.

We apologize about Denver and San Diego."

"If it isn't a mistake we shall have done our duty

in part at least."

"But...

we would never start a war ourselves!"

cried the second in command.

"Remember what the admiral said!"

The crew cheered quietly.

"There are certain circles in Washington eager

to destroy us.

Are two missiles sufficient?"

"Two missiles..." said the captain.

"Proceed."

And so he remained poised on a balance of error,

not knowing whether he had started a nuclear war

or merely stoked fires that were raging already.

(alarm blaring) (men chattering)

(alarm blaring) (engines racing)

When bomber crews scramble it certainly sounds like

the end of the world.

(alarms blaring)

Memories of the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor

nearly 40 years ago still haunt American strategies,

so they always keep a hundred aircraft on alert,

laden with nuclear weapons.

Otherwise a sudden strike by missiles

might annihilate the entire bomber force on the ground.

So, if the warning comes, the crews scurry into the air.

An attack of that sort would be yet another way

for a nuclear war to start.

One superpower or the other coming to believe

it can or must strike first,

the aim being to cripple the other's nuclear forces

embodied in bombers, missiles and submarines.

Any of them sooner or later

could well be vulnerable to attack.

(aircraft roaring)

(aircraft screeching)

Even if the somewhat elderly B-52s get airborne in time,

won't they just be shot down

before they reach their targets?

- Not all manned bombers are necessarily vulnerable.

They have become increasingly vulnerable

as time goes on because, for example,

the Soviet Union has developed an anti-aircraft system

that essentially layers the air above the ground

and addresses each layer with a different weapon.

Therefore, they sort of have covered the entire range

in which a bomber could fly with a different kind of weapon

and that seems to be reasonably lethal.

On the other hand, a bomber has ways to confuse

the radars, for example, of the anti-aircraft system

and thereby be able to penetrate with less danger

and threat than one would normally expect.

The best way, of course, to do that is avoid

the defenses and that's where the cruise missile comes in.

(vehicles humming)

The cruise missile can be launched from the bomber

and travel very near the ground

where it would probably hide in the clutter,

in the noise that the ground generates on a radar.

Therefore, be able to penetrate much more easily

than a large bomber like a B-52.

Then the bomber does not have to approach

the dangerous areas that are defended

and therefore its survivability is increased.

(missile rumbling)

The equation of survivability versus penetrability

goes back and forth.

You devise a new weapon and for awhile

you have the ability to penetrate and hit a target.

The other fellow who is interested in defending the target

eventually defines a counter measure to that.

Then of course you come around and you define

a new weapon that takes care of that countermeasure.

And it's this measure-countermeasure situation

that you are really encountering in military operations,

in bombing or in anything like that.

So, it is perhaps misleading to say that

the bomber is inexorably vulnerable

and will be eliminated from the face of the Earth.

- [Ustinov] The superpowers wouldn't trust their destinies

to just one method of hitting each other.

That's why scattered across the countryside

the intercontinental missiles stand

in their buried launchers.

The Americans have a thousand.

But would they survive in a nuclear battle?

Would the airborne commander in his Looking Glass aircraft

have anything left to launch?

Once through the looking glass we find

the garden of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

And if the order should come from Strategic Air Command

or from the Looking Glass aircraft,

then the massive lid on which I'm standing

would be thrown aside and the Minuteman missile

would come roaring out.

This is a silo in the military

rather than in the agricultural sense

and there are over a hundred of them

in the farmland in this part of North Dakota.

(mechanism rumbling)

But each Minuteman has three separate

nuclear warheads concealed in its nose,

each aimed at a different target.

And now that the big Russian missiles, too,

have several re-entry vehicles apiece,

swarms of powerful and accurate warheads

might in theory rain down on the silos

and destroy most of the Minuteman force.

(rocket roars)

If the duel of missile against missile

becomes plausible, the side that shoots first

might gravely weaken the other,

unless of course the victim hurriedly launches

his own missiles before they're hit.

- [Kosta] Missiles are being tested now from test sites

into the Pacific Ocean or the Atlantic Ocean

and the same thing is the case in the Soviet Union.

Neither country, I believe, have tested missiles

from operational silos with operational crews

over the trajectory they're going to follow in time of war.

Therefore we don't really know what's going to happen

if you try to launch

a thousand missiles over half an hour

and send them all cross-targeted

against a thousand silos.

This kind of extremely complex process

that obviously like all technical

and technological processes will have bugs in it,

has never been tested, has never been rehearsed even.

Therefore, it seems to me to say

with any degree of certainty that indeed

the missile is going to perform as we expected,

is simply not true.

- I certainly believe the Soviet Union has taken advantage

of Minuteman vulnerability in the past

through the development

of their large, heavy, SS-18 missiles.

I certainly think they will take advantage

of it in the future.

of it in the future. As a matter of fact, I think it's their number one goal

As a matter of fact, I think it's their number one goal

to be able to launch first strikes,

wiping out 90% of our Minuteman III-IVs.

I don't think they'll do it dramatically

or cause any great public concern,

but over a period of time through the mid-1980s

they will take advantage of our Minuteman III vulnerability.

- The Soviet Union may within two or three years

have enough accurate re-entry vehicles

technically to destroy 90% of the Minuteman silos.

That doesn't mean that they can destroy the missiles.

They could launched before they were destroyed.

It doesn't mean that the Soviet Union

would do what they are technically capable of doing.

They would use more missiles, more re-entry vehicles

than they would destroy.

They would still have to face the submarine launched

ballistic missiles and the air-launched cruise missiles.

It makes no sense for the Soviet Union to destroy

only a small component of the U.S. strategic force.

- One of the first things the president

has to decide when he's elected

and takes that oath of office,

what will he do if he is told with no question,

no lack of confirmation that there is

a 500,000 missile attack on our Minuteman field?

He shouldn't have to say, "Gee, I never thought of that.

Let's form a committee." And as soon as he takes office,

he'd better make up his mind what he's going to do.

If he's done that, either he's going to launch

or he's not going to launch.

If he's not going to launch then clearly

the missiles are at risk.

If he decides that he will launch

before the adversaries' missiles arrive,

then they're no longer at risk

and I would think that if he's made such a decision

and it's understood, that is part

of the overall deterrence.

- If the worst came to the worst,

what would actually happen?

Well, this question exercises well-informed experts

and well-informed computers both here in Washington

and elsewhere, and they fight imaginary wars

and try to assess how many people would be killed

and what damage would be done on both sides.

And these activities are called "war games."

Any number can play.

(buttons clicking)

The outcome is always disastrous

with tens or hundreds of millions of dead.

Yet nowadays the war games of the superpowers

often commence with one team making a hopeful strike

at the other's nuclear forces.

The simple idea of avoiding a nuclear war

by deterrence is being eroded by notions

on fighting and winning quickly

without suffering unduly in the process;

a question of a judicial selection of targets.

- If our enemy is really the Soviet state

and its leaders, murdering...

murdering Soviet children is not,

to my mind, where our strategy ought to be.

Also, I think it's militarily and politically foolish,

but it's not the kind of promise of damage

that the Soviets should find most deterring.

The kind of damage they would find most deterring

is loss of their military power,

loss of their ability to control their country politically.

But we can not even begin to think hard

about what kind of target sets we should strike for that

unless we at the same time recognize

that we have to be able to limit the damage

they can do to us, because no matter how intelligent

a set of targeting suggestions I can give you

for our forces, if the Soviets can kill

a hundred or 120 million Americans within a few days

of the beginning of World War Three,

any reasonable American president who isn't drunk,

drugged, or just insane, would not be able to exercise

offensive strategic options

because of what they could do to us

we would be self-deterred.

We have to have a strategy from which

we are not self-deterred.

- The Soviet argument about deterrence is this:

very simply, that if deterrence fails

then you go over to limiting the damage

upon your own country.

And indeed in military preparation terms

you take all measures to minimize that,

even if it should include striking first

at a potential enemy.

(water splashing loudly)

- [Ustinov] But are Russia's own forces any safer from attack?

The missile submarines after the bombers

and land based missiles are the third main branch

of the superpower's nuclear forces.

They're intended always to survive

for the final revenge, but every Soviet submarine

leaving its base at Murmansk, attracts attention

from the submarine hunters of the West.

(aircraft rumbling)

If it's bound for the Atlantic,

it passes under the eyes of the Norwegian air force.

(aircraft humming)

And they're just the first of its uninvited escorts,

these watchful men of Norway.

In keeping track of Soviet submarines,

the allies in NATO use all the skills

and resources they can command.

Could their superior technology

put the missile submarine fatally at risk?

(speaking in Norwegian)

The submarine is not well hidden even if it dives.

When the Norwegians alert their British colleagues,

a Nimrod aircraft will pick up the trail.

In the Bible, Nimrod was the mighty hunter.

(aircraft rumbling)

It's mainly concerned that the large Soviet fleet

of ordinary submarines might one day run riot

through the shipping in the Atlantic,

which prompts this diligence.

(cannister clattering)

The submarine can't avoid making a noise as it travels.

If they're searching for it in the right patch of sea,

it'll give away its position when the RAF men

sow their sound detectors in the water.

(big splash)

As the readings come in by radio, they have contact.

So the Russian submarine finds itself

in a chase that's disconcertingly realistic.

(buttons clicking)

- Buoys are in the water then

and submarines are somewhere to the north

of the line of buoys.

And we're expecting them to do--

- [Ustinov] The submarine will try to shake off its pursuers,

but a string of secret and ultrasensitive sound detectors

lies in ambush across its path,

all the way from Britain to Greenland.

(aircraft roaring)

This pursuit engages the interest

of the United States Navy,

with their clever airborne instruments.

(aircraft humming)

They track it relentlessly.

This is what passes for peace in our time.

(aircraft rumbling)

- Sir, here's the tape you've been waiting for.

The three o'clock... let's see what's on it.

- All right.

- [Ustinov] And when the fliers return

to their carrier, a computer devours their recording.

- Okay, Lieutenant Sandberg.

- [Ustinov] The machine refreshes its knowledge

of the submarines at sea.

It can always recall their last positions,

so the Russian submariners can never feel

safely out of sight of the western Navy.

At the start of a war many could be promptly sunk

and they might include some of the missile carrying boats,

which form an essential part

of the Soviet nuclear deterrent.

The executioner could be another submarine;

an attack submarine or hunter-killer.

The American Navy has fearsome craft of this sort

and they can hound their prey wherever it goes.

(water churning)

For the coup de grâce they can strike

with anti-submarine missiles and homing torpedoes.

(apparatus humming)

American arms control officials have argued

that these thorough going systems

of anti-submarine warfare could well sap

the Russians' confidence in the submarine branch

of their deterrent.

So, just as the West abhors the growing power

and accuracy of Soviet intercontinental missiles,

Soviet leaders may be alarmed

by increasing Western ingenuity.

An ominous interplay because sooner

than any hope of victory, it is fear of defeat

that might impel that fatal first blow.

(water splashing)

- I've no doubt at all

that the political administration of the United States

and the political administration in the Soviet Union

have, in academic terms,

no wish at all to have a nuclear world war.

I'm convinced of that.

But the technology will make it almost inevitable

that the politicians decide to do it

in order to stop the other side,

which they trust very little, in doing it to them.

And it's this reason which is so dangerous

for world security.

- Anybody who can count up to five will tell you

that that building over there is the Pentagon.

Well, tabloid newspapers like nothing better

on fallow days than to publish pictures

of cats and dogs in perfect harmony

playing innocently together.

It seems to prove that instinctive antagonisms

can be countered with a little patience.

Superpowers also have instinctive antagonisms

by virtue of their size, their influence, their power,

and they adopt aggressive postures

before any calmer counsel can prevail.

Well, how can harmony be brought to superpowers?

First of all, it's essential for them

to understand each other's point of view.

You are seeing the world there

from the point of view of the West.

I over here from my surrounded position see it

from the point of view of the Soviet Union

and I seem to sense from here, from being surrounded,

I seem to sense your agressions.

I seem to sense your paranoia even and your fear.

Why? Because of your troops and listening stations in Alaska.

Throughout the Arctic Circle, down Europe,

cross Turkey, Iran, where a hole was driven

into the hedge only the other day

with characteristic outcry, Afghanistan,

where the hole was punctured in the other direction,

China with its offer to the United States

to compensate for the lost listening posts in Iran,

and back to Alaska again.

And there is nothing in history to reassure me from here.

After all, they remember only too well

that in 1917 feeble expeditionary forces

from the United States, Britain, and France

landed in order to attempt to thwart the 1917 revolution.

They did nothing in point of fact

but give the Red Army its first battle honors

and its first experience against foreign troops.

You may remember how exercised the United States was

when there were Soviet missiles on Cuba.

Well, what would be the position of the United States

and of the entire West, I wonder,

if there were Soviet troops and listening devices

all along the Canadian border, all along the Mexican border,

and throughout the Caribbean?

We must remember and remember solemnly

that a cornered animal and a cornered man

are the least open to appeal.

There comes a moment when the terrible lucidity

of desperation takes over and then...there is no way back.

Of course the historians, or whatever historians

there are left, will always find it

extremely difficult to decide whether it was

on the pecan pie or the blueberry tart

that the American president so nearly choked himself

when he first got the news of the missile attack.

And what is perhaps even more difficult

to attribute is the blame for the end of the world

as we knew it.

As the president himself said when he recovered his breath,

"Maybe we shouldn't have gone on alert."

Well, on day one Washington asked Moscow

to stop fighting the Chinese and also asked Peking

to stop fighting the Russians.

But on day two, the Chinese suddenly announced

that the Americans were now their allies.

"The path to peace lies through the tunnel

of nuclear confrontation," they proclaimed.

The Americans denied this.

The American president said, "As far as we're concerned

both sides are Communists."

On day three the Russians set in motion

a huge civil defense exercise.

"That is scary..." said the Americans and put their bombers

on generated alert.

"The Americans are war mongering" said the Russians

and sent their submarines out to sea.

In an effort to bring down the temperature,

the American president left his command center

and ostentatiously undertook all sorts

of civilian duties and ended the day

with a civilian supper which was interrupted.

"I want an immediate decision to execute,"

said the secretary of defense.

"To execute?"

"He has to shoot, to launch, to get the missiles

off the ground where they can't be dug out."

"Those aren't cans of caviar they're sending over, sir.

NORAD predicts 2,000 warheads aimed specifically

at our nuclear bases, at our missile bases

and our bomber bases.

The general stakes his life on that data."

"Well I...it wasn't the general's life

I was thinking about specifically,"

said the president, "Although I gotta believe him."

"Can we just hit their missiles?"

"You'd just be wasting your force on empty silos."

"That's what we can do to him if we hurry."

The secretary of state spoke up.

"If you should choose to do nothing, sir,

"you'd certainly have my support.

I realize that millions of us are going to be killed,

but if we retaliate, why, that's the end of everything."

"No!" said the secretary of defense.

"He's gambling on our holding back."

Well, if the president was listening to these arguments,

he showed no sign of it.

"We hit their silos and they hit our...

ah, no, they hit our silos, we hit their cities,

and they hit our cities...

I guess the bullet's left the rifle, huh?"

"Now, all you have to say is Tripoli, sir,"

said the defense secretary.

"Yeah...

Tripoli."

"Execute, you have the word of the commander in chief."

"Do the people know what's happening?"

said the president as he was hurried to safety.

"Oh yes, sir, they're getting it all on television."

- [Narrator] One, go to a public fallout shelter.

Know where the nearest one is

to your office, your home, your children's school.

(ominous tone)

If you decided to take shelter at home,

know how to improvise and improve your protection there.

(water jet gushing)

- Everybody wants to avoid the big war,

of course they do, but how?

For as long as anyone can remember,

Switzerland here has been the main talking shop

for peace and disarmament.

And here in Geneva at the Palace of the Nations,

the negotiators now talk of nuclear submarines

and napalm where they once talked

of battleships and bayonets.

And in their embassies, in their villas,

in their hotels, the negotiators struggle through

glaciers of talk and mountain ranges of paper

with exemplary patience.

What drives them on?

It is the hope that among all this

there may be the magic words, the magic few pages

which will save millions of lives.

I wish I could report that our Swiss hosts

have the greatest confidence in these negotiations,

but they are by nature a cautious people

and they have hedged their bets in quite an expensive way.

Like the Chinese who have covered their land

with a rabbit warren of protective tunnels,

the Swiss are resolved that they will survive

any nuclear holocaust which happens to drift this way.

(water gushing)

Switzerland, owing to her special status,

is hardly likely to be the object of direct attack

from any quarter, but whereas bombs may recognize

neutrality, fallout has no such scruples.

(wind blowing & indistinct noises)

Every man not assigned to the army

is forced to serve in Switzerland's civil defense

and the men in the very sinister suits behind me,

well they could be engineers, factory workers,

or clerks practicing here in Geneva's civil defense school.

By law every new house built in Switzerland

has to have, purpose built in the very foundations,

a shelter as a protection against nuclear war,

but...be warned.

This nation of fine hotels and boarding houses

makes no special provision for foreign tourists,

nor indeed for the foreign negotiators in Geneva,

should their missions fail.

(shovels scraping)

The local government has a larger and stronger shelter

from which it would continue to administer the canton

in the event of... fallout drifting across

from France, Germany, or Italy,

or a few misguided missiles actually falling on Swiss soil.

Oh yes, I always suspected that the last survivor

would be a bureaucrat.

But actually, the Swiss are more active

and more determined in civil defense

than any of the countries engaged

in the nuclear confrontation whose populations

are asked to trust the nuclear strategy

of their governments, enshrined, of course,

in the principle of deterrence.

- Deterrence has worked so far because of the fact

that no aggressor could contemplate

starting a nuclear war and gaining any advantage.

Any aggressor would be faced with the fact

that for him to start a nuclear exchange

would mean national suicide.

It's also worked because both sides recognize

that they have the retaliatory forces

that provide that deterrent and, therefore,

they don't have to start an exchange out of fear...

out of fear that their deterrent would be destroyed.

Now as long as those factors continue to exist,

deterrence will continue to exist,

and that, of course, is one of the purposes

of arms control, to preserve that situation

of strategic stability.

- We have, most of the time since the end

of World War II, have had nuclear superiority,

so the Soviet Union did not dare attack us.

I think today we have what we would call

rough equivalence or parity.

The Soviet Union would not attack,

but if we allow them through treaties

or through our own decisions of cutting back

our forces unilaterally, to achieve nuclear superiority

then deterrence will break down

and there is the possibility of an attack

by the Soviet Union.

- In the next five years

I think it's possible to state almost statistically

that a risk of nuclear war is quite considerable,

precisely because of the imbalance in forces

and the different perceptions of both sides.

If we can get through to the 1990s

then I think the danger would recede.

- I believe that the incentive

for all nuclear weapon states,

in particular...the two major powers...

to find a way of regulating their competition

in the nuclear field, that incentive

remains very powerful. I would expect that

in the messy world of the future,

with possibly other nuclear weapons states around,

that incentive will grow even further.

And so, the two major countries responsible

for the maintenance of deterrence...will, I think...

find it almost inevitable that they should sit down,

they should try in dialogue and in agreements

to regulate this relationship.

- Perhaps every 5 or 10 years it should be required

that all world leaders attend a multi-megaton blast

in the atmosphere.

I think if they were to, let's say,

strip down to their skivvies to feel the heat

at a distance of some 20 or 30 miles...

they would appreciate a little better

the enormity of the power which they have

at their disposal and I think that once

they realize this and continue to realize it

the way I think our present world leaders do,

then I think we can count on the deterrence

for a very long time.

- People talk about disarming, destroying nuclear weapons.

I think that is not the way to do it.

I think there will be too much suspicion

that the other guy will hide

some missiles, hide some bombs, and thereby acquire...

supremacy of some kind when you disarm.

So my belief is let's stop the technological arms race.

Let's not make any new weapons.

Let's leave what we have alone

and gradually even stoop proof testing it,

so those missiles will rot or corrode

or whatever will you have it in the silos

and the submarines will become less and less safe

to dive under the sea.

And that kind of a obsolescence...

will make it less and less tempting...

to use or even to threaten to use

these arsenals in time of political crisis.

- [Ustinov] May the missiles then pass uneventfully

from decrepit silos in distant fields

to decent exposure in famous museums.

And here in future times the visitor will, perhaps,

pause to wonder at our unromantic age

when great nations spoke plainly to one another

only in the language of mutual extermination.

But it's for the sake of those new generations

that I trust we'll allow no other fears

ever to surpass our fear of nuclear war,

and think no effort of mind and heart too troublesome

or too risky if the alternative is

that our nuclear nightmares come to pass.

(indistinct chatter)