Anyone getting "Threads" vibes lately?

One of the effects of Threads and The Day After was to make Reagan realise the futility of it all and to re-assess how he dealt with The Russians - take a look at Operation Able Archer for a sobering look at how close we all came to The End, something else that made him wake up.

There doesn't seem to be anything along the lines of Threads these days...although I like to think we've matured (a little, anyway) since 1984 as a species.

I believe there will be no sirens this time - everyone's phone will ring at the same time. Even when this was made, I've read (but can't verify) that the 15 minute warning was nonsense; you'd know about the attack when you saw the mushroom cloud.

My response to it now is the same as it was then: Go and lie in my back garden and wait for the shockwave to kill me. Hopefully. I wouldn't want to survive in the world that was left.

Would you?

Oh yeah. And Remember! Get pisst out of your mind, and straight underneath it (the bomb) when it goes off.

"I'm a vehemently anti-nuclear, paranoid mess, harbouring a strange obsession with radioactive sheep."

I'm 37 years old and have been a paratrooper when I had to do my time as conscript. If the Russians force us to fight them, I'll be nothing like the Waffen-SS or Gestapo, I will be worse...if they make me go through hell, I will turn there *beep* homeland into something worse than hell.

Ich bin kein ausgeklügelt Buch, ich bin ein Mensch mit seinem Widerspruch.
Conrad Ferdinand Meyer

The thing that's different about now, as compared to the Cold War, is that now there are no competing ideologies. The US no longer sees the Russians as "godless communists", the Russians no longer see the Americans as "reactionary imperialists". Nobody in America is talking about Russians taking over the world, especially via insidious communist infiltrators, "Reds under every bed", etc. Russia has basically become a "wild west" style capitalist state, with a great deal of corruption and with political control in the hands of the most wealthy. If Russia were smaller and had a few nuclear weapons or less, it would be a perfect US client state.

The result of all this is that the rivalry between the US and Russia is much simpler: it's about geopolitical power and control of resources. And where during the Cold War there was some trade between the adversaries, now their economies are interconnected to a huge degree. Multinational corporations have foreign subsidiaries and billions of dollars invested in each other's countries, where during the Cold War they didn't. And it's the wealthy, well-connected leaders of those multinational corporations who will be watching most closely for the rhetoric to get ratcheted up to such a degree that it starts to imperil the security of their investments. That's when things will start to cool down.

The lack of ideology as a factor is beneficial. Negotiating over ideology is tricky, because nobody wants to compromise their beliefs. But negotiating over "stuff" is easier -- you can always just divide it. Not "easy" -- but "easier".

Revenge is a dish best served cold.
-- Klingon proverb

Yes

You have no idea.

As someone who didn't grow up in the 80s (I was born in '89), I felt a feeling of absolute dread while watching the events that lead up to the nuclear exchange in the movie, not only because of how effective the film was but also because I couldn't help but notice how eerie the parallels were between what happened in the film and what's happening now between Russia and the west. In Ukraine, Russia accuses the West of instigating the coup that overthrew the pro-Russian government, in Syria Russia is backing one side of a very bloody civil war there while we back another side, and here in the USA we're accusing Russia of "hacking the election" but not offering much in the way of proof. Add all that up, and things look scary indeed. Here's hoping and praying that "Threads" is not a prophecy for mankind.

Now, for sure.