Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety

orchestrated by “KGB leaders” and “Marxist leaning 60’s leftovers”: Quoted in Wittner, Toward Nuclear Abolition, p. 189.

about 70 percent … supported a nuclear freeze: Ibid., p. 177.

more than half worried: Cited in Frances FitzGerald, Way Out There in the Blue: Reagan, Star Wars, and the End of the Cold War (New York: Touchstone, 2001), p. 191.

one of the most dangerous years of the Cold War: In The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and Its Dangerous Legacy (New York: Doubleday, 2009), David E. Hoffman does a masterful job of conveying the threat that year, as an aging, paranoid Soviet leader faced a self-confident and seemingly bellicose American president. The events of 1983 are depicted in pages 54 to 100. Robert M. Gates offers an insider’s perspective; he was the deputy director for intelligence at the CIA that year. See “1983: The Most Dangerous Year,” a chapter in From the Shadows, pp. 258–77.

code-named Operation RYAN: For another perspective on the events of 1983 and the KGB’s role in them, see Benjamin B. Fischer, “A Cold War Conundrum: The 1983 Soviet War Scare,” Central Intelligence Agency, Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1997.

the Reagan administration’s top secret psychological warfare program: See “Cold War Conundrum”; and Peter Schweizer, Victory: The Secret Strategy That Hastened the Collapse of the Soviet Union (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1994). As Fischer notes, Victory may not provide a convincing explanation for why the Soviet Union collapsed, but the book seems to give an accurate description of the Reagan administration’s covert activities against the Soviets.

“the focus of evil in the modern world”: Quoted in Francis X. Clines, “Reagan Denounces Ideology of Soviet as ‘Focus of Evil,’” New York Times, March 9, 1983.

“Engaging in this is not just irresponsible”: Quoted in Fischer, “Cold War Conundrum.”

“an act of barbarism” and a “crime against humanity”: Quoted in Flora Lewis, “Leashing His Fury, Reagan Surprises and Calms Allies,” New York Times, September 11, 1983.

alarms went off in an air defense bunker south of Moscow: See Hoffman, Dead Hand, pp. 6–11.

rays of sunlight reflected off clouds: See David Hoffman, “‘I Had a Funny Feeling in My Gut’; Soviet Officer Faced Nuclear Armageddon,” Washington Post, February 10, 1999.

two million people in Europe joined protests: Cited in Joseph B. Fleming, “Anti-Missile Movement Vows to Fight On,” United Press International, October 23, 1983.

serious problems with the World Wide Military Command and Control System: See Pearson, WWMCCS: Evolution and Effectiveness, pp. 315-17; and “JTF Operations Since 1983,” George Stewart, Scott M. Fabbri, and Adam B. Siegel, CRM 94–42, Center for Naval Analyses, July 1994, pp. 23–31.

“a frustrated Army officer used his AT&T credit card”: “JTF Operations Since 1983,” p. 28.

Able Archer 83: See Gates, From the Shadows, pp. 270-73; Hoffman, Dead Hand, pp. 94–95; Fischer, “Cold War Conundrum.”

“the KGB concluded that American forces”: The agent was Oleg Gordievsky. He worked not only for the KGB but also for British intelligence. His quote is from Fischer, “Cold War Conundrum.”

A number of the Soviet Union’s own war plans: See Hoffman, Dead Hand, p. 94.

About 100 million Americans watched The Day After: Cited in Robert D. McFadden, “Atomic War Film Spurs Nationwide Discussion,” New York Times, November 22, 1983.

another B-52 had caught on fire on a runway: See Phyllis Mensing, “5 Die in B-52 Fire at Air Base,” Associated Press, January 27, 1983.

the retrofits were halted … because the program ran out of money: Peurifoy interview.

“The worst probable consequence of continuous degradation”: “‘Hot’ Topic! Nuclear AID [Accidents, Incidents, Deficiencies] Topics,” USAF Nuclear Surety Journal, no. 90–01, p. 5.

“Naturally, this would be a catastrophe”: Ibid.

“follow procedures and give the weapons a little extra care”: Ibid.

A software glitch could launch a Pershing II missile: Peurifoy and Stevens interviews. See also Stevens, “Origins and Evolution of S2C,” pp. 116-18.

Reagan watched red dots spreading across a map: See Reed, At the Abyss, pp. 233-34.