Newly-Declassified US Documents Reveal How Close The Soviet Union Came To Launching A Nuclear Attack During A NATO Weapons Exercise In 1983

Photo credit Photo by Staff Sgt. Brittany Murphy 

Daily Mail: Thirty minutes from nuclear war: Newly-declassified US documents reveal how paranoid Russians loaded nukes onto fighters in East Germany in 1983 over fears NATO exercise was invasion 

 * NATO forces carried out Able Archer exercise to simulate a nuclear attack 

 * But Soviet leaders feared the exercise was cover for a genuine offensive 

 * They readied fighter bombers with 'warloads' and were on 30-minute alert 

Newly released US intelligence files show how close the Soviet Union came to launching a nuclear attack during a NATO weapons exercise in 1983. 

The Communist bloc put fighter bombers strapped with nuclear bombs on high alert in East Germany during a 'war scare' prompted by a NATO exercise in Western Europe called Able Archer in November 1983. 

Soviet leader Yuri Andropov made 'preparations for the immediate use of nuclear weapons' and forces were on 30-minute standby to destroy enemy targets in what was one of the tensest moments of the Cold War. 

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WNU Editor: The declassified documents are here .... Able Archer War Scare “Potentially Disastrous” (National Security Archive). 

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