Affects+on+the+Cold+War

Would actual fighting have broken out without "the weapon you never have to fire?" Nuclear weapons were used as a deterant during the cold war to avoid direct conflict between the US and the Soviet Union. This led to the US and the Soviet Union funding other countries in conflicts between communism and democracy such as Vietnam and Afganistan. The reason why the US and the Soviet Union did not go into a direct conflict is because both countries feared that the other country would resort to using nuclear weapons. If this happened nobody would win because both countries would destroy each other and the nuclear fallout would devastate everyone else remaining on the planet. With out this impending outcome of direct conflict the US and the Soviet Union would probably try to invade each other leading to World War III. The war would probably break out in Europe along the borders of east and west Germany. This would mostly be a large stalemate as both sides had a large build up of arms on the border already leading to both sides looking for a flanking opportunity or a way to attack from another direction. The Soviets would most likely try to invade America through Canada as they would not be able to get through the European countries and the Soviet navy was far inferior to the large naval forces that the US created during world war II. As for the outcome of this war, it is uncertain due to the fact that both countries were the largest super powers in the world and fairly equally matched. VS The only reason why the US and the USSR never had a direct conflict during the Cold War was due to the fact that they were both afraid of the other country using nuclear weapons. They were so afraid of the nuclear weapons, and once used these bombs could spark an entire new war. During WWII the bombs against Japan wiped out millions of people. So if these bombs were used in a war, they could have the potential to completely destroy both nations altogether. Without nuclear weapons, though, I believe that the nations would have eventually fought against each other since they both had great militaries at the time. It makes sense too, because at the time both nations basically hated each other, and Americans were especially against the USSR's use of communism during the Red Scare. It would end up becoming a whole new war, and because of the results of the Vietnam and Korean Wars I believe that the USSR would have won against the US if they had gone into a direct conflict. Besides, at the time of the Cold War the USSR was allied with the great communist nation of China, which could have led up to the downfall of the US since China could have easily stopped their imports with the US, making the US have less amounts of resources to use against them. This war was called the Cold War because there was no real physical attacks from both opposing sides. The actions that both sides took were that they made threats and created a lot of propaganda. Without the nuclear bombs, threats of bombing a whole country would not have been believable because no one would have though that there was a weapon dangerous enough to do that. Therefore, without the creation of nuclear weapons, the "Cold War" would come to be known as "WWIII," since it'd be a great big war dealing with many different countries.