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Stas Bush wrote: don't know about RB-36 flybys (there are lots of PVO operators and they readily tell about even more recent flyovers, but no info on RB-36 flybys has surfaced so far which is why I conclude that looks more like a legend).

It's quite possible that RB-36 Featherweights were used on shallow coastal flyovers of your siberian coastline; at the 50,000 foot photographic altitude of a RB-36, you can see 270~ miles into Russia; which should be sufficient to map the exterior air defenses of the Siberian coastline, which means that you can stay in "international waters" 12 miles from the Russian Coastline, and still see far in.

Of course. Else you'd embarrass yourselves, but also totally prove there's no "misile gap" and that shit Kennedy's been peddling.

It wasn't just Kennedy who was peddling that stuff; it was a LOT of other people who were in hysterics over the Red Menace.

Your leaders knew all that but you just chose to keep the sheeple in the dark.

Ike really took a lot of flak and got blamed for "losing our strategic superiority" to "teh Reds" from all sides during that period, and while he could have released all that information to save political face; he didn't, which I have to give him credit for.

Neither did you seriously explain how badly you outclassed us even after we downed a U-2, nor after the CMC.

*shrugs* I dunno?

Stas Bush wrote:

The Duchess of Zeon wrote:We know, after all, that the SA-10 / SA-12 had in total about 15,000 deployed (the numbers for the SA-10 alone were 10,000 in the early 1980s), and at the very least a very large number of these must have nuclear-tipped.

No, you compute wrongly. Only S-200M "Vega-M" and S-200D "Dubna" had nuclear payloads. In fact S-200M "Vega-M" arrived only post 1970 and S-200D only arrived in 1976.

Then - what the hell is "total deployment"? You know full well that the peak number of actively deployed S-200 systems was 130 sites and 1,950 launchers in mid-1980s - and not all of them (though by that time probably most) were of the Dubna and Vega variety.

So in short, your numbers are totally wrong. Total deployed over the years from 1967 to 1991 is not the number of units deployed at any given time, and the first "many thousands" of such units produced were not nuclear-tipped.

Well, since I don't doubt you, it's probable that the sources I'm going by quoted numbers that were from Team B, i.e., they're what Paul Nitze convinced the Reagan administration that you had.

The Duchess of Zeon wrote:Well, since I don't doubt you, it's probable that the sources I'm going by quoted numbers that were from Team B.

Quite probable. It was enough to even hear that the unit was tested in ABM capability to get uppity I guess. In 1985-91, nuclear stockpiles were counted and... well, I already detailed the results.

About the destruction of industry however... even the destruction of half our industry and urban centers with housing would prove disastrous since Russia has very harsh climate conditions.

Let's say it that way, the US can devolve to tribes with sticks and still have good natural conditions. In Russia, destruction would lead to a more massive dieoff.

Stas Bush wrote:Even if there was a thwarted flyby or provocation, I'm sure USSR would get all up in arms about it. I don't know about RB-36 flybys (there are lots of PVO operators and they readily tell about even more recent flyovers, but no info on RB-36 flybys has surfaced so far which is why I conclude that looks more like a legend).

They might not have been sure of their purpose. The US and the Shah collaborated on overflights in the '70s using RF-4Cs and when one got knocked down (a MiG-21 pilot rammed it), the crew claimed they had been on a navigation mission and got lost....and the Soviets believed them, because they were released relatively quickly.