OK Tim thanks for your politeness you're obviously entitled to your opinion.
But I have to say that the CIA's assessment of the Soviet threat is in the public domain as is what Krushchev's assessment of the chances of the Soviet Union actually ruling the World by military means were (slim and none). Given that the GDP of the Soviet Union was 1/5th that of the USA and the USA hadn't been devastated in a World War. What would your assessment of their chances be?
And given this factual information i.e. according to CIA the USSR offered no real military threat to Western Europe. How do you explain why the UK was spending 1/8th of its GDP on 'defence'?
Last edited by RIHoward; 13th Aug 2010 at 00:36.