Cold War Games

The Soviet Union should have its own character, just as National-Socialist Germany and Prussia do.

@El_Zato With Putin trying to bring back the "good old days" of the USSR, I don't think they've split nearly as much as Germany has from it's past.

"Two sworn enemies standing waist deep in gasoline, one with three matches, the other with five."
-Some guy I forgot

@psykolog Carl Sagan

@Svear Thanks

@psykolog Wouldn't matter how much gasoline they were in, it wouldn't ignite very easily. Has to be turned into a gaseous mixture for it to ignite, ideally at a air to gas ratio of 14.7:1

The answer: "Winter"

@firerosearien And the dead comes with it

Canada doesn't often get a lot of attention in international history, and since the Cold War was primarily concerning the USA and USSR I imagine other countries overlook Canada entirely during that period. But being smack between the two major players, Canada actually was doing stuff too. My teacher for Canadian history was a really great storyteller, and his tale of the Canadian perspective of the Cold War went something like this:

When the Cold War first started brewing, Russia began sending out spies to various countries to conduct espionage and surveillance. They were very secretive and even though tensions between America and Russia were rising and it was suspected that Russia was spying on everyone, no one knew the true extent.

Until one day, an agent working in the Russian Embassy in Ottawa decided to defect. He gathered up a big box of evidence proving that Russia was spying on not only Canada, but also America, Britain, and many other countries. With his box of evidence, he snuck out of the Russian embassy, made his way to RCMP headquarters (the Canadian national security force, equivalent to the FBI in America), and offered them his big box of proof in exchange for protection for him and his family.

The Mounties laughed him out of the building. Russia spying on Canada?? Pull the other one, you comedian!

The poor guy ended up wandering Ottawa with his box of evidence, praying there weren't Soviet assassins already after him, while the RCMP officers had themselves a good chuckle at the crazy Russian.

Eventually word of this event made it to the national security of Britain (pretty sure it was Britain but it might have been the US). I like to think one of the Mounties called up one of his international buddies to share the joke.

Except the Brits weren't laughing. "You mean to say someone came in claiming to have proof of massive espionage endeavours by the Russians and you KICKED HIM OUT?! What if he was telling the truth?! Go find him!!"

After hastily searching Ottawa, the Mounties eventually found the dude who had managed to evade any assassins out for his blood, and took a look through his box of proof, which did indeed prove that Russia was collecting massive amounts of information and surveillance.

The world was shocked, but none so much as America. They lost their shit. All their paranoid suspicions were true, and there was all but panic in the streets. COMMUNIST SPIES COULD BE ANYWHERE, WWIII IS IMMINENT, THE NUCLEAR APOCALYPSE APPROACHES, QUICK LETS TEACH OUR CHILDREN TO HIDE UNDER THEIR DESKS IN THE EVENT OF A NUCLEAR STRIKE AS IF THAT WILL DO A SINGLE DAMN THING!!

Meanwhile up north, rather than panic the national attitude was one of bewilderment. There was undeniable proof that Canada was being spied on, but Canadians still couldn't quite believe it.

"But... Why would someone want to spy on Canada? We're just Canada... We don't have any secrets that you'd need to spy on... Like, are you sure? But why would they spy on us??"

Honestly Russia. You could have just ASKED.

The panic came later, when the US and Russia began threatening each other with nuclear war heads, and doing their whole mutually assured destruction schtick. Because sure, they were building missiles to shoot each other, but they were also trying to figure out ways to stop incoming missiles before they landed.

Which Canada was understandably not happy about because OMG GUYS STOP FIGHTING OVER US. LIKE YOU ARE LITERALLY GOING TO BE FIGHTING OVER TOP OF US, ANY INCOMING MISSILES YOU SHOOT DOWN WILL LAND ON US INSTEAD! WHAT DID WE EVER DO TO DESERVE SUCH TERRIBLE NEIGHBOURS?!

and so, stressed out by the rudeness and bad manners of our neighbours, Canada decided that clearly the best idea in such a bad situation was to use the favourite Canadian tradition for redirecting aggression: putting the Cold War on pause so Canada and Russia could have an epic game of hockey. Several games, actually.

Screw the Cold War and impending Nuclear Apocalypse, forget about some lame Space Race, Canada had to challenge Russia to a Summit Series to determine once and for all who was the best at hockey. The Russians sneaked professional players into the international hockey championships, and then claimed they were the best at hockey when their professional teams beat everyone else's amateurs and Canada would stand for this nonsense NO LONGER!

Spoiler: Canada is best at hockey. The final game, which was a winner-takes-all tie-breaker, is considered one of the greatest games ever played, and Paul Henderson is a national hero for scoring the winning goal.

Not sure how others view it, but Canada's perspective on the Cold War was indignation about our unfortunate next-door neighbours shouting at each other over our heads, and the most epic game of hockey ever played.

Disclaimer: my Canadian History class was... Uh... Damn, nearly 10 years ago now. I may have forgotten or changed in my head certain details in the past decade, but the above is the story I was told to the best of my memory. About the guy with the box of evidence, anyway. I know I'm not wrong about the Summit Series, because like I said, most epic game of hockey with the star player a national hero.

Oh haha I looked it up and I remembered it pretty well, actually! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Gouzenko

Apparently after the RCMP laughed him out the door he went to a newspaper and they didn't think he was telling the truth either!! And he really did have people coming after him, I couldn't remember if they really did or he was just afraid they would.

So there you have it kids. The Cold War started in Canada.

@Liung Well, Canada maybe peaceful and nice on the outside, but with you mess with us, we'll(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_Washington) gut(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Vimy_Ridge) you(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_of_Arnhem) like a seal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kapyong).

@CommunistParty BREAKING NEWS! Canada declares war on the US, and by 8 AM the next day nothing was left of Canada but a nuclear wasteland!

@v0ider Then every country on earth turns on America for using nukes!

@Liung Now THAT is why I read the comments ^.^ Thank you for the cool story! I absolutely loved it! ^.^

@starsylph The thing about all the multitude of Cold War-era spy novels and WWI and WWII novels, is that there are just so many amazing, miraculous, tragic, and unbelievable stories that are completely true. I personally find it sad that veterans and survivors are not constantly sought by journalists and publishers trying to get their stories.

if this is a flashback to the Cold War, shouldn't Russia be wearing a pure red shirt with the hammer and sickle on it and not the current Russian flag? At the very least, the letters CCCP? In fact, as with the example of "Nazi Germany", Soviet-era Russia should look, perhaps, more like Stalin or one of the drab later leaders, like Krushchev or Brezhnev?

@AgProv
don't call khrushchev drab he had a passion for corn

http://33.media.tumblr.com/5ab10afed48b8c5eaf7919d0667286e7/tumblr_inline_n28j66ZY0J1rq29x2.jpg
http://backstoryradio.org/files/2013/10/KHRUSHCHEV-FOR-TUMBLR1.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/I2xnF1c.jpg
http://kp.ru/f/4/image/93/10/451093.jpg

anyone who loves corn this much couldn't possibly be boring

@Willowthecollie
God how we hate the 2nd of the trinity of idiots

@Elzo
Who are the other two? Is Gorbachev the other one? I'm just guessing. The only things I know about Russia's leaders is from my ap comparative gov class. So I do not know that much.

@Willowthecollie
1st is the last emperor of Russian Empire Nicholas Second. He was so incompitent, that he ruined one of the most stable states of that time.
3rd one is Yeltsin. Always drunk. Shoots parlament from tanks. Allows thugs and external forces to rip country apart. Yeay go Boria go.
BTW - this is the main reason no one likes so called "nonsystem democratic opposition" in modern Russia. Cause they say the same things as Yeltsin and his people said. Many of they leaders are thugs and politicians from Dashing 90s!!! People simply hates them for ruining the country =)

@Elzo We'll trade you all three for one Trump.

@AgProv Agree! SatW has "Nazi Germany" character, also "Soviet Union" character is needed. Easiest way to do this is just change shirt colour.

And then.... go fight on somebody else land.... BTW, shouldn't USSR be different from Russia, the same way Nazi Germany is Different from Germany?

@TimMogens
I agree. Soviet Russia should have hammer & sickle on red shirt and wear oversized peaked cap and Stalinist mustache.

@Danelaw or perhaps, be bald and have a Lenin beard. You know, Russia already has the hat.

@TimMogens
I agree on that. It's completely another country nowadays, and only elders dream of "regaining powers and be a country the USSR used to be". Lazy bastards. Really. The whole generation that is used not to think bc the gov is thinking for them now has to survive. I'm really disappointed young generation now has to do all the possible to make others see us different.

@Katherine
Well, I see your situation. But I must say Putin is not a good pearson if you want to change this view the world has about you. But I believe in Russia!!! Hurray the BRICS!!!!

For America to carry those bombs, he must very strong. Those things can weigh more the 8 million pounds, more or less, depending on how much tnt is in them.

@UnluckyKitty13, you were joking about the weight, right?

@gctwnl
I wish I was joking. That is an actual true fact. The "Little Boy" from World War 2 weighed about 12,500 Tons of TNT and the "Fat Man" weighed about 22,000 tons of TNT. Those guys killed about 14,000 people and three days later, 80,000 more

@UnluckyKitty13

I'm guessing you aren't a native English Speaker? The weight of the Bombs wasn't that much, the Destructive Potential was the equivalent of setting that much off in one place at one time. It may seem like a petty distinction to you, but it's a pretty significant difference. Your comment phrases it as Mass, The actual physical weight of the objects. You are actually talking about the Energy Release.

@Manatheron
=_= Dude, I'm using what I know from MatPat's theory of "How Batman isn't a hero" by the bombs, ok? And I am a Native English Speaker

@UnluckyKitty13 - Are you referring to the Megaton load of the bombs? That is referring to how much TNT it would take to create an explosion of equal size to the bombs themselves. You can't launch something that actually weighs 50 megatons (50 million tons) into orbit to wipe out an enemy city on another continent, nor can you fly something that weighs 5 megatons across an ocean. The bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima & Nagasaki were measured in kilotons of TNT, rather than megatons, as they were very much smaller than later constructs.

The most powerful bomb detonated by the US was 22-25 megatons (intended to be 15, but turned out stronger due to materials used) while the Soviet Union built Tsar Bomba, a 50 megaton bomb (originally intended to be 100 megatons, but not even the USSR had balls big enough to go for that scale of weapon) and was too powerful - the shockwave deflected the explosion back up into the atmosphere, and nearly took out the plane that dropped it.

Hope that helps

@Mecharic
Yes it does. Thank you.

It was sorta the other way around though, wasn't it? Reagan convincing the Soviet Union that they had more bombs until the Soviet Union was outta cash.

@HanNorwood That and that we were researching things that were, at the time, merely in the realm of science fiction... but seemed so plausible the Soviets went absolutely nuts over.

@HanNorwood really it was some of each. Under Reagan, the US national debt TRIPLED. The only difference is, we could support excessive military spending, and the Soviets couldn't.

@HanNorwood It was the other way around in terms of size, too - Castle Bravo was our biggest and it wasn't even a third of the yield of the Tsar Bomba

The whole war was basically Russia and America comparing d**k sizes, but they were both too chicken to actually prove theirs was bigger because they secretly fear the other really has a bigger one.

@PandaLover00 TRUUUU

'@PandaLover00'
Or that proving anything would be the end of the world, there's that too.

Of course we proved it, just not with the bombs. We took our American d**k and stretched it all the way to the MOON just to spite the Soviets.

Were you just lazy or learned the wrong history, because that's the flag of the Russian federation and the Russian empire.

@Ice0tea
I agree; maybe it'd be better if the russian wore the flag of the Sovjet union instead of the Russian flag, just to have it a little more politically correct.