Sure... as were advocates of an invasion of Western Europe among Soviet leadership. Cooler heads prevailed. Thus began the Cold War, which most people on this forum were too young to remember. When the USSR dissolved, the feeling was one of gigantic disbelief. We thought the USSR would endure.
It's hard to describe the feeling as kids and young adults when each side had 10,000+ nukes aimed at each other. You'd look up in the sky and imagine dozens of re-entry trails culminating in that awful blinding light. It was deadly serious and very frightening, and more than once, the world was on the cusp of nuclear war.
