Mutually Assured Destruction
Learn about mutually assured destruction (MAD) — the Cold War nuclear doctrine that paradoxically kept the peace by ensuring any nuclear attack would mean total annihilation.
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) was the paradoxical nuclear doctrine that defined the Cold War: the idea that if both superpowers possessed enough nuclear weapons to destroy each other completely, neither would dare launch a first strike. Peace was maintained not through trust or goodwill, but through the certainty that nuclear war would mean the end of both attacker and defender — and possibly civilization itself.
The doctrine emerged gradually as both sides built nuclear arsenals of staggering size. By the 1980s, the United States and Soviet Union together possessed over 60,000 nuclear warheads — enough to destroy the world many times over. Each maintained a 'nuclear triad' of land-based missiles, submarine-launched missiles, and bomber aircraft, ensuring that even a devastating first strike could not prevent a retaliatory second strike. This 'balance of terror' kept the Cold War cold.
MAD created strange contradictions. Arms control agreements like SALT and START limited weapons numbers but preserved the fundamental logic of mutual destruction. Anti-missile defense systems were restricted because they might undermine the balance of terror. Critics argued that MAD was insane — betting civilization on the rationality of leaders — while defenders argued it was the only thing preventing World War III. The doctrine raises questions about nuclear weapons that remain unresolved: can deterrence work forever, or is nuclear war eventually inevitable?