Russia should have attacked in 1958

against NATO.  They may have been at their strongest relative to NATO.

Even the possibility of an army having nukes,especially in an era where radar and ,generally,surveillance capabilities where primitive, is severe enough to prevent a war.

The swarms of Russian troops and tanks invading West Germany would have been nuked into sl*g. I doubt at this stage there were enough nukes to cause total destruction to the planet, but I'm glad the war never happened. It would have been long, bloody, and destructive. 

Even if it did happen, would we be any better off today?

Here is a graph of US and USSR nuclear arsenals during the Cold War.  As you can see, in 1958 the USSR had a limited arsenal and the USA had a fairly large one.  If anything, the USA should have attacked the Russians then.  The Soviets also got a much bigger advantage out of ICBM's than the USA did.  The Red Air Force would have a much harder time destroying American bombers than the USA would have had shooting down Russian bombers over Europe and the North Pole.  ICBM's (and later SLBM's) could not be stopped by the enemy after launch and were the Russians only real chance of assuring the destruction of the USA as a functioning society.  The USSR also had a much better chance in the late 1970's after Gorshkov had expanded their fleet.

They also didn't have a nuclear deterrent then, and much of their homeland lay in ruins.  They also had no fleet to pose any sort of a threat to NATO shipping lanes from North America to Europe. 

^

Originally posted by Genghis Even during the height of Detente, I don't think they'd have that much surprise.  US-Soviet relations were cold ever since 1943.  NORAD would have been on alert for a soviet surprise attack for decades.

Edited by Cryptic - 15-May-2007 at 14:30

Originally posted by DukeC any major Soviet  operation into western Europe would have been met with tactical and then probably strategic nuclear weapons as the conflict escalated.

Originally posted by DukeC It was part of NATOs stated policy to use battlefield nukes in the event of an overwhelming Soviet ground attack. By the 1980s the U.S. had weapons like the Pershing II tactical missile in place that would have targted Soviet command centers far behind the front.

    Pershing II missiles gave the US the option of striking with survivable tactical nukes.  This was only an option though and was never meant to be an automatic response.

Edited by Cryptic - 17-May-2007 at 17:16