Just Another Cold (War) Day: Reflecting on the Simulation

Red and blue are more than just opposites on the color wheel; once these hues were adopted by the USSR and the West, they went from being a child's finger painting colors to highly politicized indicators of territory. In the simulation today, as a member of the US/Western Europe interest group, I was intensely interested by how much influence a single color could have. When we had no communication with the Soviet Union and only speculation about USSR actions, the huge block of red in the east seemed more and more ominous. As the (mild) paranoia mounted, the desire to contain the communist "threat" seemed increasingly more reasonable. (We never even considered protecting the United States by confining ourselves to the western hemisphere...hence the scuffle for Mexico in the last three or so rounds.) By placing bases near to the heart of the USSR--or as close as we could come--we felt more secure in our offensive capabilities. However, our policy of containment was ineffective, even though our strategic prowess seemed to be right on target. Why? I suspect it had something to do with our lack of information. We were making moves based on our Western conception of how the Soviet think-tank works, and yet we were not familiar enough with their strategy to possibly know their goals, actions, and philosophies. Therefore, our good moves were simply flukes. We left too many holes in our geographical strategy to be of any real threat to our opponents. It's no wonder that our ultimatum fell short of the desired effect--so what if we had nukes in Japan? They slipped through the many gaps we left open, take Mexico, threaten us with close-range missiles. We did not establish ourselves as a formidable force, so why should they treat us like one?

Ultimately, bombing on a whim--or perhaps a fear--seemed like a pointless solution to our color problem. It would not only be a waste of power but also a meaningless exercise. Nuclear warfare would do nothing to establish us as the better faction, and if our bat-like strategy wouldn't work, brute force wasn't going to be much of an improvement.