WEBVTT - 8. World Gone M.A.D. 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:08.280 In the movie biz, there's something called the false defeat. 0:00:09.240 --> 0:00:11.719 It's a moment towards the end of a movie when 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:15.040 things are going really well, too well. The heroes just 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:17.479 had a victory and the finish line is in sight, 0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:22.320 and then a grave challenge presents itself, one that seems 0:00:22.360 --> 0:00:25.640 so insurmountable that for a brief moment, the audience can't 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:31.400 even fathom a happy ending. It's like in Sleepless in 0:00:31.440 --> 0:00:33.320 Seattle when Annie is rushing to the top of the 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:36.960 Empire State Building, but it's too late because Sam and 0:00:37.000 --> 0:00:39.760 Jonah are already in the elevator on their way down. 0:00:40.080 --> 0:00:41.920 I'm sorry, man, empty. 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:47.000 It's like in Home Alone when after Kevin absolutely roasts 0:00:47.040 --> 0:00:51.120 Harry and Marv with all his booby traps, they finally catch. 0:00:50.920 --> 0:00:57.880 Up with him high a pal be out smart this time. 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:03.120 It's like when Our Fearless History slewth Nate Jones discovered 0:01:03.200 --> 0:01:05.880 that there was a top secret piffy app report one 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:10.000 hundred pages long, all about Able Larcher, and then found 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:13.600 out that it would take decades to unseal, and he 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:15.560 probably wouldn't see it in his lifetime. 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:17.399 We were in big trouble. 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.760 Nate had waited eight years for his piffy app foya. 0:01:20.920 --> 0:01:22.160 When he finally. 0:01:21.760 --> 0:01:24.720 Faced the music, it just wasn't working. 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:27.319 It was never gonna happen. 0:01:29.880 --> 0:01:30.600 Just kidding. 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.120 Another thing about a false defeat. The hero always finds 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:35.720 a way. 0:01:36.040 --> 0:01:37.160 Is never the end of the road. 0:01:37.240 --> 0:01:43.240 I learned that avoid Nate filing a FOYA isn't the 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:47.120 only way to get a secret document declassified. There's one 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:50.520 other path, but it's a real hail Mary. 0:01:50.640 --> 0:01:53.280 Called Mandatory Declassification. 0:01:52.600 --> 0:01:58.480 Review aka MDR aka ice CAP. Don't ask me why. 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:03.840 Ice CAP is effectively a side door into the government vaults. 0:02:04.200 --> 0:02:09.760 It's a small born of one representative of all of 0:02:09.760 --> 0:02:13.000 the intelligence agencies sitting at the National Archives. 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:18.080 Meaning instead of each agency taking years to approve declassification 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:20.840 one by one, all the agencies sit down in a 0:02:20.919 --> 0:02:24.160 room and review it together at the same time. 0:02:24.760 --> 0:02:27.040 For a historian, it's kind of like the hottest ticket 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:27.480 in town. 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:30.360 Yeah, we're talking a hotter ticket than macho Man Randy 0:02:30.360 --> 0:02:36.840 Savage versus hul Kogan WrestleMania five, nineteen eighty nine. But 0:02:36.880 --> 0:02:39.280 there's a catch. If you want to try to get 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:42.840 those ice Cap tickets, you have to withdraw your foyas first. 0:02:43.520 --> 0:02:46.520 You can't do both, which meant Nate would need to 0:02:46.520 --> 0:02:50.360 withdraw a FOYA that was already eight years in progress. 0:02:51.360 --> 0:02:55.080 Then if ice Cap declined to review the pifyab, he'd 0:02:55.080 --> 0:02:59.919 have to start all over again, eight years down the drain. 0:03:01.320 --> 0:03:03.680 But in the wise words of a risky Tom. 0:03:03.480 --> 0:03:08.680 Cruise, sometimes you gotta say what the fuck make you move? 0:03:10.880 --> 0:03:13.000 So we decided we are going to take a shot 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:17.560 and do MDR and Gopher broke. If ice Cap can't 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:18.800 do it, we're pretty screwed. 0:03:22.600 --> 0:03:25.520 All right, my listeners, We have arrived at the final chapter, 0:03:25.919 --> 0:03:28.600 and we've had quite a ride here, haven't we. First 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:31.160 we heard about how Reagan's tough guy speeches plus a 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:34.520 new deployment of super fast earth destoring weapons, fueled the 0:03:34.560 --> 0:03:38.240 Soviets paranoia to the point that they convinced themselves the 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:42.080 US was going to nuke them at precisely the same 0:03:42.160 --> 0:03:47.080 time NATO was rehearsing a nuclear war. But at the 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:49.800 last minute, we were all saved by a couple of 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:54.240 spies and Lieutenant General Leonard Perutz, who, in a tense moment, 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:58.920 kept a cool head. But then we learned that there 0:03:59.080 --> 0:04:01.600 isn't a record of the so called war scare in 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:05.640 Eastern archives that two of the main eye witnesses might 0:04:05.720 --> 0:04:09.240 be kind of unreliable, and that maybe the story of 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:12.440 Able Archer eighty three is nothing more than a Cold 0:04:12.520 --> 0:04:20.280 War myth. But one stone remains unturned the piffy. This 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:23.919 episode we take one more shot at the most elusive 0:04:24.080 --> 0:04:28.719 facet of history, the truth. I'm at Helms and this 0:04:29.080 --> 0:04:39.119 is the season finale of Snaffoo Able Archer eighty three. 0:04:40.160 --> 0:04:43.400 One day in twenty fifteen, Nate Jones woke up for work. 0:04:43.880 --> 0:04:46.719 It was his thirty second birthday. He took his time 0:04:46.800 --> 0:04:48.839 moseying into the office. 0:04:48.560 --> 0:04:51.240 Probably about ten o'clock. I guess nicely might be in 0:04:51.240 --> 0:04:52.720 a historian, you can't go to work a little later. 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:56.520 It was an ordinary day, save for a few happy birthdays, 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:59.119 maybe a cupcake or two, and of course that thirty 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:02.000 dollars check from Graham, which is so nice but never 0:05:02.040 --> 0:05:04.919 seemed to keep up with the pace of inflation. Come on, grandma. 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:08.960 Nate settled in at his desk, unaware that the best 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:14.880 birthday president of all time was about to arrive certified delivery, 0:05:16.200 --> 0:05:18.159 and it went through the mail slit. 0:05:18.320 --> 0:05:21.200 So there's kind of a thud onto the floor. 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:26.159 Nate Jones wondered, what could. 0:05:26.000 --> 0:05:29.640 It be that was about one hundred pages thick with 0:05:29.839 --> 0:05:32.640 government and dress government stamps. So I knew it might 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:36.240 be good. So went and looked at it and then 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:39.279 saw that it was from ice Cap. My heart started 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:43.160 beating a little bit and ripped it open and saw 0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:43.960 the title. 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:49.880 The Soviet War Scare President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, also 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:54.200 known as Piffy AM. 0:05:54.440 --> 0:05:58.120 I still remember. It had a bright red stamp, had 0:05:58.720 --> 0:06:00.280 seven code words. 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:06.479 Top secret, wintel, no FRON, no contract, orcn Umbra, gamma. 0:06:06.560 --> 0:06:08.400 And all seven of them had a line through them 0:06:08.440 --> 0:06:11.160 tick tick tick tick tick tick tick, meaning that they 0:06:11.160 --> 0:06:12.480 were no longer classified. 0:06:13.160 --> 0:06:16.640 This is it. The report to end all reports? Was 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:20.120 able Archer a Cold War myth like some historians believed, 0:06:20.600 --> 0:06:23.800 a propaganda plot like the CIA concluded in the eighties, 0:06:24.320 --> 0:06:28.840 or a terrifying nuclear near myss like Leonard Perutz had 0:06:28.839 --> 0:06:33.920 insisted for so many decades. Nate nervously began to flip 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:37.719 through the Piffy app hoping praying that what he was 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:41.880 holding was not one hundred percent redacted. 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.400 And I flipped through and I saw way more text 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:48.640 than redactions, and I said, oh my God, this is it. 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:50.839 And then I actually read it for the content and 0:06:50.880 --> 0:06:54.080 I said, oh my god, this is revealing the secrets 0:06:54.120 --> 0:06:55.599 that I was so curious about. 0:06:56.320 --> 0:07:02.039 Finally clarity. All right, let's break it all down, shall we. 0:07:03.000 --> 0:07:05.640 The report confirmed a lot of things that Nate had 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:08.640 already figured out from other sources, like those planes in 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:11.760 East Germany loaded up with nukes. But there was some 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:12.680 new stuff too. 0:07:13.320 --> 0:07:17.840 There's details about flights and helicopter flights, probably for surveillance 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:19.040 of able Archer. 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:24.000 The Soviets conducted over thirty six reconnaissance flights monitoring able Archer. 0:07:24.320 --> 0:07:27.160 The report said that even though the Soviets monitored able 0:07:27.240 --> 0:07:31.920 archer every year, this was more reconnaissance than any year before. 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:36.400 And apart from these flights, all other Soviet flights were grounded. 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:40.680 Why is that important? The report author speculates that this 0:07:40.840 --> 0:07:43.400 was in order to have as many aircraft as possible 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:45.200 at the ready for combat. 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:49.320 Said that Soviet military reaction hadn't been like this since 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:49.960 World War Two. 0:07:52.160 --> 0:07:55.480 For example, the Soviets stopped production at their tractor factory 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:59.200 and started using it to build tanks. The last time 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:04.760 they did that was during World War Two. The report 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:08.520 also pointed to the Soviet's own nuclear wargames as evidence 0:08:08.560 --> 0:08:12.440 that they genuinely believed NATO might launch a surprise nuclear attack. 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:16.840 The wargame they're talking about is called Druzeba, which, according 0:08:16.920 --> 0:08:21.840 to Google, translates to Friendship. That's right, a wargame called friendship. 0:08:21.840 --> 0:08:24.720 Who says that Soviets don't have a sense of humor anyway. 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.800 In the years after Able Archer eighty three, in nineteen 0:08:27.800 --> 0:08:31.800 eighty five, eighty six, and eighty seven, the Druzebil wargame 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:36.000 scripts all began the same way, with NATO launching a 0:08:36.000 --> 0:08:41.280 surprise nuclear attack during Autumn Forge, which is the NATO 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:51.280 exercise that ends with Able Archer. Ultimately, the Able Archer mystery, 0:08:51.679 --> 0:08:54.320 the mystery of how close we really were to all 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:57.760 dying that night in nineteen eighty three, It really comes 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:03.360 down to one question. How genuine was the Soviets fear 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:06.280 that the US was going to attack them? Were they 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:11.280 terrified finger hovering over the button or were they pretending 0:09:11.440 --> 0:09:16.240 to be terrified. Well, the pifyab's take was this. 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:21.920 They concluded that during Naval Archer that US actions and 0:09:22.040 --> 0:09:25.320 Soviet actions put the world on hair trigger away from 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:26.000 nuclear war. 0:09:31.600 --> 0:09:34.400 They said knowing what we know now, it's very possible 0:09:34.400 --> 0:09:38.000 the Soviets were genuinely afraid that an attack was imminent, 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:41.520 and they may have prepared their own nuclear weapons to 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:43.839 fire first. 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:49.199 And I agree with this conclusion that the war scare 0:09:49.360 --> 0:09:51.040 was real and the war scare was dangerous. 0:09:51.880 --> 0:09:54.800 Nate immediately wrote up a summary and the next day 0:09:54.880 --> 0:10:00.200 he published the declassified Pifyab for all the world to see. 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:03.319 I won't say I cried, but my eyes did get 0:10:03.320 --> 0:10:06.120 a little misty. I've had a lot of good birthdays, 0:10:06.120 --> 0:10:07.000 but that one might. 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:14.200 Take the cake. Happy birthday, buddy. The End You music 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:20.880 roll credits SNAFU was a production of iHeartRadio, Film, Nation Entertainment, 0:10:20.920 --> 0:10:27.040 and Pacific Electric Picture Company. I'm kidding, it's not the 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:32.439 end people. There's always a twist. Nate's Piffy ab win 0:10:32.640 --> 0:10:36.160 was supposed to be our hero's victory against all odds. 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:38.920 The Foyer Warrior fought for the Piffy ab Report and 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:42.680 finally he solved the able Archer mystery once and for all. 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:48.600 But it turns out this might be a false victory 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:52.840 after the false defeat, or something like that, because even 0:10:52.880 --> 0:10:54.720 though Nate was convinced. 0:10:54.720 --> 0:10:57.559 Very good analysis very good use of facts. 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:04.280 Not everyone would agree. You see in the PIFYAB reports 0:11:04.280 --> 0:11:07.320 one hundred pages, it didn't actually claim to solve the 0:11:07.360 --> 0:11:11.400 mystery of Able Archer. It didn't say what definitely happened 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:14.560 that night. It used a lot of equivocating phrases like 0:11:14.960 --> 0:11:18.880 may have and very possible. And the truth is, the 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:23.200 conclusions that are drawn from the Piffyab will differ depending 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:24.480 on who's reading it. 0:11:25.760 --> 0:11:29.240 The first time I read the PIFFIAB report was when 0:11:29.240 --> 0:11:33.760 the National Security Archive managed to get a copy of it. 0:11:34.160 --> 0:11:37.080 This is Ben Fisher. He's the CIA historian who brought 0:11:37.120 --> 0:11:39.439 the Able Archer story into the public eye in the 0:11:39.520 --> 0:11:42.960 late nineties, the one who convinced the intelligence community at 0:11:43.000 --> 0:11:46.240 large that Able Archer may have been much more than 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:51.080 a propaganda plot. So you may be surprised to hear 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:54.600 that by the time the PIFYAB report came out, Ben 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:56.319 had this to say about it. 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:01.240 I think that the Piffyab study was an exaggeration. 0:12:02.720 --> 0:12:07.000 I know, it's surprising that the guy who changed everyone's 0:12:07.000 --> 0:12:10.360 mind about Able Archer would say such a blasphemous thing 0:12:10.920 --> 0:12:14.760 in light of you know, everything we've talked about on 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:19.400 this show, The war mongering speeches, the euro Missiles Operation Ryan, 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:22.080 the stories of Oli Gordievsky and ryder Up, the airplanes 0:12:22.080 --> 0:12:25.120 on alert with nukes potentially loaded, Missile commanders called in 0:12:25.160 --> 0:12:27.800 for emergency shifts. Not to mention the new details from 0:12:27.800 --> 0:12:31.440 the PIFYAB report, reconnaissance flights, tank production, and Soviet nuclear 0:12:31.480 --> 0:12:32.080 war games. 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:38.240 But nonetheless I began to move away from the countdown 0:12:38.320 --> 0:12:41.760 to armageddon. The Abel Archer alert was a night we 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:42.880 almost went to war. 0:12:43.600 --> 0:12:46.600 Ben says. Despite the way it looks, there could be 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:53.520 another reasonable explanation for everything. Let's start with the Soviet's 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:55.880 military mobilization during Able Archer. 0:12:55.640 --> 0:13:00.840 Shall we Especially during the Able Archer Alert, the Soviets 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:05.120 did take certain actions. The strip alert for the aircraft 0:13:05.280 --> 0:13:07.400 is one thing. They may have put some of their 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:11.959 forces on alert. Senior officials may have repaired to their 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:16.240 underground bunkers. How do I interpret this? I think it's 0:13:16.240 --> 0:13:19.480 what we call signaling. It's sending messages to the other 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:22.840 side by doing things, rather than saying things. 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:26.000 Like, hey, we see you doing your big exercise over there. 0:13:26.080 --> 0:13:29.640 We're watching and we're ready, so don't try any funny business. 0:13:30.280 --> 0:13:34.320 It's like the wargame equivalent of that like I'm watching 0:13:34.360 --> 0:13:36.520 you thing where you point at your eyes and then 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:38.360 point at the other guy's eyes and then point at 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:42.959 your eyes again. Ben says that if the Soviets were 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:45.320 truly on the brink, we should be seeing a lot 0:13:45.480 --> 0:13:49.440 more military activity than we did, Entire armies at the ready, 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:56.280 navy ships, submarines and tanks, anything smaller just signaling. Okay, So, 0:13:56.320 --> 0:13:59.080 what's beIN's take on our two spies, you know, the 0:13:59.120 --> 0:14:01.160 two men who just so happened to have their own 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:04.600 stories about the Soviets getting really freaked out during Able Archer. 0:14:05.320 --> 0:14:10.880 Well, it was a flush telegram, It wasn't super urgent telegram. 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:13.240 Do you remember sending a message in there? 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:19.720 I remember sending You know, we always have this problem 0:14:19.760 --> 0:14:22.320 with people who do who defect, you know, how much 0:14:22.360 --> 0:14:24.520 of what they say is true, how much of it it's 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:28.120 not true, how much of it is slanted in a 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:28.960 certain direction. 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:33.240 We reached out to both Gordiovski and Ruugh to try 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:35.920 to get to the bottom of all this. Oleg Gordievsky 0:14:35.960 --> 0:14:38.640 was unavailable due to his health, plus the fact that 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:42.040 he's in a safe house hiding from Putin's assassins, and 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:45.520 we just never heard back from Rhina Rup, so ultimately 0:14:45.720 --> 0:14:48.880 we can't ask them these questions. But for what it's worth, 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:52.160 Ben doesn't think Oleg Gordievsky is a liar. 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:57.320 Oliah Gordiowsky was absolutely the best Soviet agent of the 0:14:57.360 --> 0:15:00.360 Cold War. I've met him a couple of times. A 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:03.880 good man who risked his life. Obviously, I think he 0:15:04.080 --> 0:15:08.520 reported what he believed and what he saw and what 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:11.720 he heard. There's a bigger question of what about the 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:15.560 people above him. I mean, to what extent were they serious? 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:21.680 By they? Ben means the KGB leaders who under Operation 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.320 Ryan commanded their spies in the West to report back 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:29.520 any indication of NATO war preparation. You remember that proverbial 0:15:29.560 --> 0:15:33.440 tic tac toe board of death the batshit crazy nuclear 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:37.560 crystal ball. But Ben thinks Operation Ryan may have actually 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:41.000 been more down to earth, that the Soviets were just 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:44.600 doing due diligence in a period of heightened nuclear tension. 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:50.240 Simple they were concerned that they balance the power was 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:55.000 tipping against them. They wanted to be prepared for if 0:15:55.040 --> 0:15:56.680 and when that happened. 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:00.200 Yeah, they did send messages to their spies saying the 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:03.480 adversary could attack us at any moment, But maybe they 0:16:03.480 --> 0:16:06.680 were just saying that to encourage thorough espionage. 0:16:07.280 --> 0:16:09.840 Sevie Union's following apart. They've got all kinds of problems. 0:16:09.880 --> 0:16:12.280 You need to keep the morale of your troops up. 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:16.880 How do you do this, Well, you give them a task, 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:21.680 and the task is to go out and collect information 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:26.480 related to the possibility of a surprise nuclear missile attack 0:16:26.840 --> 0:16:30.480 on the Soviet Union. Okay, this gives people something to do. 0:16:33.320 --> 0:16:36.680 So back to the central question. Just how close of 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:41.720 a call was a larger How scared were the Soviets. 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:45.280 I'm from Oklahoma, I'm a country boy. As a phrase, 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:47.800 I use that they were worried, but they weren't shaking 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:48.800 in their boots. 0:16:49.520 --> 0:16:52.160 Ben believes that there was at least some element of 0:16:52.200 --> 0:16:54.920 truth to the Soviet fear in nineteen eighty three. If 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:57.360 they weren't afraid at all, they wouldn't have shot down 0:16:57.400 --> 0:17:00.560 that Korean Airlines flight. If they weren't afraid at all, 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:03.960 they wouldn't have spent billions of dollars building underground bunkers. 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:07.360 If they weren't afraid at all, they wouldn't have practiced 0:17:07.400 --> 0:17:11.560 a nuclear wargame. That begins with NATO attacking undercover of 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:15.879 Autumn Forge. So yeah, they were scared, but they weren't 0:17:15.960 --> 0:17:19.879 quote shaken in their boots. In other words, Ben doesn't 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.479 think Yuri and drop Off was anywhere close to pushing 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:24.040 that button. 0:17:24.359 --> 0:17:26.840 It was a serious matter, but it wasn't almost the 0:17:26.960 --> 0:17:27.679 end of the world. 0:17:33.080 --> 0:17:36.160 That said, Ben admits he doesn't know for sure. 0:17:37.000 --> 0:17:39.879 I realized how complex it is. There's no hard and 0:17:40.000 --> 0:17:44.560 fast answer. It's a very marky world and rarely does 0:17:44.600 --> 0:17:48.400 it offer concrete evidence of this or that. And that's 0:17:48.440 --> 0:17:53.000 why you have intellvisionce failures. It's not scientific, it's an arts, 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:53.640 not science. 0:17:55.880 --> 0:18:01.240 Hold on, Ben, that's kind of terrifying. These intelligence agencies 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:03.440 hold the fate of the world in their hands, and 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:07.280 you're telling me there's rarely concrete evidence of this or that. 0:18:08.160 --> 0:18:09.360 It's an art. 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:15.080 Intelligent and honest people on both sides of the same issue. 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:18.520 People are not bad because they have one point of 0:18:18.600 --> 0:18:21.520 view or not good because they have another point of view. 0:18:21.880 --> 0:18:26.119 They're human beings struggling to make sense of what's going 0:18:26.200 --> 0:18:27.879 on around them. 0:18:28.560 --> 0:18:32.560 The Able Archer mystery is riddled with maddening contradictions. As 0:18:32.600 --> 0:18:35.280 a result, rational people can look at the same information 0:18:35.920 --> 0:18:38.600 and draw startlingly different conclusions. 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:43.720 No matter what's found, I think that the debate will continue. 0:18:44.480 --> 0:18:47.159 That's history arguing both sides. What the best evidence you 0:18:47.200 --> 0:18:48.240 have in. 0:18:48.200 --> 0:18:52.240 The end Able Archer is a rorshack test. In other words, 0:18:52.240 --> 0:18:54.280 how you see it might just be a reflection of 0:18:54.320 --> 0:18:59.159 your personality, how optimistic or cynical or fearful you might be. 0:19:00.960 --> 0:19:03.080 I don't know if you ask me, No matter how 0:19:03.080 --> 0:19:06.159 it makes you feel, the fact that intelligent people can 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:09.680 still argue about how close we came to armageddon means 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:19.119 we came too damn close. It was June of nineteen 0:19:19.119 --> 0:19:22.119 eighty four, about seven months after Able Archer, when Ronald 0:19:22.119 --> 0:19:25.200 Reagan took the Able Archer Rorschach test himself. 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:29.240 While we go on believing that the Soviets are blotting 0:19:29.280 --> 0:19:33.360 against us and mean us harm, maybe they are scared 0:19:33.400 --> 0:19:37.639 of us and think we are a threat. 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:42.119 This is an entry from his diary. It was written 0:19:42.160 --> 0:19:44.639 right around the same time that Reagan first read a 0:19:44.800 --> 0:19:48.800 detailed report listing the specifics of the Soviet reaction to 0:19:48.840 --> 0:19:52.160 Abel Archer, and even though his own CIA analysts claimed 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:54.720 that there was absolutely nothing to worry about, that these 0:19:54.720 --> 0:19:58.400 Soviet reactions were all part of a propaganda campaign that 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:02.600 wasn't Reagan's takeaway. To him, it seemed possible that the 0:20:02.680 --> 0:20:07.560 Soviets were preparing for war on his watch without his knowing. 0:20:08.280 --> 0:20:11.320 In the end, Reagan ignored the advice of his own analysts. 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:15.000 He believed that the able Archer war scare was quote 0:20:15.720 --> 0:20:20.159 very scary. He decides to set up a face to 0:20:20.200 --> 0:20:22.920 face meeting with the new Soviet leader, the first time 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:25.560 he would do this in over three years of being president. 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:28.040 He writes, and I quote, I. 0:20:28.119 --> 0:20:34.240 Haven't got feeling we should do this, no shit. So 0:20:34.240 --> 0:20:37.600 this is why I tell people the war scare is 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:39.280 actually a good news story. 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:44.760 Okay, there's always a room for miscalculation, there's always a 0:20:44.880 --> 0:20:48.760 room for hubris, there's always a room for mistakes. But 0:20:48.800 --> 0:20:52.399 what came out of the war scare, well, President Reagan 0:20:52.520 --> 0:20:56.240 learned for the first time in his life that this 0:20:56.320 --> 0:20:59.679 helped mes a're scared of us, And from that you 0:20:59.760 --> 0:21:03.520 can or a straight line to his second term, where 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:06.840 he says he wanted to be known not as the 0:21:06.880 --> 0:21:08.960 man who waits to coal warp, but the man who 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:13.000 would end it. And he realized that to do this 0:21:13.680 --> 0:21:16.359 he was going to have to deal with the Soviet leaders. 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:21.680 He was going to have to talk to them. 0:21:21.800 --> 0:21:24.200 This is tomorrow morning's Washington Post. 0:21:24.320 --> 0:21:25.800 Reagan Gorbachev signed. 0:21:25.640 --> 0:21:28.600 Nuclear missile treaty. As you can see, it is very 0:21:28.640 --> 0:21:30.919 big news here in the United States. 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:34.800 On December eighth, nineteen eighty seven, over four years after 0:21:34.880 --> 0:21:39.479 able Archer, President Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Gorbachev signed 0:21:39.520 --> 0:21:44.560 the historic Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty AKAINF. 0:21:45.200 --> 0:21:48.080 This ceremony and the treaty we're signing today are both 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:52.040 excellent examples of the rewards of patients. On the Soviet side, 0:21:52.080 --> 0:21:56.439 over fifteen hundred deployed warheads will be removed. On our side, 0:21:56.680 --> 0:22:00.520 our entire complement of pershing to and ground launched cruise missiles, 0:22:00.640 --> 0:22:04.159 with some four hundred deployed warheads, will all be destroyed. 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:10.920 It's almost a miracle in some ways, because eventually in 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:13.720 Italy to the end of the Cold War. 0:22:14.119 --> 0:22:16.879 At the signing of the i in F, the entire 0:22:17.080 --> 0:22:21.880 globe heaved a giant sigh of relief. At last, the 0:22:21.880 --> 0:22:26.120 Cold War was coming to an end. Now, I wish 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:29.200 I could say that at this point we collectively threw 0:22:29.240 --> 0:22:32.399 aside all of the geopolitical theater that led us to 0:22:32.440 --> 0:22:35.639 able our t eighty three, that we got smarter, that 0:22:35.720 --> 0:22:39.399 we approached the nuclear dilemma with a little more humility 0:22:39.480 --> 0:22:44.119 and a little less trash talking. But unfortunately that's not 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:45.240 what happened. 0:22:46.600 --> 0:22:50.560 As President Winston Churchill once said that trying to maintain 0:22:50.840 --> 0:22:54.200 a good relationship with a communist was not unlike trying 0:22:54.240 --> 0:22:58.520 to woo a crocodile. When it opened its mouth, you 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:01.439 never could be quite certain whether it was trying to 0:23:01.520 --> 0:23:02.879 smile or eat you up. 0:23:03.359 --> 0:23:05.880 This is from an interview with Reagan after news about 0:23:05.880 --> 0:23:09.000 the inf treaty broke. You may or may not be 0:23:09.080 --> 0:23:12.120 surprised to hear that he got a lot of criticism 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:14.920 from his own party about being too weak. 0:23:15.760 --> 0:23:19.359 Americans respect you, love you, and pulling for you, with 0:23:19.440 --> 0:23:23.160 their concerned that perhaps you are going to or already 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:26.600 have allowed Gorbachev to eat you and us up. 0:23:27.560 --> 0:23:30.600 Well, I haven't changed from the time when I made 0:23:30.600 --> 0:23:33.240 a speech about an evil empire, evil empire, evil empire. 0:23:33.240 --> 0:23:40.199 Ere Certain phrases come to mind at a time like this. 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:43.680 Old habits die hard. You can't teach an old dog 0:23:43.760 --> 0:23:47.960 new tricks. Nancy's astrologer made me do it. You see, 0:23:48.040 --> 0:23:51.160 even after Ronald Reagan had his able Archer epiphany, even 0:23:51.200 --> 0:23:53.960 after he reached across the Iron Curtain and negotiated a 0:23:54.000 --> 0:23:58.320 groundbreaking treaty publicly, he wasn't prepared to let go of 0:23:58.359 --> 0:24:01.840 his tough guy persona. In other words, according to Reagan, 0:24:01.880 --> 0:24:04.640 the Cold War didn't simply end through a mutual detente. 0:24:05.200 --> 0:24:10.280 He the American cowboy had finally conquered the evil Communist villain, 0:24:10.840 --> 0:24:13.200 and the US had won the Cold War with pure 0:24:13.359 --> 0:24:14.320 brute strength. 0:24:16.480 --> 0:24:21.320 The men in those positions are so confident. 0:24:22.240 --> 0:24:25.160 Here's Jeffrey Lewis talking about the people in power during 0:24:25.200 --> 0:24:25.880 the Cold War. 0:24:26.320 --> 0:24:31.440 They believe that they are like the masters of the universe, 0:24:31.880 --> 0:24:35.680 and that they are in complete and total control, and 0:24:35.800 --> 0:24:40.280 nothing will happen without them allowing it to happen. And 0:24:40.320 --> 0:24:46.280 that you're this incredibly clever brinksman who will always pull 0:24:46.320 --> 0:24:48.600 back at the last moment because you know what you're doing, 0:24:48.760 --> 0:24:50.400 because you don't know what the fuck you're doing. 0:24:50.880 --> 0:24:53.320 Thank you, Jeffrey. And that brings me to my next 0:24:53.359 --> 0:24:55.720 point where it all went wrong. 0:24:58.320 --> 0:24:59.879