ABSTRACT
Following the breakdown in East–West relations in the late 1970s, consequent in part on the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan and the installation of the markedly hawkish Reagan administration in the United States shortly afterwards, there was a period of intense escalation of nuclear deployments by both superpowers. This affected most classes of nuclear weapons, involved quantitative increases and also qualitative improvements in capabilities and was accompanied by similar if smaller-scale developments in the middle-ranking nuclear powers.
