ABSTRACT

Did a microchip win the cold war? Starting in the mid-1970s and gathering momentum in the 1980s, the Soviet Union embarked on an unprecedented military buildup that threatened the global balance of power. The vision of Soviet forces invading Europe, or Red Army nuclear-tipped missiles crashing into the United States was not just a fantasy. The proliferation of advanced microelectronics in the United States and their increasing use in military systems threatened to erase Moscow's investment in military hardware. The "revolution in military affairs," a notion that came from Soviet planning experts, did not start in Russia. Russia's leaders took the risk of impoverishing their country and destabilizing their empire in exchange for the big prize: control of Western Europe and the Middle East, the humiliation of the United States, and the end of American domination of the global economy.