CREDIT: This video file has been created from files found and acquired from the Museum of Classic Chicago Television (http://fuzzymemories.tv/), an organization dedicated to the preservation of Chicago television broadcasts from years gone by. My thanks go out to them. Posted with permission. INFO: This video is a discussion panel from the ABC News panel discussion program 'Viewpoint', moderated by Ted Koppel, from November 20 1983. This episode focuses, narrowly speaking, on the then-recently aired nuclear war television movie 'The Day After' (information on it can be found on Wikipedia). However, I don't feel one needs to see the TV Movie to follow/understand this discussion. More broadly speaking, though, the discussion focuses on topics such as nuclear war, nuclear deterrence, and the then-present tensions between the East and West in the midst of what was a very tense and dangerous part of the Cold War. I found this to be an insightful and intriguing look into an era gone by that, I feel, can never really be truly and totally understood (in terms of what living in it was like) by those who were born after it had passed - myself included. The panel, moderated by Ted Koppel, consists of (in no particular order): - Carl Sagan (notable and distinguished scientist and an authority on the topic of Nuclear Winter) - William F. Buckley Jr. (noted conservative political commentator, publisher of the National Review) - Robert S. McNamara (United States Secretary of Defense to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson) - Henry Kissinger (National Security Adviser and later Secretary of State for President Richard Nixon) - Brent Scowcroft (National Security Adviser for President Gerald Ford, and later National Security Adviser for President George H.W. Bush) - Elie Wiesel (Nobel Peace Prize recipient and Holocaust survivor) and a brief interview with George Shultz (then-Secretary of State to President Ronald Reagan at the time of the broadcast) Again, this panel is extremely intriguing into the subject of nuclear war, the effects of it, the danger of it, nuclear deterrence and how it connects to the former subjects, tensions between the East and West, and various other things - all within the context of a time where all of these things were very present, very real realities that everyone living in that time had to live with and accept. I hope it's as intriguing to you all as it was to me.

• published: 26 Nov 2013
• views: 12