THIS IS ONLY A GAME, BUT...

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000100390006-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 9, 2010
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: May 23, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100390006-2
APTt"L E APPEARED
22
NEWSWEEK
'23 May 1983
This Is Only a Game, But.. .
This just in from Washington ... The White House says II.S.
Navy planes have attacked and destroyed several Russian ships in
Havana harbor and crippled a Soviet sub discovered off the coast
of Nicaragua ... Pentagon sources confirm that spy satellites
have, in fact, spotted nuclear medium-range missiles in Cuba...
The Russian news agency Tass has just announced that an
American F-16 fighter-bomber. carrying nuclear weapons was
shot down over Cuba by Soviet, Cuban-based missiles ... While
the president was meeting with :,Defense Department officials,
Russian troops in Cuba launched an air and missile attack
Derails are sketchy but preliminary re-
ports indicate that nuclear
weapons were used ... Herein
.Miami's northern suburbs
thewordisbedlam... Thereisnoorderto
-evacuate' however, people are leaving
anyway in droves.. .
Casual listeners to radio station
KFRC in San Francisco could be forgiv-
en a touch of panic in recent weeks after
hearing taut "news bulletins" suggesting
the onset of Armageddon. In fact, it was
part of a new audience-participation
game called FiREBREAxs-created and
distributed by Ground Zero, the Wash-
ington-based educational group, to dem-
onstrate just how easily decision makers
can blunder on to what Ground Zero
founder Roger Molander calls "the slip.
pery slope to nuclear war."
For many nuclear-age players,
FIREBREAKS has megatons more appeal
than Monopoly. By last week, the $10
game had been played by about 150,000
individuals at 4,500 high schools, ? col.
leges, churches and community groups
from Apachia to Alaska. Participants are divided into
teams of advisepalrs to U.S. and Soviet leaders,with some playing
specific roles such as CIA director or Kremlin defense minis-
ter. They must vote on various policy options in a scenario of
rising U.S.-Soviet conflict in Eastern Europe and -Central
America-with hostilities between India and Pakistan and a
nuclear "warning" explosion by Pakistan thrown in for.
good
measure. Developed by former National Security Council
staffer Molander and a team of experts, FIREBREAKS .coma
complete with team badges, briefing papers, charts, maps and a
newspaper froni page whose headline reads: SUPERPOWERS
.STAND AT-BRINK OF.ALL.OUT wAit.
All the verisimilitude .has produced some -very troubling
EAA,. wu~ pmyrnave Opt1
overwhelmingly (80.peroent) for ?mt7i-
Earl Molander at KFRC Nuclear options
half choosing either strategic
or battlefield :nuclear wean.
ons. "I feel we have no option; this is a
crisis-we must strike first," sobbed
one woman who called the KFRC stu-
dio, where Molander's brother Earl, a
student of Russian strategy, was en-
sconced. At Ground Zero headquar-
ters, Molander was a bit depressed.
"It's sobering to think that so many
young people feel that their leaders
would use nuclear weapons," he said.
"Clearly we need to educate people."
Indeed, the game is designed to focus
attention on the *firebreaks". that
could help prevent escalation into all-
out war. arms control, better communi-
cations between U.S. and Soviet leaders
and improved international mediation.
Wrote one seventh-grade participant,
Debby Kuntz: "Preventing nuclear war
isn't as easy as it seems."
DAVID M. ALPERN with
GERALD C LUBENOW in San Frano.oo
and MARY LORD in Wathingtcn
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/09: CIA-RDP90-00806R000100390006-2