Wow, this is probably the longest a book has sat on my "currently reading" shelf on Goodreads. It's hard to really give this book a truly fair review considering the authors were prognosticating and didn't have the benefit of hindsight like I do reading it now. So much of their predictions for the future are not just off, but hilariously wrong: the US and Iran remaining staunch allies through the 1980s, China and Japan allying to form a "sphere of co-prosperity," East and West Germany never reunifying, etc. But some of their less specific predictions were quite prescient: the idea of specific citizenship in a more economically and diplomatically unified Europe becoming less important, nationalist sentiment in border republics of the USSR helping lead to its downfall, and the advancement of telecommunications leading to the rise of telecommuting, making where you live less and less relevant to your employment.

The authors personal political bias seeps through often, blaming liberals and trade unionists and "peaceniks" for a decline in military ability for NATO that almost costs them the war. They blame generational shifts for not having proper military officers ready to serve. The book reads like a thinly veiled Cold Warrior's appeal to ramp up defense budgets, relying on a severe misunderstanding of the actual aims and motivations of their adversary.

The speculative history (or for us now, alternate history) the authors create is quite intriguing to read. The authors weave a tale of international and domestic events that lead to the outbreak of war in August 1985 that while some of it quite implausible, does tend to follow its own logic if your accept the initial premise. I found myself really wanting to dive in more to the series of events they laid out, and found myself craving an old school History Channel documentary made about it.

The real reason the review is as low as it is, and why it took me almost a year to actually get through this book (reading 14 books in between starting and finishing it) is while its marketed as a thriller paperback, it reads most of the time like a very dry think tank report. The entire middle section of the book is dedicated to intricate discussions of force structure and armaments development. Chapter after chapter of the reshuffling of chains of command, civil defense development, replacement of aircraft models with new ones, etc. While this information is important to understanding the war, it is overly detailed here to a point it just serves to dissuade you from reading more. At least half of the info contained within could have been cut and summarized much more efficiently.

Unless you're a cold war military buff, there's not really enough redeeming here to really make this worth your time. ( )

A book that made a huge impression on me in the early 1980s. What we know now may make it a bit rough around the edges to say the least, but great stuff. ( )

A very interesting, but now outdated, speculative work about the possible causes and initial phases of WWIII. I found this really interesting at the time it came out, but it is now almost 30 years out of date.
A chilling, apocalyptic book about a possible World War III and how, why, when, and where it would be fought, as told by Sir John Hackett, the former commander of the British Army of the Rhine and other top-ranking NATO Generals and Advisors.

A very interesting, but now outdated, speculative work about the possible causes and initial phases of WWIII. I found this really interesting at the time it came out, but it is now almost 30 years out of date. ( )

Having been a serving soldier, the author makes a credible senario for the final cataclysm which will end us all. The construction is well written, and the effect really dampens down my enthusiasm for military adventures. A good professional soldier view. ( )