1.3: The balance of terror
A global Cold War Tension reading sits over the Conflicts page, driven by real events and carrying real consequences. Defence chiefs of the nuclear powers can climb a weapons tree, run tests the whole world sees, and build a stockpile out of the defence budget.
The world now keeps a running temperature. Cold War Tension rises with tests, coups, crises and declared wars, and it falls when nothing happens for long enough. A frightened world behaves differently: panic buying, bank runs, civil defense drills and peace marches all arrive on the executive's desk when the reading stays high.
The nuclear powers can act on it. A defence chief can put money into a weapons programme, run a test that every other country sees and reacts to, and hold a stockpile that is paid for out of the defence budget like anything else. East Germany can pursue one covertly. Nothing about this is free, and nothing about it is hidden from the rest of the world for long.