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by consilient 1013 days ago
> him having personally experienced Soviet brutality didn't have the luxury of being ignorant of reality.

Allied troops didn't reach Hungary until 1944, and the Soviet-backed coup occurred in 1947. von Neumann moved to Germany in 1926, and to the US in 1933.

> Von Neumann was right about everything

He wanted the US to start WWIII with a nuclear first strike on the Soviet Union.
2 comments
everybodyknows 1013 days ago
> He wanted the US to start WWIII with a nuclear first strike on the Soviet Union.

Source?

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consilient 1013 days ago
I'm having trouble finding a primary source, but here's a paper discussing the issue.

Field, A. (2014). Schelling, von Neumann, and the Event that Didn’t Occur. Games, 5(1), 53–89. doi:10.3390/g5010053

https://sci-hub.se/10.3390/g5010053

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sabarn01 1013 days ago
I think you are thinking of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russell Who having visited the Soviet union after the revolution didn't think much of it.
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brigadier132 1013 days ago
> and the Soviet-backed coup occurred in 1947. von Neumann moved to Germany in 1926, and to the US in 1933.

He personally experienced communism.

> He wanted the US to start WWIII with a nuclear first strike on the Soviet Union.

If we look at the past 100 years of Soviet existence what can we say has happened?

The spread of soviet arms across all of the world, hundreds of millions dead from famine, war between Russia and Ukraine today.

What is the alternate history where the US does invade the Soviet Union?

Also given we are talking about the smartest person from the 20th century, I'm going to guess his logic when coming to the conclusion of first strike was sound.

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