"You surely aren't suggesting we should have nuked the Soviet Union?"
We should have FOUGHT the Soviet Union over principle, and they would have given ground over East Germany and Poland, Checkoslovakia, because we HAD the bomb!
Patton was RIGHT.
Here is exactly what Patton said:
"We promised the Europeans freedom. It would be worse than dishonorable not to see they have it. This might mean war with the Russians, but what of it? They have no Air Force anymore, their gasoline and ammunition supplies are low. I've seen their miserable supply trains; mostly wagons draw by beaten up old horses or oxen. I'll say this; the Third Army alone with very little help and with damned few casualties, could lick what is left of the Russians in six weeks. You mark my words. Don't ever forget them. Someday we will have to fight them and it will take six years and cost us six million lives. "
The man was brilliant - to have foretold the disasters that Russia would bring to us.