World War III

Dancing on the Abyss
I was ten years old when WORLD WAR III debuted on television. I was lusting for some good ole slam-bang, commie-slaughtering action, and in that regard I wasn't disappointed. This two part TV movie, however, offers a helluva lot more than bloody combat sequences. It's a frightening, really almost terrifying speculative look at how the Cold War might have ended with a red-hot bang.

The story begins sometime in the "near future" (which, since the flick was shot in '82, presumably means the late 1980s), with the Soviet Union being wracked by food riots caused by a U.S. led grain embargo. In response, and without the knowledge of the moderate Soviet leader Secretary Gorny (Brian Keith), KGB boss Gen. Rudenski (Robert Prosky) sends an elite Soviet unit led by Col. Voroshin (Jeroen Krabbe) to a remote part of Alaska.Their mission? To blackmail the U.S. into resuming grain shipments by threatening the Alaskan oil pipeline with destruction.

The fly in the Soviet...

World War III on the Brink
When starving mobs riot in the streets of Moscow and other major cities in Russia, the powers within the Russian government launch a covert mission within the United States. Their goal: Threaten to destroy 30 miles of oil pipeline in Alaska in order to force the American government to restore grain shipments to Russia. As a squad of American National Guardsmen battle Russian Spetznaz commandos at an oil pumping station, the President must try to prevent the conflict from blowing up into World War III. From a lonely battlefield in Alaska to the inner sanctums of world power, World War III delivers a powerful display of drama and action in this Cold War drama.

chilling and unusually poignant
i watched this miniseries as a kid in the 80s and was blown away at the time. Decades later, i found it on Amazon and, still being in possession of a vcr, obtained the tapes and watched it recently. This is one of the greatest miniseries scripts ive ever seen in terms of the constant one-upmanship and escalating tension. A crack team of Soviet paratroopers has covertly invaded Alaska with the goal of seizing an important Alaskan oil pumping station in a KGB scheme to blackmail the us into rescinding its grain embargo. David Soul is the troubled Colonel, exiled to Alaska, who must redeem himself leading a ragtag band of national guardsmen against a superior armed force. He communicates with the President, played with fierce intelligence by Rock Hudson in one of his best roles (compare this engaged, whip-smart leader with the current clowns we have running for president). The superpowers are caught in a world of hellish game theory, where a seemingly logical move results in...

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