Guess I’m a cold war holdover but seems like we were told a steaming pile of crap about the Soviet Union’s capabilities during that period. Only Reagen saw through it to kick down the Potemkin village of the Russkies true war making abilities.
Billions if not trillions wasted tearing the red horde.
Reagan didn’t ignore anything, he spent billions to overcome the Russian military threat, intermediate missiles in Europe, SDI, Neutron bombs, massive Reforgers, and much more.
We took the Russians very, very seriously in NATO.
The USSR’s capabilities were quite substantial, given that they also had the entire Eastern Bloc (manpower, weapons mfg., etc.) at hand, too. Ukraine alone was a major weapons, manpower, and parts source. Unquestionably, even with many inefficiencies, the USSR and its allies matched NATO in Europe in a conventional war.
Reagan did not “see through it to kick down the Potemkin village of the Russkies true war making abilities.” He bloody outspent them, part of that going to support new strategies, and a lot to support better weapons. The USSR could not keep up, and eventually cracked.
Note that the sensible goal for conventional defense is not to match an opponent’s capabilities, leading to the likelihood of a long, drawn out, horrific struggle. A “fair fight” is to be avoided at almost any cost. If you have the capacity to do it, you make yourself so strong no opponent dares attack / engage you. Trump understands this. See “Lil Kim”.