Conservatives have always opposed any position or policy which promotes the idea of nuclear war being equally devastating to the winner as well as the loser. Presumably, this is because they feel it would lead to unilateral disarmament and capitulation to a nuclear-armed foreign enemy. To liberals, any idea that nuclear combat could be survived and that there could be a victor only made it more likely to happen as both sides prepared for it. In the 50s and 60s, attempts to publicize the pointlessness of Civil Defense preparations were severely criticized by the right, as was opposition to or ridicule of the new fallout shelter industry.

Even works of fiction of that period were lauded or blasted depending on how optimistic they were about the prospects of survival of a nuclear war. "Alas, Babylon", covering the short period of mild confusion between a nuclear exchange and the re-establishment of government authority was taught in the schools as a sort of reassuring and optimistic counter to more pessimistic works such as "On the Beach". The works of Hermann Kahn were widely supported by conservatives because they spoke of winning or surviving limited nuclear exchanges. Kahn also promoted the idea of flexible response and nuclear war fighting and nuclear strategies as opposed to reliance on the conventional Mutually Assured Destruction option. The idea that nuclear combat did not necessarily mean the end of the world was anathema to some, but a joyous cause for celebration to others.

Works of fiction studying the possibility of nuclear warfare as the result of accident or sheer stupidity (such as "Fail-Safe" or "Dr. Strangelove", respectively) were evaluated on both sides of the ideological spectrum by their political correctness, not on any intrinsic value as art. When Carl Sagan announced his theory of nuclear winter, which postulated that even a clear nuclear war victor could still lose all by destroying the world, it was criticized and defended with many arguments highly reminiscent of the contemporary debate over global warming.

Since nuclear war, particularly the general nuclear exchange feared during the Cold War, never actually materialized, it is impossible to determine whether Conservative or Liberal projections about a post-nuclear world were more realistic. What is clear is that positions on these issues were primarily dictated by political preconceptions.