United States House of Representative member. Oleg Gordievsky believes that the Soviet Union mistook the civilian airliner to be a United States Boeing RC-135, which is a reconnaissance gathering aircraft which looks very similar to a Boeing 747 due to the fact that it has four engines and a wide body similar to the airliner. This is refuted by the pilots of the attacking Soviet aircraft claiming that he knew it was a civilian jet, but he shot it down anyway because it could have been easily converted for reconnaissance. The attitude of the Soviets towards anything that might be perceived as a threat was devolving more and more towards a 'shoot first, ask questions later' mentality. While it may have been uncalled for, Soviets were on edge about everything at this point. This would prove to be incredibly dangerous in the impending strategic nuclear war exercises about to be conducted by the United States and its NATO allies. Able Archer 83 Able Archer 83 took place between November 2–11, 1983. This was a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (N.A.T.O.) strategic arms exercise conducted by the United States government in order to simulate an escalating nuclear conflict. Staffs walked through the procedural drill which included asking permission from N.A.T.O political authorities to fire nuclear weapons. The codes were changed for Able Archer as there were new message formats and periods of radio silence. Able Archer 83 occurred just two months after the shootdown incident of Korean Air Lines Flight 007. The United States was simulating the deployment and use of the Pershing II nuclear missile system that was being developed at the time. The Soviets suspected the United States of performing a surprise nuclear attack with the Pershing II system, despite the fact that the Pershing II missiles were not delivered to Europe until November 22, eleven days after the conclusion of Able Archer 83. The Soviets believed the United States had determined that a nuclear war was technically winnable. The reason behind this rationale by the Soviet Union was related to the fact that the United States had just recently upgraded its Minuteman III ICBM to the Minuteman IIIA. This ICBM was several times more accurate and had twice the yield of its predecessors, thus making Soviet hardened nuclear silos a viable target. That same year, the United States also introduced the Trident C-4 submarine-launched ballistic missile. All of these