On 23 March 1983, Ronald Reagan proposes the Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI), a major technological programme commonly referred to as ‘Star Wars’. The project aims to protect the United States from the threat of enemy nuclear weapons by means of a space-based shield that can detect and destroy enemy ballistic missiles as soon as they are launched. The US project (which does not come to fruition) draws the USSR into a frenzied arms race which leads the country to the brink of financial and economic collapse.