> A lot of weapons were nuclear ... to make up for inaccuracy
In fact, I've read that that's the real reason for even the large strategic nuclear weapons: The accuracy of missiles launched from thousands of miles away is (or was) dreadful, but if you used strategic nukes, you still could take out the targets: The Kremlin, the naval base, etc.
I've even read that modern 'smart' weapons (the article discussed Perry's work on them and their accuracy) could make nuclear weapons obsolete.
That was definitely a large part of it. Another part was the desire to maximize what you got out of a particular shot: if you have one bomb per missile, then you want each missile to pack maximum punch. Improving accuracy and the development of MIRVs both contributed to less powerful bombs becoming more desirable.
I'm not sure about precision conventional weapons making nuclear weapons obsolete. I can see it for some cases. Destroying a missile silo can probably be done with a large normal bomb delivered with sufficient accuracy. Destroying an airfield would require a lot of bombs, impractical if you're delivering them on ICBMs. And destroying a well built underground command post probably requires nukes.
Worse, sometimes cities really might be targeted deliberately, at least as a deterrent. A war limited to military targets might be seen as acceptable, while having cities destroyed could make it unacceptable, so there's incentive to threaten retaliation against cities in the event of an attack. No amount of precision lets conventional weapons substitute for nukes there. (Note that MIRV and better accuracy does still push for smaller weapons, as many smaller weapons detonated over an area is more efficient at destroying things than a single large weapon.)
A good book discussing the drivers (and some of the technology involved) of increasing ICBM/SLBM accuracy is "Inventing Accuracy: A Historical Sociology of Nuclear Missile Guidance".
In fact, I've read that that's the real reason for even the large strategic nuclear weapons: The accuracy of missiles launched from thousands of miles away is (or was) dreadful, but if you used strategic nukes, you still could take out the targets: The Kremlin, the naval base, etc.
I've even read that modern 'smart' weapons (the article discussed Perry's work on them and their accuracy) could make nuclear weapons obsolete.