On 26 September 1983, Stanislav Petrov, a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Air Defense Forces, was the officer on duty at the Serpukhov-15 bunker near Moscow which housed the command center of the Soviet early warning satellites, code-named Oko.[10] Petrov's responsibilities included observing the satellite early warning network and notifying his superiors of any impending nuclear missile attack against the Soviet Union. If notification was received from the early warning systems that inbound missiles had been detected, the Soviet Union's strategy was an immediate and compulsory nuclear counter-attack against the United States (launch on warning), specified in the doctrine of mutual assured destruction.[11]
Shortly after midnight, the bunker's computers reported that one intercontinental ballistic missile was heading toward the Soviet Union from the United States. Petrov considered the detection a computer error, since a first-strike nuclear attack by the United States was likely to involve hundreds of simultaneous missile launches in order to disable any Soviet means of a counterattack. Furthermore, the satellite system's reliability had been questioned in the past.[12] Petrov dismissed the warning as a false alarm, though accounts of the event differ as to whether he notified his superiors[11] or not[8][full citation needed] after he concluded that the computer detections were false and that no missile had been launched. Petrov's suspicion that the warning system was malfunctioning was confirmed when no missile in fact arrived. Later, the computers identified four additional missiles in the air, all directed towards the Soviet Union. Petrov suspected that the computer system was malfunctioning again, despite having no direct means to confirm this.[13] The Soviet Union's land radar was incapable of detecting missiles beyond the horizon.[12]
It was subsequently determined that the false alarms were caused by a rare alignment of sunlight on high-altitude clouds and the satellites' Molniya orbits,[14] an error later corrected by cross-referencing a geostationary satellite.[15]
In explaining the factors leading to his decision, Petrov cited his belief and training that any U.S. first strike would be massive, so five missiles seemed an illogical start.[11] In addition, the launch detection system was new and in his view not yet wholly trustworthy, while ground radar had failed to pick up corroborative evidence even after several minutes of the false alarm.[12]
I just mentioned that story to my kids about someone who literally saved the world, but is rarely talked about. There should be statues of him all over the world.
cinepro wrote:I just mentioned that story to my kids about someone who literally saved the world, but is rarely talked about. There should be statues of him all over the world.
I feel there should be a statue of him outside of the UN in New York.
I know of this guy. In my opinion, he's the single greatest hero who has ever lived. Literally.
"Finally, for your rather strange idea that miracles are somehow linked to the amount of gay sexual gratification that is taking place would require that primitive Christianity was launched by gay sex, would it not?"
On this day in 1979, operators at the U.S. missile warning center were shocked to see their displays light up with the ultimate horror: a full-scale Soviet nuclear attack bearing down on the United States. Unlike previous false warnings the operators had experienced, there was no mistaking the signatures of an all-out nuclear attack designed to destroy nuclear command centers, U.S. nuclear-armed bombers, and land-based missiles.
Click on the link for the whole story, but this false alarm, if anything, seemed even more real than the one Petrov avoided responding to. Had it not been for a temporary ebb in Cold War tensions at the time, a nuclear war would very likely have started then. The operators at the U.S. missile warning center at that time also deserve hero status for preventing a catastrophic nuclear war.
No precept or claim is more likely to be false than one that can only be supported by invoking the claim of Divine authority for it--no matter who or what claims such authority.
“If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.”
― Harlan Ellison