In nineteen-eighty-three the period of detente had come to an end.
The new president of the United States, Ronald Reagan, had referred to the Soviet Union as
an ‘evil empire’ and commissioned the construction of the Strategic Defence Initiative,
a missile defence system that was supposed to protect the United States from a nuclear
attack.
Furthermore, three weeks before, a Soviet fighter jet shot down a commercial airplane
that flew through Russian airspace from New York, killing all two-hundred-and-sixty-nine
passengers, including over sixty Americans.
It seemed that the Cold War, could become hot at any moment - and it nearly did, in
a Soviet control room that one night suddenly started giving warnings and alerts of a nuclear
attack had launched from the United States towards Russia.
If the Russians would follow protocol and respond, it would mean an all-out nuclear
total war.
-intro-
At the Soviet Union anti-aircraft warning center just outside of Moscow, the word START
suddenly appeared in large red letters on the wall, on the night of September 26, nineteen-eighty-three.
The signal meant the United States had launched a nuclear attack towards the Soviet Union,
and the radar showed five nuclear missiles on their way.
"The machine indicated that the information had the highest degree of reliability," Stanislav
Petrov, the Russian officer that commanded the control room, reminisced later.
The report could not have come at a worse - or rather more logical - moment.
It was one of the most tense moments of the Cold War, that was about to become hot, had
Petrov not acted in the way that he did.
Both the intelligence service, the notorious KGB and the political leadership of the Soviet
Union, had become convinced in the years previous that the United States was preparing a potential
nuclear attack.
The General Secretary of the Communist party, and thus de-facto leader of the Union, Yuri
Andropov, was obsessed with the risk of an American nuclear attack.
As for the warnings inside the anti-aircraft centre, protocol prevented Petrov from making
a decision himself: he would have to pass on his report to the leadership of the anti-aircraft
department.
The General Staff would then directly consult Yuri Andropov, and considering the fears among
the Soviet military and party leadership, the only logical result would be a direct,
overwhelming nuclear counterattack as soon as they got wind of an attack from the United
States.
In short, if Petrov would pass on his report, all-out nuclear war would undoubtedly erupt.
Petrov reminisced about his doubts and deliberations later on: "There was no rule about how long
we were allowed to think, but every second I deliberated, valuable time, which the political
and military leadership of the Soviet Union needed, was lost," he later explained.
"But I could not move.
It was as if I were sitting on a hot frying pan.
"The tension in the command center rose, and dozens of subordinates looked at Petrov.
And eventually, he gave the order to pass a system failure.
Petrov argued that it was illogical that the US would start a nuclear war with only five
missiles: the US would do little damage but provoke a nuclear attack from the Soviet Union.
But more than that; it was a decision based on his gut-feeling, 'a gamble of 50-50'.
25 minutes later, the relief rushed through him when no US missiles struck.
The error turned out to be a Russian satellite that malfunctioned, which confused the reflection
of the rising sun on clouds for the flames of rockets.
And as for Petrov?
He didn’t receive a reward, merely a reprimand due to incomplete complete paperwork.
A year after saving the world, Petrov requested a transfer and subsequently suffered from
a nervous breakdown and retired early to look after his wife who was suffering from cancer.
Born in nineteen-thirty-nine Petrov, son of a fighter pilot and a nurse, was destined
to become a forgotten historical anecdote.
That is, up until his chief, General Yuri Vontintsev, described the incident in his
memoirs, fifteen years later.
After his memoirs were published, the fact that the entire world was on the brink of
nuclear destruction suddenly received much more attention.
Petrov was invited to the United States, where the United Nations honored him in a meeting,
he received the World Citizen Award, and the Dresden Peace Price in Germany.
Furthermore, a Danish documentary featuring Petrov as the protagonist was produced in
two-thousand-fourteen; The Man Who Saved The World.
Petrov passed away in May two-thousand-seventeen, although his death wasn’t widely reported
until September.
His death came at an interesting time as the discussions about whether the newly elected
US president could start a nuclear war on his own, as tensions between North Korea and
the US were rising during those months.
I suppose we ought the think it reassuring that human calm and rationality can prevent
the destruction of our world at crucial moments.
There is another example of a man that kept calm during a crisis that could have ensued
in an all-out nuclear war, by voting not to launch nuclear torpedoes from a nuclear submarine
at the height of the Cuban Crisis.
It was a fellow Soviet officer, Vasili Arkhipov, but that’s a story for another time.
Thank you for watching this video and what is a person or event during the Cold War that
you would like to know more about, and perhaps see a video of?
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See you next time.