He Had MINUTES to Stop a Nuclear War

On 26 September 1983, a Soviet early warning screen told Stanislav Petrov that America had launched a nuclear missile, then four more. Petrov was the duty officer in the Serpukhov-15 bunker near Moscow, and his job was to warn his bosses. The brand-new Oko satellite system rated the alarm "highest" reliability. But his gut said a real American attack would use hundreds of missiles, not five, so he reported a false alarm and waited. Nothing landed: the satellites had mistaken sunlight on high clouds for rocket launches. Instead of a medal, he was questioned and reprimanded for not writing the incident in the logbook. His answer: he had a phone in one hand and the intercom in the other. He retired early, and the story only came out in 1998, in General Yuri Votintsev's memoir. By then he was growing potatoes to get by. Sources: Washington Post (David Hoffman, 1999); BBC News interview (2013); Al Jazeera (2017); Wikipedia, 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident. #history #coldwar #nuclear