nuclear-news

The man who saved the world. In 1983 Soviet Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov was the duty officer working the overnight shift at the Soviet Union’s nuclear early warning base. His job was to monitor the Soviet early warning system and alert his higher ups to US nuclear attacks. In the wee hours of Sept. 26, an attack appeared to be happening.

“The sirens sounded very loudly, and I just sat there for a few seconds staring at the screen with the word  ‘launch’ displayed in bold red letters,” Petrov told the BBC in 2013. Petrov watched as his systems warned him of another four launches—for a total of five incoming Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missiles. Only minutes remained before they would reach their targets. “The computers changed their alerts from launch to missile strike.”

But Petrov decided not to trust the computer. He reported a false alarm to his superiors, forestalling a possible Soviet retaliatory strike. “But I myself was not sure until the very last moment,” he said.

Making an educated guess, Petrov decided that the alerts were wrong.

In a real war, the United States would launch a massive attack on Soviet defenses, Petrov had been told. “When people start a war, they don’t start it with only five missiles,” he told The Washington Post. Petrov, who died in 2017, is often credited with preventing a nuclear war.

The Cuban Missile Crisis and bad advice. For a little over a month in the fall of 1962, the world stood on edge as the United States and the Soviet Union engaged in a standoff over Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba–just 90 miles from the United States. Coming a little more than a year after the ill-conceived Bay of Pigs invasion, in which US-trained Cubans made a miserably failed attempt to overthrow Cuban leader Fidel Castro, the Cuban Missile Crisis happened at a time of sky-high tensions between the Cold War enemies. When US spy plane photos showed Soviet missile installations in Cuba, President John F. Kennedy had to do something. He’d taken a tough line on Cuba and the Soviet Union as a presidential candidate, after all.

Kennedy’s advisors, including his brother Robert Kennedy, had a lot of suggestions.

The advisors developed proposals, including a strike on the Soviet missile facilities or a full-on invasion of the island involving tens of thousands of troops. Luckily for the world, Kennedy didn’t invade, which could have ignited a nuclear war. He didn’t go with his brother’s idea to stage a false-flag attack on a US base to justify an invasion, either.

According to a review of his book in The New Yorker, historian Martin J. Sherwin believes Adlai Stevenson, the US representative to the United Nations and a two-time presidential candidate, successfully urged Kennedy to negotiate. The Soviets pulled their missiles off the island, and the United States agreed not to try and invade Cuba again and pulled its own missiles from Turkey……….

Tip: The web will be flooded with election-related disinformation today. There could be false claims about voting irregularities such as ballots being thrown away, or of people voting twice. Trump himself has been making false claims about a rigged election or voter fraud for much of the election cycle. When you see something that causes you to break out in cold sweats, check another source.

The presidential elections are a high stakes event. It’s understandable to be nervous. But remember that first reports can be and often are incorrect. Through it all, try to maintain the calm of a Stanislav Petrov and the wisdom of Adlai Stevenson. You may not save the world from Armageddon, but just maybe, you’ll preserve your own sanity. https://thebulletin.org/2020/11/the-nuclear-launch-authorizers-guide-to-staying-calm-on-election-night/