1983 Soviet Nuclear False Alarm Incident
On September 26, 1983, the nuclear early warning system of the Soviet Union twice reported the launch of American Minuteman ICBMs from bases in the United States. These missile attack warnings were correctly identified as a false alarm by Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov, an officer of the Soviet Air Defence Forces. This decision may have prevented an erroneous retaliatory nuclear attack on the United States and its Western allies. Investigation of the satellite warning system later confirmed that the system had malfunctioned.
Read more about 1983 Soviet Nuclear False Alarm Incident: Background, Incident, Aftermath
Famous quotes containing the words soviet, nuclear, false, alarm and/or incident:
““Is there life on Mars?” “No, not there either.””
—Russian saying popular in the Soviet period, trans. by Vladimir Ivanovich Shlyakov (1993)
“The emotional security and political stability in this country entitle us to be a nuclear power.”
—Ronald, Sir Mason (b. 1930)
“Everyone in the full enjoyment of all the blessings of his life, in his normal condition, feels some individual responsibility for the poverty of others. When the sympathies are not blunted by any false philosophy, one feels reproached by one’s own abundance.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)
“Dignity takes alarm at the unexpected sound of laughter.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
““It is of the highest importance in the art of detection to be able to recognise out of a number of facts which are incidental and which are vital.... I would call your attention to the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.”
“The dog did nothing in the night-time.”
“That was the curious incident.””
—Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930)