Background
The incident occurred at a time of severely strained relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. Only three weeks earlier, the Soviet military had shot down a South Korean passenger jet, Korean Air Lines Flight 007, that had entered into Soviet airspace, killing all 269 people on board. Many Americans were killed, including U.S. congressman Larry McDonald.
Bruce Blair, an expert on Cold War nuclear strategies and current president of the World Security Institute in Washington, D.C., says the U.S.–Soviet relationship at that time "had deteriorated to the point where the Soviet Union as a system — not just the Kremlin, not just Soviet leader Yuri Andropov, not just the KGB — but as a system, was geared to expect an attack and to retaliate very quickly to it. It was on hair-trigger alert. It was very nervous and prone to mistakes and accidents. The false alarm that happened on Petrov's watch could not have come at a more dangerous, intense phase in U.S.–Soviet relations." In an interview televised in the United States Blair said, "The Russians saw a U.S. government preparing for a first strike, headed by a President capable of ordering a first strike." Regarding the incident involving Petrov, he said, "I think that this is the closest we've come to accidental nuclear war."
Read more about this topic: 1983 Soviet Nuclear False Alarm Incident
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