On 26 September 1983, during theCold War, the Soviet nuclearearly warning systemOko reported the launch of oneintercontinental ballistic missile with four more missiles behind it, from theUnited States. These missile attack warnings were suspected to befalse alarms byStanislav Petrov, an engineer of theSoviet Air Defence Forces on duty at the command center of the early-warning system. He decided to wait for corroborating evidence—of which none arrived—rather than immediately relaying the warning up thechain of command. This decision is seen as having prevented aretaliatory nuclear strike against the United States and itsNATO allies, which would likely have resulted in a full-scalenuclear war. Investigation of the satellite warning system later determined that the system had indeed malfunctioned.
The incident occurred at a time of severely strained relations between the United States and the Soviet Union.[1] Responding to the Soviet Union's deployment of fourteenSS-20/RSD-10 theatre nuclear missiles, theNATO Double-Track Decision was taken in December 1979 by the military commander of NATO to deploy 108Pershing II nuclear missiles in Western Europe with the ability to hit targets in easternUkraine,Belarus orLithuania within 10 minutes and the longer range, but slowerBGM-109G Ground Launched Cruise Missile (GLCM) to strike potential targets farther to the east. In mid-February 1981, and continuing until 1983,psychological operations by the United States began. These were designed to test Soviet radar vulnerability and to demonstrate US nuclear capabilities. They included clandestine naval operations in theBarents,Norwegian,Black andBaltic Sea and near theGIUK gap, as well as flights by American bombers, occasionally several times per week, directly toward Soviet airspace that turned away only at the last moment.[2]
"It really got to them," recalls Dr.William Schneider Jr., [former]undersecretary of state for military assistance and technology, who saw classified "after-action reports" that indicated U.S. flight activity. "They didn't know what it all meant. A squadron would fly straight at Soviet airspace, and other radars would light up and units would go on alert. Then at the last minute the squadron would peel off and return home."[2]
From the accounts of CIA andsenior KGB officers,[3][4] by May 1981, obsessed with historical parallels with the1941 German invasion andReaganite rhetoric, and with no defensive capability against the Pershing IIs, Soviet leaders believed the United States was preparing a secret nuclear attack on the USSR and initiatedOperation RYaN. Under this, agents abroad monitored service and technical personnel who would implement a nuclear attack so as to be able either to preempt it or havemutually assured destruction.
On 1 September 1983, the Soviet military shot down a South Korean passenger jet,Korean Air Lines Flight 007, that had strayed into Sovietairspace. All 269 people aboard the aircraft were killed,[5] including U.S. RepresentativeLarry McDonald and many other Americans.[6] The first Pershing II missiles were delivered toWest Germany on 1 December 1983.[7]
Bruce G. Blair, an expert onCold War nuclear strategies and former president of theWorld Security Institute in Washington, D.C., says the American–Soviet relationship at that time:
... had deteriorated to the point where the Soviet Union as a system—not just the Kremlin, not just Soviet leaderYuri 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.[8]
In an interview aired on American television, Blair said, "The Russians [Soviets] saw a U.S. government preparing for a first strike, headed by a PresidentRonald Reagan capable of ordering a first strike." Regarding the incident involving Petrov, he said, "I think that this is the closest our country has come to accidental nuclear war."[9]
On 26 September 1983,Stanislav Petrov, a lieutenant colonel in theSoviet Air Defense Forces, was the officer on duty at theSerpukhov-15 bunker nearMoscow which housed the command center of the Sovietearly warning satellites, code-namedOko.[10] Petrov's responsibilities included observing the satellite early-warning network and notifying his superiors of any impending nuclear missile attack against the Soviet Union. If notification was received from the early-warning systems that inbound missiles had been detected, the Soviet Union's strategy was an immediate and compulsory nuclear counter-attack against the United States (launch on warning), specified in the doctrine ofmutual assured destruction.[11]
Shortly after midnight, the bunker's computers reported that oneintercontinental ballistic missile was heading toward the Soviet Union from the United States. Petrov considered the detection a computer error, since afirst-strike nuclear attack by the United States was likely to involve hundreds of simultaneous missile launches in order to disable any Soviet means of a counterattack. Furthermore, the satellite system's reliability had been questioned in the past.[12] Petrov dismissed the warning as afalse alarm, though accounts of the event differ as to whether he notified his superiors[11] or not[8] after he concluded that the computer detections were false and that no missile had been launched. Petrov's suspicion that the warning system was malfunctioning was confirmed when no missile arrived. Later, the computers identified four additional missiles in the air, all directed towards the Soviet Union. Petrov suspected that the computer system was malfunctioning again, despite having no direct means to confirm this.[13] The Soviet Union's landradar was incapable of detecting missiles beyond the horizon.[12]
It was subsequently determined that the false alarms were caused by a rare alignment of sunlight on high-altitude clouds and the satellites'Molniya orbits,[14] an error later corrected by cross-referencing ageostationary satellite.[15]
In explaining the factors leading to his decision, Petrov cited his belief and training that any U.S. first strike would be massive, so five missiles seemed an illogical start.[11] In addition, the launch detection system was new and in his view not yet wholly trustworthy, while ground radar had failed to pick up corroborative evidence even after several minutes of the false alarm.[12]
Petrov underwent intense questioning by his superiors about his actions. Initially, he was praised for his decision.[11] GeneralYuri Votintsev, then commander of the Soviet Air Defense's Missile Defense Units, who was the first to hear Petrov's report of the incident (and the first to reveal it to the public in 1998), stated that Petrov's "correct actions" were "duly noted".[11] Petrov himself stated he was initially praised by Votintsev and was promised a reward,[11][10] but recalled that he was also reprimanded for improper filing of paperwork with the pretext that he had not described the incident in the military diary.[10][16]
He received no reward. According to Petrov, this was because the incident and other bugs found in the missile detection system embarrassed his superiors and the influential scientists who were responsible for it, so that if he had been officially rewarded, they would have had to be punished.[11][10][16][17] He was reassigned to a less sensitive post,[16] took early retirement (although he emphasized that he was not "forced out" of the army, as is sometimes claimed by Western sources),[10] and suffered anervous breakdown.[16]
Oleg Kalugin, a former KGB chief of foreign counter-intelligence who knew Soviet leaderYuri Andropov well, said that Andropov's distrust of American leaders was profound. It was conceivable that if Petrov had declared the satellite warnings valid, such an erroneous report could have provoked the Soviet leadership into becoming bellicose. Kalugin said: "The danger was in the Soviet leadership thinking, 'The Americans may attack, so we better attack first.'"[18]
