
Vasili Arkhipov - jbevain
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasiliy_Arkhipov
======
strlen
Interesting tidbit: when I describe my Soviet and early post-Soviet childhood
to Americans, Americans of my age are surprised that their fears of Soviet
nuclear attack, civil defense training ("duck and cover"), were not unique.
"Whoa, you thought we were going to nuke you?! We thought you were going to
nuke us." A popular (not very politically correct by US standards!) Soviet
joke of this time conveyed the cynicism around the idea that once a nuclear
war began, humanity would have any hope--

Armenian Radio
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Yerevan_jokes](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Yerevan_jokes))
was asked: "what do to if a nuclear attack is imminent?"

Armenian Radio responded: "wrap yourself in a linen sheet and slowly, in
organized fashion, without creating any panic, crawl to a cemetery."

To paraphrase War Games (a classic which I watched only after coming to the
US), the winning move is not to play."

------
guantes
This is another interesting story about a Russian who may have saved the
world:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov)

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
Yup in 1983. Thanks to both of them. Petrov is still alive, so you can send
him a Hallmark card if you're over 30 and glad to be alive.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov)

~~~
mietek
Do you have his address?

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
The thread is two years old, but it is a start. Let me know if you have any
luck. BTW, someone in the Reddit thread points out that cash sent through the
mail _will_ be stolen, so if anyone wanted to send him money, we'd have to me
more clever about it.

[http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/dkear/can_anyone_...](http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/dkear/can_anyone_find_the_address_for_stanislav/)

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packetslave
Oh look, another title edit that adds nothing and takes away from the original
title that actually told us why we should care about Vasili Arkhipov. Get it
together, mods!

~~~
Stratoscope
Out of curiosity, does anyone know what the original title was?

~~~
jbevain
It was “A guy called Vasili Arkhipov saved the world”, a quote from a former
NSA director, taken from the first paragraph of the article.

------
shurcooL
It's a lonely and sad thought that the biggest heroes whose immense sacrifices
and contributions to the well being of everyone around them are celebrated
by... the blissful ignorance of everyone else.

Except in movies. There, we get to see and experience it all.

~~~
arbuge
It is also a scary thought that a decision on nuclear war was/is in the hands
of a few individuals.

~~~
ekianjo
It still is. Most nations' Commanders in Chief (i.e. the Presidents) have the
power to order a nuke launch by themselves. Of course they have advisers and
so on, but that does not mean they have less of a power.

~~~
dredmorbius
Under US protocols, only the President can _authorize_ the use of nuclear
weapons, however the Secretary of Defense must _also_ approve the use.

~~~
ekianjo
> Under US protocols.

I wasn't only talking about the US. There are many other countries in the
world who own nukes and where their usage protocol is different.

~~~
dredmorbius
Interesting factoid: The US made it's PAL (permissive access link) technology
available to other nuclear powers, _including enemies_ in order that _they_
could secure _their_ weapons against unauthorized use.

Which makes _everyone_ better off.

~~~
ekianjo
How many are using their technology as well, then ?

------
rismay
I was lucky enough to learn about this in high school - Andover. I forget the
speakers name but he gave the speech between 2001 - 2005 (I can't remember).
It was an incredible speech about Mutually Assured Destruction and how the
theory was absurd. The speaker pointed out that no one thought that we would
exit the Cold War without a horrible war. And then he asked, "Why did this not
happen?" He pointed to Vasili's example as to how one SANE person can make a
difference. He talked about several other examples. He ended the speech by
repeating, "PEACE. PEACE. PEACE." At the moment I thought it was cheesy... but
here I am more than 10 years later and I still remember it.

~~~
erikpukinskis
> At the moment I thought it was cheesy... but here I am more than 10 years
> later and I still remember it.

Incidentally, I think that's what good parenting looks like.

------
Killah911
It's a shame that we have gotten ourselves to a point where we must rely on
the level headed decision making of so few people to keep us from
annihilation. To say 'saved' may be a bit premature. It's more of a shame that
we have created such monstrosities with the gifts of technology and have kept
them around and continue to threaten our very own existence with them. Here's
to hoping for cooler heads and compassion to always prevail, for all our
sakes.

------
Shivetya
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VPY2SgyG5w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VPY2SgyG5w)
is an hour long documentary about this man and the incident he is famous for

------
keithpeter
_" Three officers on board the submarine [...] were authorized to launch the
torpedo if agreeing unanimously in favor of doing so. An argument broke out
among the three, in which only Arkhipov was against the launch."_

Opportunity for a playwright to write a really tight two scene piece there.
Doubt if we could get it up to 50,000 words[1] even if we did the 'follow
three scenarios with multiple endings' trick, and even if we had the Bobby
Kennedy/LBJ dynamic in the committee going.

Edit: The K-19 'incident' would have made a major psychological impression on
_anyone_ , even allowing for the high threshold that I imagine Soviet navy
commanders of that era had.[2]

[1] [http://nanowrimo.org/](http://nanowrimo.org/)

[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_submarine_K-19](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_submarine_K-19)

~~~
keithpeter
[http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB75/](http://www2.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB75/)

Has the charts, photos, signals and some wonderfully unreliable reminiscences
by crew members. (edit link has gone hence reply to my own post).

------
snird
the guardian wrote about his story:
[http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/27/vasili-...](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/oct/27/vasili-
arkhipov-stopped-nuclear-war)

------
austinz
Well, I'm glad the worst is over. It's chilling how many near misses there
were. How many more near misses might we have endured, had the Cold War gone
on, before the one not-any-kind-of-miss that would have destroyed human
civilization?

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
I've been reading a lot of Bamford lately for obvious reasons. Apparently, the
CIA, NSA, and Chair Force were quite provocative during the Cold War.
Something like twenty US aircraft were shot down by the Soviets (over Soviet
airspace).

~~~
jjh42
I find it amazing the US officials thought it a good idea to drop small
(trainer) explosives on a nuclear armed USSR sub during one of the tensest
standoffs of the Cold War.

Is it only in retrospect that this seems poorly thought through?

~~~
smsm42
They didn't just do it for sport, they tried to get it to surface and there
aren't that many way to talk to a submarine that doesn't want to be found and
is too deep to hear radio communications. They wanted the sub to surface,
probably to enforce the blockade over Cuba. The captain of the sub erroneously
decided that they're being attacked, because he had no communications with
outside and didn't know what's going on. Arkhipov persuaded him not to rush
and surface, and find out what's going on before firing.

------
erbo
An essay in the book _What Ifs? of American History_ (Robert Cowley, ed.) by
Robert L. O'Connell, "The Cuban Missile Crisis: Second Holocaust," details
what might have happened if Arkhipov had not been successful and the
_Randolph_ had in fact been hit by a nuclear torpedo.

In the aftermath, the U.S. military executes air strikes on Cuba followed by
an invasion. The Soviet forces obliterate Guantanamo with a nuclear strike,
send nuclear cruise missiles at the incoming invasion force,and, most
seriously, manage to launch two of the SS-4 missiles...one of which hits
Washington D.C. and wipes out the entire National Command Authority. In
response, U.S. forces execute the entire SIOP against the Soviet Union, an
effort which gives "overkill" a new name.

The aftermath of "The Two Days' War" includes the near-extermination of the
Soviet Union, radiation issues in large parts of the world, and a "nuclear
twilight" causing worldwide food shortages and famine. Ultimately, the United
States was viewed as the aggressor by the rest of the world, compounded by the
actions of President Richard Nixon (elected in 1964, replacing Acting
President John McCormack). The U.S. stood alone in refusing to join the Geneva
Convention for the Abolition of Nuclear Armaments in 1966, and renounced UN
membership in 1968, ordering the organization out of New York City. The
American public felt Nixon had taken the wrong turn, and elected Eugene
McCarthy to succeed him in 1972.

The essay is written as the report of an investigative commission written in
1972 and finally declassified in 2002, in part by the actions of U.S.
Archivist Newton Leroy Gingrich (who never went into politics in this
timeline) at the New Capital District in Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado.

------
Houshalter
Should we extend Petrov Day to him too?
[http://lesswrong.com/lw/jq/926_is_petrov_day/](http://lesswrong.com/lw/jq/926_is_petrov_day/)

------
Intimatik
Holly Molly, I live 1 mile far from this guy's last home(which was in Kupavna,
Moscow region, a place where Russian air defense command resides)

------
guard-of-terra
Vice Admiral is hardly "a guy", while I'm not sure he had this rank at the
time of incedent.

~~~
dnautics
he was a flotilla captain, 2nd in command of the boat, but in command of two
others, according to the WP article.

------
dredmorbius
Спасибо, товарищ.

~~~
Intimatik
KGB watches you, tovarisch!

------
D9u
We read about this 7 months ago...

[https://paste.xinu.at/hVamTs/](https://paste.xinu.at/hVamTs/)

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mnml_
Great story, but not really tech related

~~~
abrichr
From the Guidelines [1]:

 _On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes
more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the
answer might be: anything that gratifies one 's intellectual curiosity._

[1]
[http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
oldgirl
That basically translates to "any off-topic shit that the community and mods
will tolerate". Shame on them.

~~~
koenigdavidmj
This is pg's playground. You can play by his rules, or play elsewhere.

The best way of playing by hos rules is creating content that we would find
interesting. It's a lot more fun than whining for everyone.

