
Stanislav Petrov, a Soviet officer who averted nuclear war, has died - apsec112
https://www.rt.com/news/403625-nuclear-soviet-officer-died/
======
4WIW
It may be that our biggest collective luck was that the alarm happened at the
time subcolonel Petrov was on duty. He was an analyst, maybe even chief
analyst of the unit, he authored the playbook for the officers on duty; being
on duty wasn't his main job (source:
[https://cont.ws/@adviser095/717098](https://cont.ws/@adviser095/717098) ), he
would go on duty from time to time.

Due to his knowledge of the early warning system he was more likely to cast
doubt than a regular officer on duty. Several factors looked suspicious: 1)
The reported starts (5 in total) happened from a single base in the US which
didn't make sense from the military point of view: the US would have put
themselves at a grave disadvantage by sending just a few missiles; 2) They had
visible light and infra-red visuals on the US territory and none of them
checked out and 3) It would have been highly unlikely for the war to start
suddenly, without any prior escalation.

Like other officers on duty, he had college education as an electronics
engineer and additional 2 years of special training. All this probably helped
him make the right decision.

This is not to take away from the importance of Mr.Petrov's heroic personal
contribution: he definitely deserves recognition (which he didn't get from the
Soviet Army and his own country BTW). Still I would also like to hope that we
are all collectively not as stupid as to go caboom just because of the single
fluke in the satellite system.

~~~
majewsky
> 1) The reported starts (5 in total) happened from a single base in the US
> which didn't make sense from the military point of view: the US would have
> put themselves at a grave disadvantage by sending just a few missiles

There was an interview with Petrov (in the 90s or 00s) when he spoke about
this point, and the interviewer said that in 1983, the US plans for a
preemptive strike started with a "beheading strike", in which a few missiles
would be sent to hit the Kremlin and a handful strategic military bases. Then
the US would wait if the Soviets were still twitching, in which case the
second, more massive round would've been fired. Petrov admitted that, if he
had known that, he would've decided differently on that fateful day.

(Don't have a direct source link to back this up, sorry. My source is one of
the earlier episodes of [https://alternativlos.org](https://alternativlos.org)
where they talked about the Cold War.)

~~~
0xbear
This plan strikes me as idiotic TBH. The Kremlin is situated smack dab in the
center of the most populous city in Russia, Moscow. You can’t take out just
the Kremlin without taking out millions of people in the process. And even if
you could, the USSR would have no choice but to respond. It’s like someone
nuked the White House. Rockets would be flying within minutes.

Nowadays there’s an automated system in place that ensures a response even if
the entire high command is taken out:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand_(nuclear_war)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand_\(nuclear_war\))

~~~
dwringer
Well... to that page's credit somewhere halfway down it does mention that the
existence of a dead hand is only a hypothesis. I suppose it's just one more
onto the pile of things from Dr. Strangelove that people interpret as absolute
fact.

~~~
0xbear
Of course it’s a “hypothesis”. No one wants to drink polonium tea after
confirming it.

~~~
dwringer
The whole point of a doomsday device is lost if you keep it a secret! But, a
little bit of polonium in your tea is nothing compared to the international
conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.

~~~
0xbear
Not really. It’s like Israel’s nuclear arsenal. Not confirming its existence
allows Israel to stay out of the various treaties, but is there any doubt that
they have it?

------
jimrandomh
This is tragic.

The anniversary of the crisis Petrov saved us from is coming up soon, on
September 26th. There's a ritual/ceremony that I and some others have been
observing yearly on that day, which I recently put online at
[http://petrovday.com/](http://petrovday.com/), which talks about that (and
the world's other close calls, and historical context).

~~~
aswanson
That's a great idea, awareness needs to be spread about how lucky we are.

------
Twisell
This remind me of a recurring theme in "Doctor Who" fictional stories (I'm
bing watching right now).

There no such thing as an unimportant person because countless time in the
stories the world or even the universe have been saved by ordinary people and
nobody will ever know about them.

Only this is real life, this is deeply amazing. I feel so much gratitude and
kindnesses for this man. RIP Станислав Евграфович Петров

PS: added emphasis on Fictional stories for clarity.

~~~
dingaling
> There no such thing as an unimportant person

And on that theme, when I wore uniform we were told never to use the term VIP
but instead NP, Notable Person. Which I thought was a good workaround as it
separated fame from "importance"

~~~
labster
Perl Conference first-time attendees are VIPs: very important to Perl. This
separates authority from importance. This might be their only visit, so we
should make it worthwhile.

On the theme that anyone can save the world, I think of the Lord of the Rings.
And particularly of Samwise Gamgee.

------
smitherfield
Perhaps the better story for this audience is the one about the electrical
engineer who nearly caused nuclear war...

~~~
testestx
Who?

~~~
sturmeh
Whoever was responsible for the fault that detected the sun rays as incoming
missiles.

------
pmoriarty
Another Soviet officer who also probably prevented nuclear war was Vasili
Arkhipov.[1]

 _" On 27 October 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, a group of eleven
United States Navy destroyers and the aircraft carrier USS Randolph located
the diesel-powered, nuclear-armed Soviet Foxtrot-class submarine B-59 near
Cuba. Despite being in international waters, the Americans started dropping
signaling depth charges, explosives intended to force the submarine to come to
the surface for identification. There had been no contact from Moscow for a
number of days and, although the submarine's crew had earlier been picking up
U.S. civilian radio broadcasts, once B-59 began attempting to hide from its
U.S. Navy pursuers, it was too deep to monitor any radio traffic. Those on
board did not know whether war had broken out or not. The captain of the
submarine, Valentin Grigorievitch Savitsky, decided that a war might already
have started and wanted to launch a nuclear torpedo._

 _" Unlike the other subs in the flotilla, three officers on board the B-59
had to agree unanimously to authorize a nuclear launch: Captain Savitsky, the
political officer Ivan Semonovich Maslennikov, and the second-in-command
Arkhipov. Typically, Russian submarines armed with the "Special Weapon" only
required the captain to get authorization from the political officer to launch
a nuclear torpedo. However, due to Arkhipov's position as flotilla commander,
the B-59's captain also was required to gain Arkhipov's approval. An argument
broke out, with only Arkhipov against the launch._

 _" Even though Arkhipov was only second-in-command of the submarine B-59, he
was in fact commander of the entire submarine flotilla, including the B-4,
B-36 and B-130, and equal in rank to Captain Savitsky. According to author
Edward Wilson, the reputation Arkhipov had gained from his courageous conduct
in the previous year's Soviet submarine K-19 incident also helped him prevail.
Arkhipov eventually persuaded Savitsky to surface and await orders from
Moscow. This effectively averted the nuclear warfare which probably would have
ensued if the nuclear weapon had been fired. The submarine's batteries had run
very low and the air-conditioning had failed, causing extreme heat and high
levels of carbon dioxide inside the submarine. They were forced to surface
amidst its U.S. pursuers and return to the Soviet Union as a result._

 _" Immediately upon return to Russia, many crew members were faced with
disgrace from their superiors. One admiral told them "It would have been
better if you'd gone down with your ship."..."_

[1] -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Arkhipov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Arkhipov)

~~~
baybal2
>"Immediately upon return to Russia, many crew members were faced with
disgrace from their superiors. One admiral told them "It would have been
better if you'd gone down with your ship."..."

The main point here - this has shown that Soviet officers were reluctant to
carry orders, and if ordered "fight to the bitter end," would betray the
political leadership

It showed that no matter of what Soviet political establishment tries, it
would be unable to force the military to blindly follow the protocol. The fact
that this got uncovered and publicised displeased the higher ups in the
military because this endangered their positions, by rendering them incapable
of instilling that order.

------
tscs37
I first heard of his death in a very niche subreddit and only by chance. He
died in May and only now we know it. I was wondering how long it'd take for
mainstream media to pick up.

He was truly a hero, without his reaction a good chunk of this planet would be
nuclear wasteland.

~~~
greglindahl
Mainstream media? This is an rt.com article, a mouthpiece for the Kremlin.

~~~
int_19h
Its affiliation doesn't make it any less mainstream.

~~~
kk_cz
I think OP might have been disputing the "media" part rather than the
"mainstream" part.

------
Lxr
Petrov's story is a really good example of why employing smart people and
trusting them beats procedures and metrics every time. May he rest in peace.

~~~
tqkxzugoaupvwqr
You can’t take this case and generalize. In fact, the US’ strategy was a first
strike with a handful of nukes and a second, huge wave after the first strike
took out main communication/decision centers. So if this had been a real
strike, having this intelligent person disregard protocol could have ended in
a disaster for the Soviet Union.

…On the other hand, a not-so-intelligent person that blindly followed protocol
would have caused the downfall of the US and Soviet Union and the death of
hundreds of millions of people all over the world.

We all just got lucky.

~~~
TremendousJudge
>On the other hand, a not-so-intelligent person that blindly followed protocol
would have caused the downfall of the US and Soviet Union

I was reading on the Cuban missile crisis last night. There not one but
several instances where the Americans said 'if x happens, we nuke the
soviets', and then when x happened they didn't (for example, the downed U2
incident). The Soviets probably had just as many of those incidents. I think
it really shows that deep down nobody was actually ready to go to war, so in
all the chances they had to launch they chose instead not to.

~~~
mikeash
The Cuban Missile Crisis is fascinating. I think the US military was
absolutely ready to go to war, but thankfully they were reined in by the
civilian leadership. Some parts of the US military had been pushing for a
preemptive strike on the Soviets for years (thinking, correctly, that the
Soviets had little capability to strike back at the US, but that it would not
remain that way for much longer) and saw Cuba as a good opportunity to finally
get it done. That scene from Dr. Strangelove where General Turgidson says the
US would "get our hair mussed" with a mere 10-20 million dead was a pretty
accurate portrayal of how a lot of the military leadership thought. And they
pushed Kennedy _hard_ to go to war. A more bellicose president could have
easily been swayed by them, and we'd be living in a different world today.

------
unexistance
and

I'm reminded by the movie WarGames when the nuke officers (not sure the actual
designation) are replaced by relays...

I'm just glad the officer-just-doing-his-job expects systems to fail & trust
hsi own judgment, instead of our current ever-increasing trust in machines

~~~
flukus
In Wargames they detected a massive preemptive attack. One of the things that
tipped off the officer in this case was that it was such a small scale attack,
which doesn't make sense because it leaves the enemy willing and able to
respond.

~~~
_coldfire
From the article:

Taught that in case of a real attack the US would have gone on an all-out
offensive, Petrov told his bosses the alarm must have been caused by a system
malfunction.

------
csomar
This should actually sound the alarm: The decision (and the alarms) were so
randomly affected by life unbalances. This means that a whole system of
nuclear missiles might be just waiting for the right random wrong moment to
unleash hell on humans.

------
StanislavPetrov
Obligatory post on this thread due to my username (chosen to honor him).

------
laretluval
The prevalence of close calls on the Soviet side, and their likely existence
on the American side too, suggests thst the MAD system is robust to false
positives.

~~~
mikeash
Can you quantify "robust"?

The fact that these incidents have happened and armageddon has not yet
happened suggests that the probability of accidental nuclear war is relatively
low. But how low? Maybe the odds are one in a million per year. Maybe the odds
are one in a hundred per year. I'd say that both numbers are compatible with
the publicly known facts, but result in wildly different conclusions. The
former number suggests that nuclear war is a minor worry and we should
concentrate elsewhere. The latter suggests that human civilization is very
likely to be destroyed in this way, and we should do everything possible to
avert it.

------
paulbjensen
I watched this documentary about him and that event
[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2277106/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2277106/)

It's a good watch. RIP Stanislav Petrov.

------
amai
Not to forget:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Arkhipov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Arkhipov)

------
known
Reminds me of
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Few_Good_Men](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Few_Good_Men)

------
merraksh
_It was later revealed that what the Soviet satellites took for missiles
launch was sunlight reflected from clouds_

I hope detection systems improved since the 80s.

------
triangleman
According to the article, Petrov actually died on May 19th.

~~~
ameliaquining
Yes, but it seems as though no one outside of Petrov's family knew about it
until just now.

------
forapurpose
When AIs are making life and death decisions (because there are only
microseconds to act), will they hold their fire in the name of
humanitarianism? Would an AI have launched the missiles?

~~~
wutbrodo
You've misunderstood the story. Petrov didn't defy high-level Soviet goals in
the name of humanitarianism: the goal was to fire back if fired upon and _not_
to fire back if not fired upon. Petrov's achievement was making the right
judgment call that the US had not actually fired on Russia (i.e. that it was a
detection anomaly or something). Given that he wasn't deviating from the high-
level goals handed down, I don't see why an AI would be different in that
regard.

~~~
gambiting
Correct, it's actually likely that a good AI would also conclude, just like
Petrov did, that this is not an attack, given everything that was expected
from a real attack at the time. If they simply wired a launch detector to the
button that launches nukes, then that's not AI.

~~~
maxxxxx
I look forward to the debugging cycle of such an AI. After a few failures it
will work perfectly:)

------
faragon
Glory for a true hero. Thank you, Mr Petrov.

------
gozur88
If I had my druthers only two people would be recognized as individuals with a
national holiday in the US: Stanislav Petrov and Norman Borlaug.

------
sillysaurus3
When "just doing my job" saves the world.

 _“My cozy armchair felt like a red-hot frying pan and my legs went limp. I
felt like I couldn 't even stand up. That's how nervous I was when I was
taking this decision,” he told RT._

How well would any of us have done in that situation? It's tempting to think
that we'd have said no, don't launch. But picture yourself as a military
commander, raised in that lifestyle. Then add the natural inclination to
freeze up and make bad choices under pressure.

It's also a lesson in secrecy. We almost didn't hear about this story. It was
kept secret for a decade. How many secrets are you sitting on, bound by your
NDAs? Will you ever make the important ones public a decade later, or will you
decide it's not your position, or that it might affect your career?

It's easy to rationalize that it isn't our position to say anything about what
we know. But it's also too easy.

I wish it were possible to make a service that lets you upload encrypted notes
that will be made public after your death. But those two requirements
conflict.

~~~
canoebuilder
> _I wish it were possible to make a service that lets you upload encrypted
> notes that will be made public after your death. But those two requirements
> conflict._

That's a very interesting idea. What do you mean by the "requirements
conflict"?

Couldn't it be implemented with a dead man's switch where one would check in
every year or so. Of course there would need to be some verification methods
baked in to thwart pranksters.

~~~
stordoff
> What do you mean by the "requirements conflict"?

Possibly that such a dead man's switch would require the keys to be outside of
your control to some extent - after all, if you die the day after resetting
the switch, any infrastructure owned, maintained, or paid for by you might not
exist for the switch to fire. If you give the keys to a third-party, you have
to trust they aren't reading the contents and that their security measures are
sufficient.

It could be done on an ad-hoc basis if you have a trusted third-party (close
friend, for instance), but it's difficult to see how it could be scaled into a
service. Perhaps it could be split into two parties - you upload the encrypted
notes to the service, but they don't get the keys. You pass the keys to a
trusted third-party (i.e. the close friend), who can make the notes public by
giving the keys to the notes holder, who (ideally) would verify the death via
public records. This avoids giving the secrets directly to the friend (in case
of disagreements etc.), and you can reverse the decision whilst you are still
alive (by deleting the notes).

Also, depending on the nature of the secrets, it does provide an incentive for
death.

~~~
addHocker
You could make a time triggered death man switch that needs to be reset every
year. Else your secret is decrypted

~~~
whiteandnerdy
But if the system can decrypt itself in your absence it must have access to
the decryption keys. So you can't guarantee that the subsequent maintainer of
the system won't release the keys after your death. I suppose you could hide
the system somewhere (anonymous VPS) but then the encryption isn't actually
buying you anything over what the anonymity is getting you.

~~~
AstralStorm
You could use public key system to your advantage. Devise a cryptosystem that
takes x time to crack, write a program to crack it, let it roll. If you're
alive at the time of vulnerability being found, you can adjust or change the
key.

Likewise it would be a good case for a proof of work system with specialized
single machine input. You have to prove x amount of work every so often to
keep the data encrypted.

------
aaron695
The concept that people 'believe' the USSR would not have considered that a
satellite might give off a false positive seems the most important piece thing
to learn here.

It sounds like a well trained person, who was good at their job, did their job
well. Had they not of, which we all know happens, it would have been caught up
the chain.

It seems like people are more surprised that a Soviet officer was an
intelligent, controlled human being and I think this says more about us than
anything else.

------
addHocker
Im pretty sure, similar stories happend in the US, but as the winner gets to
write history, this page did not made it to print.

~~~
chiph
Anyone with the appropriate level of SIOP access (these days called OPLAN
8010-12) won't be talking.

------
jacquesm
So, how many Western countries will erect a statue for him?

~~~
MrZongle2
And in those countries, how many generations will pass before the mob demands
the statue be torn down?

~~~
mikeash
Do not sully this man by attempting to associate him with people whose only
notable achievement was fighting for the right to own other people.

------
rwoodley
rt.com is a russian tv station funded by the government. It is a proganda
outlet for Russia. one can assume kgb involvement and vetting of their
stories.

so this story seems benign enough, but bear in mind the source and consider
what their motivations might be.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT_(TV_network)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT_\(TV_network\))

~~~
Synaesthesia
Similar to the BBC for England or many countries which have state television.

~~~
aaronlifshin
Not really.

The BBC is a pretty independent body, and criticizes the government often. RT
is a propaganda arm of the government and is under its direct control, as all
mass media in Russia now (with few exceptions).

~~~
Synaesthesia
The BBC is quite balanced, I watch Russia today and find it similar in tone to
most western outlets, both state owned and private ... screeching on about
terrorism. Repetitive, mundane. They’re all quite openly propagandistic from
my point of view.

------
sien
The USSR put the first objects and people into space. They also built
armaments that could compete with NATO's best.

Meanwhile, today in North Korea it's pretty different.

Who knows what kind of systems they have in place to detect US attacks and how
faulty and flawed they are likely to be and how unstable the people on top of
them are and it's really something to fear.

~~~
tryingagainbro
_Who knows what kind of systems they have in place to detect US attacks and
how faulty and flawed they are likely to be and how unstable the people on top
of them are and it 's really something to fear._

It's easier, there the top leader decides and he loves his life: "Should you
launch something at us, we know where you are (show a few slides) and will
launch x nuclear weapons personally at you, wiping your entire family."

USSR had a leader but also the Politburo, in NK we have everything in one, and
so far for three generations. Maybe relay the same threat to the top generals
and you're done. Make it personal. Not your country, but your family will go
go first. The country will follow...

------
random_upvoter
As a religious person it is my belief that only divine protection saved us
from nuclear annihilation during that era. If you think about the primitive
state of that technology, the amount of brutal, stupid men that walked around
in the military and the number of close calls, you really have to wonder how
it did not happen.

~~~
staticelf
Really respectful to take away his heroic act and give credit to a fantasy-
figure. /s

~~~
pc2g4d
Why does believing God was involved mean Petrov wasn't heroic? Perhaps God was
why the hero Petrov was there when he was?

~~~
staticelf
Because it's fucking stupid and below HN. You are still giving a fantasy
figure the credit since he put the right guy there.

~~~
dang
Religious flamewar is not allowed on HN. Please don't post like this here,
regardless of how wrong or annoying other comments are.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
staticelf
Well, it is not disallowed like you say but I see what you mean. I would edit
away the first sentence but I can't anymore.

> Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something
> genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents.

This is what I responded to in the first place, flamebait. But I would have no
issues saying the first sentence in real life, to the face of anyone making
such a comment. I did not know how else to put it because it seriously makes
zero sense and is impossible to debate.

