

Bugs in Soviet early warning system could have started WWIII - wallflower
http://www.worldcitizens.org/petrov2.html

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varjag
Not sure how factual the story is.

From what is known about Soviet nuclear protocol, sanctioning this kind of
launch required unanimous confirmation from three suitcase holders: General
Secretary, Minister of Defence and Head of Strategic Missile Command. Only in
case of confirmed death of all three the Perimetr system (automated full-scale
response to any detected missile attack) should've kicked in.

It is very unlikely that this sort of decision would've been left to a sole
officer in minor rank.

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Confusion
I knew I'd seen this before, along with some other instances of near WWIII:
<http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=913#more-913>

