PETROV DAY - WW3 ALMOST

LT. COL. S. Y. PETROV
(7 Sep 1939 – 19 May 2017),

Wouldn't be wrong to say that World War III clouds appeared over the horizon after almost four decades, on 24th February 2022 to be precise, the last close shave being Petrov Day, this day in 1983...

The world was saved from WW3 on at least four other occasions - The Berlin Wall issue in 1961, the Cuban crisis of 1962, Vietnam war in 1965 and the Middle East conflict in 1973...

It was on this day that USSR's nuclear early-warning system, manned by Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov, detected an US missile launch. Three weeks earlier USSR had downed a Korean Air Lines Flight 007 on 1st September 1983 into the Sea of Japan with 269 on board including 23 crew members...

Petrov, whose duty was to monitor and report any missile attack warnings to his superior in command who would have decided the nature of response, analysed the warning as a FALSE ALARM. For, he had a gut feeling that his superiors, under the prevailing circumstances, would have certainly pulled the trigger if informed...

Petrov's hunch proved right as the system had malfunctioned, detecting a rare alignment of sunlight on clouds above North Dakota as a missile strike...

Despite valid reasons for his judgement Petrov was eased out by the authorities. In 1984 Petrov took up a job at the institute that had developed the early warning system. In 1998 he reportedly suffered a mental breakdown, with a feeling that he was made a scapegoat...

For a man who averted a possible WW3 Petrov went rewardless. For, he had embarrassed his superiors and the scientists responsible for it, and they would have faced punishment had he received one...

🙏🙏