What if… Stanislav Petrov Made the Phone Call?

A Culture Pipeline

History Date: September 26, 1983

How It Likely Wouldn’t Have Happened

On September 26, 1983, inside a Soviet early-warning bunker outside Moscow, Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov received alert of a U.S. nuclear missiles were inbound. His screen showed multiple launches. His duty was to pick up the phone and report the attack, triggering a Soviet counterstrike that would almost certainly have started a nuclear war.
But Petrov didn’t make that call. He reasoned that the alert was probably a system malfunction. He was right. It was a false alarm caused by sunlight reflecting off high-altitude clouds. In our timeline, Petrov’s hesitation saved the world. But what if he had made the call?
The year 1983 was already the most dangerous period of the Cold War since the Cuban Missile Crisis. In an alternate timeline, a more cautious Petrov trusts his computer instead of his instincts and alerts Soviet high command, including Yuri Andropov, the General Secretary of the Communist Party. Given the climate of fear, Andropov might have ordered an immediate retaliatory launch. Within 20 to 30 minutes, hundreds of Soviet ICBMs could have been en route to NATO targets in Western Europe and the continental United States.

The Butterfly Effect

Petrov’s choices that night were driven by a deep sense of moral clarity, rather than by any standard training. If a different officer, someone more compliant or less questioning, had been on duty, we might not even be having this conversation today.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident

https://www.historyextra.com/period/cold-war/stanislav-petrov-soviet-soldier-saved-the-world/

Future Of Life Award 2018

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov