Hey
Folks,Let me start off by wishing all of you a peaceful and gratitude-filled, Stanislav Petrov Day, a day celebrated the world over to commemorate the bravery and humanity of the man who, on this day, 34 years ago - September 26, 1983 - single-handedly saved the world from a thermo-nuclear holocaust.
This is not hyperbole - it's an historic fact. And if you're not familiar with the events of that day, you're urged to look it up. For now, here's the gist of the story...
Stanislav Petrov, then aged 44, was a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Air Defense Forces. On the morning of September 26, 1983, he was stationed as the duty officer in a secret command center outside Moscow, which monitored Russia's early-warning satellites over the US, when, suddenly, alarms went off warning of an American missile attack.
According to his computers, five Minutemen intercontinental ballistic missiles had just been launched from an American airbase and were heading straight for the Soviet Union.
The cold war was at its height - President Ronald Regan had declared the Soviet Union an 'evil empire', three weeks earlier the Soviets had shot down a Korean Airline, killing all 269 people on board, including a US congressman, and the Soviet leadership was obsessed by fears of an American attack.
With computers indicating an incomming first-strike, nuclear attack, protocol called for a retaliatory launch within the 20 minutes it would take for the US missles to reach their targets.
And yet, with alarm bells clanging and 'LAUNCH' alerts flashing, and the very real prospect of a quintet of nuclear warheads hurtling towards Moscow, Stanislav Petrov, committed one of the most audacious acts of the 20th century.
He stayed his hand.
Stanislav had been trained that if, and when, the US launched a first-strike it would be a massive, all-out nuclear assault, and so the fact that only five incoming missiles were being tracked led him to question the alert data. The attack profile was odd and the early-warning computer system was relatively new, which led him to suspect a possible system failure. And though he couldn't know for sure if the alert was a false-alarm, he made the decision not to initiate a retaliatory strike, knowing full well that were he wrong in his judgement, his homeland, the country he was sworn to protect and serve, was doomed.
Fortunately for us all, his instincts proved correct. It was subsequently determined that a rare alignment of sunlight bouncing off high-altitude clouds in North Dakota had caused a false satellite reading. There were no missles heading for Moscow. There was no U.S. attack.
But make no mistake - if Stanislav Petrov had followed the rules, had trusted established protocol instead of his instincts...
...millions of people would have died that day, many more millions would have died in the following weeks, months and years, and a legitimate argument could be made that the resulting nuclear winter could conceivably have wiped all of humanity off the face of the Earth.
This end-of-days scenario is not some obscure sci-fi fantasy, this almost happened; save for the action - or rather the bold and courageous non-action - of one Stanislav Petrov, 34 years ago today.
Stanislav Petrov died this year, May 19, 2017, at the age of 77.
He was never rewarded by his own government, which was embarrassed by the failings of their missile defense system. But as time goes on, Petrov's story and the consequences of his actions have spread.
And while 34 years after the fact some things have changed - some things have not.
In the precarious and provocative times we live in, we'd do well to contemplate what horrors could occur were the triggers of such awesome weaponry in the hands of individuals possessing less of the maturity, wisdom, common sense and sheer humanity of Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov.
Oh, wait, that's the very perilous state of affairs we find ourselves facing today! WTF!
Let's hope the spirit of Stanislav Petrov touches the hearts and minds of those men and women, on both sides of the Pacific Ocean, who are in a position to prevent the worse from happening.
We can only hope.
So, meanwhile...
Happy Stanislav Petrov Day, everybody!
And may your micro-wave oven be the most radiation you're exposed to in your lifetime!
https://www.dropbox.com/s/9870wl94jpjbkgy/Humor%20Me.mp3?dl=0
And here's a fun video of my song, 'I'm a Lucky Guy' created by documentary producer, Debra Gonsher Vinik, as part of her ongoing 'Mincha Moment' series, comprised of videos encouraging viewers to take time out each day to acknowledge how truly fortunate they are:
https://youtu.be/7-JdjFeDzd4
And truth be told, we should all be infinitely grateful for the fact that Stanislav Petrov chose not to blow us all to kingdom come, 34 years ago today!
Peace Out!
PS: Oh, BTW, for those very few of you
reading this who are still pondering whether or not to
order a copy of my new album, '12 Songs', here's an
album review just published in 'Songwriting Magazine', which claims
that apparently, I '...have plenty of fuel left in the tank!' ;-)
Check it out:
https://www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk/music-reviews/12-songs-by-dean-friedman-album/39192
https://www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk/music-reviews/12-songs-by-dean-friedman-album/39192
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