Arkhipov received little recognition during his lifetime, but to his wife Olga, Vasili was always a hero. In a 2012 PBS documentary titled The Man Who Saved the World, Olga Arkhipov said, “The man who prevented a nuclear war was a Russian submariner. His name was Vasili Arkhipov.
And the person who likely did more than anyone else to prevent that dangerous day from becoming an existential catastrophe was a quiet Soviet naval officer named Vasili Arkhipov. On that day, Arkhipov was serving aboard the nuclear-armed Soviet submarine B-59 in international waters near Cuba.
Vasily Aleksandrovich Arkhipov (Russian: Василий Александрович Архипов, IPA: [vɐˈsʲilʲɪj ɐlʲɪkˈsandrəvʲɪtɕ arˈxʲipəf], 30 January 1926 – 19 August 1998) was a Soviet Naval officer who is known for preventing a Soviet nuclear torpedo launch during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Stanislav Petrov, a little-known Russian whose decision averted a potential nuclear war, died in May at 77, a family friend disclosed in mid-September. As a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Air Defense Forces, Petrov was on duty Sept.
You might not recognize the name Vasili Arkhipov, but it's more than likely that you owe him a debt of gratitude. Although his heroic actions only came to light relatively recently, it's now understood that Arkhipov's cool head helped to avert a potential global nuclear conflict.
Let us resolve to work together to realize a world free from fear of nuclear weapons, remembering the courageous judgement of Stanislav Petrov.” As Petrov had died, the award was collected by his daughter, Elena. Petrov's son Dmitri missed his flight to New York because the US embassy delayed his visa.
They are the reason why most of you were born, and why all of you are reading these lines — instead of fossilizing or spreading as ash across the globe. You owe your lives to them. Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov and Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov were two Soviet soldiers, members of the armed forces.
Stanislav Petrov was a lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defense Forces who became known as "the man who saved the world from nuclear war" for his role in a 1983 Soviet nuclear false alarm incident.
In 1992, Ukraine signed the Lisbon Protocol and it joined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear weapon state in 1994. The transfer of all nuclear material took some time, but by 2001, all nuclear weapons had been transferred to Russia to be dismantled and all launch silos decommissioned.
During the meeting, Lebed mentioned the possibility that several suitcase portable nuclear bombs had gone missing. More specifically, according to an investigation Lebed led during his time as acting secretary, it was concluded that 84 of these devices were unaccounted for.
Marinesko thus became the most successful Soviet submarine commander in terms of gross register tonnage (GRT) sunk, with 42,000 GRT to his name. Before sinking the Wilhelm Gustloff, Alexander Marinesko was facing a court martial due to his problems with alcohol and was thus deemed "not suitable to be a hero".
Stanislav Petrov, who passed away this year at the age of 77, may not be a household name, but he probably should be. After all, he single-handedly saved the world from nuclear armageddon during the hair-trigger height of the Cold War. The year was 1983.
At a time when the probability of nuclear war is as nearly as high as it was during the Cuban Missile Crisis, it is crucial that we recall the story of Vasili Arkhipov, a Soviet submarine officer who prevented a Soviet nuclear strike against U.S. surface warships during that very crisis in 1962.
Supporting an ally: After the revolution, Cuba was an ally of the Soviet Union. It had seen an abortive CIA backed attack occur at the Bay of Pigs and was perceived to be at risk of future attacks from the United States. Missiles would act as a deterrent against such an attack.
After the Bay of Pigs incident, Cuba clearly felt threatened by the United States. Castro started to look for a closer relationship with the USSR who could offer the country protection. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev decided to agree to Cuba's request to place nuclear missiles there to deter future harassment of Cuba.
After many long and difficult meetings, Kennedy decided to place a naval blockade, or a ring of ships, around Cuba. The aim of this "quarantine," as he called it, was to prevent the Soviets from bringing in more military supplies. He demanded the removal of the missiles already there and the destruction of the sites.
In 1994, Ukraine, citing its inability to circumvent Russian launch codes, reached an understanding to transfer and destroy these weapons, and become a party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).
Until 2006 the Ukrainian Armed Forces worked with NATO in Iraq. Most officials believed it would be too risky to allow Ukraine to join NATO as it would upset Russia greatly. On 6 April 2004 the Verkhovna Rada adopted a law on the free access of NATO forces to the territory of Ukraine.
Later in 1993, the Ukrainian and Russian governments signed a series of bilateral agreements giving up Ukrainian claims to the nuclear weapons and the Black Sea Fleet, in return for $2.5 billion of gas and oil debt cancellation and future supplies of fuel for its nuclear power reactors.
Two of the bombs he and his colleagues helped create were dropped on Japan, killing several hundred thousand people, mostly civilians, but helping bring the war to a quicker end. Afterwards, Oppenheimer expressed regret about these weapons and worked to stop their proliferation.
In 1983, Stanislav Petrov, a lieutenant colonel in the Soviet Union's Air Defense Forces, trusted his gut and averted a global nuclear catastrophe.
27 October 1962
At the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Soviet patrol submarine B-59 almost launched a nuclear-armed torpedo while under harassment by American naval forces.
Stanislav Petrov, a former Soviet military officer, poses at his home in 2015 near Moscow.
The purpose of the operation was to collect intelligence on potential contingency plans of the Reagan administration to launch a nuclear first strike against the Soviet Union. The program was initiated in May 1981 by Yuri Andropov, then chairman of the KGB.
The Man Who Saved the World, a feature film, tells the true yet nearly untold story of Stanislav Petrov, the Soviet lieutenant colonel who single-handedly prevented nuclear Armageddon at the height of the Cold War.