A History Of How Close We Have Come To Nuclear Annihilation

A History Of How Close We Have Come To Nuclear Annihilation.

Hello ATSer’s.

In this thread I would like to bring to light how close we have come to a third world war in the past. Some of it you may already know about, some of it you may not. I hope that by viewing this thread you will be educated about what to watch out for with future events. So let’s get started:

Operation Unthinkable

Operation Unthinkable was a plan by Winston Churchill to attack the Soviet Union to “impose upon Russia the will of the United States and the British Empire”. The allies feared the massive amounts of Soviet soldiers that was left in Europe at the end of WW2. They also feared that because the Soviets had not yet attacked Japan, they might be waiting to join forces with them (Japan) to go for an all-out war with the west.

The plan was soon found to be “militarily unfeasible” as the soviets unions army out numbered that of the allies three to one. The only way around the massive numbers of Soviets would be the element of surprise but if the “surprise” tactic didn’t work the allied forces would be caught in a “total war” that would have been extremely destructive.

Some people believe that Operation Unthinkable was the grandfather of the cold war.

en.wikipedia.org...

The Cuban Missile Crisis



Many of you would have heard of The Cuban Missile Crisis but what many of you may not know is that it was the closest we have come to all out nuclear war. In 1962, in response to the build-up of US missile bases in the UK, Italy and Turkey, The USSR began to build ICBM bases in Cuba with the capability of striking the US with Nuclear warheads.

The US considered an invasion of Cuba to dismantle the missile bases but instead choose to evoke a military quarantine of Cuba. They inspected all ships coming in and out of Cuba.

Thankfully after long talk between JFK and Khrushchev the situation was finally resolved and the Soviets dismantled the nuclear bases and shipped them back to Russia. In return the US publically announced that they wouldn’t invade Cuba, but behind close door they also agreed to disarm their sites in the UK, Italy and Turkey.

en.wikipedia.org...

Check this site for interesting fact about The Cuban Missile Crisis:
www.funtrivia.com...

Stanislav Petrov Savior Of the World?



On 26 September 1983 the Russian early warning system "Oko" alerted Stanislav Petrov that an American ICBM had been launched and was heading toward Russia. Luckily Stanislav Petrov dismissed the alert as a false alarm. Not long after the first alert “Oko” made another warning that four intercontinental ballistic missiles were on their way to Moscow, yet again and even more amazingly Stanislav noticed that it must have been a false alarm and did not tell his superiors.

This “false alarm” could have led to two scenarios:

Scenario A would have been the accidental launch of nuclear weapons by the USSR against the US and its allies, leading to all out nuclear war.

Scenario B would have been; If the warning was not a false alarm the Soviets would have had only minutes to respond the nuclear attack.

I believe we can all safely say the Stanislav Petrov is the saviour of the world and without him we would likely not be here.

en.wikipedia.org...

Able Archer 1983



Now this is a strange one, full of PSYOPS, double agents and conspiracy. The basics are that in 1983 NATO held a ten day exercise known as "Able Archer". The exercise was to simulate a series of conflict escalations where the end-game was a nuclear attack, (basically a simulation of situations that were already going on at the time).

The operation was so realistic the Soviets believed that Able Archer was a "Ruse of war". The relationship between the USSR and the US were at an all-time low. Two months before Able Archer the Soviets shot down Korean Air Lines flight 007 killing 269 people including Larry McDonald, a member of congress. Before this the US had been testing Russian air and sea space, so you can see how Able Archer seemed threatening to the USSR.

The Soviets believed so much that the allies were about to launch an attack that the readied their nuclear attack force. Its even believed that they went as far as to ready their ICBM silos. Subsequently the Soviets fears died when the exercise finished on November 11th.

Apparently after learning of the Soviets paranoia, Ronald Regan stated; "I don't see how they could believe that—but it’s something to think about."

To be honest I believe there is a lot more to Able Archer but I’ll let you be the judge.

en.wikipedia.org...

Summary

These I believe are the closest we have come to world war 3. People may say but what about 9/11? What about Iraq? What about Afganistan? Well yes they are bad but as bad as things are in the world right now, they have been worse.

If the Third World War is fought with nuclear weapons, the fourth will be fought with bows and arrows.

Louis Mountbatten

Thanks for reading.

ALS

Interesting.

A bit frightening, too. I was aware of the Cuban Missle Crisis. I wish to learn history so I can aide in not repeating the same mistakes. But the other two times which we were the closest to a Third World War (Operation Unthinkable; Petrov) I hadn't come to realize.


Who knows how many MORE times we have come to such a possible scenario, possibly igniting the war to end all wars? Where nuclear conflict, instigating a nuclear winter, would destroy most if not all the human race?


One thing's for certain:


Someone's gotta push the button...


And may we hope he's as smart as Petrov once was.

reply to post by TheTruthSeeker1996


Your right it can be a quite scary read, sometimes I think I am glad I wasn't around to see it. The problem with having these weapons of mass destruction is that when it comes down to it, the only reason we will use them is because we have them.

Its very saddening.

Thanks for reading.
ALS

A video with some info on operation unthinkable.



ALS

Bumped!

www.threeworldwars.com...

An interesting website that deserves some attention.

ALS

Here is a little known incident where a black bear in Duluth MN almost started a nuclear war, just to show how close we have come by accident.

Bear incident During the Cuban missile crisis a majority of B-47 bombers with capability to drop nuclear payloads were "dispersed" to Volk, among other bases, to make it harder for the Soviets to threaten USAF assets.[4]. At around midnight on October 25, a guard at the Duluth Sector Direction Center saw a figure climbing the security fence. He shot at it, and activated the "sabotage alarm." This automatically set off sabotage alarms at all bases in the area. At Volk Field, Wisconsin, the alarm was wrongly wired, and the Klaxon sounded which ordered nuclear armed F-106A interceptors to take off. The pilots knew there would be no practice alert drills while DEFCON 3 was in force, and they believed World War III had started. Immediate communication with Duluth showed there was an error. By this time aircraft were starting down the runway and Volk was too small for a control tower (its aircraft were dispatched from Duluth 300 miles (480 km) away). A truck raced from command center and successfully signaled the aircraft to stop. The intruder was later identified as a black bear, not the Soviet saboteurs in advance of a nuclear attack the sentry was expecting.

I remember hearing about this a long time ago and thought it is relevant to the thread.

Source: en.wikipedia.org...:

reply to post by Darkblade71


Wow, a black bear nearly causing nuclear war. Sounds lie a skit from a Benny Hill movie.

ALS

Vasili Arkhipov

The U.S. Navy started dropping depth charges around this guy's sub, during the Cuban Missile Crisis. His captain believed that a war had started and wanted to launch a nuclear tipped torpedo. The captain and 2 other officers, including Vasili discussed whether or not to launch, the torpedo was to be fired if all could agree unanimously, Vasili was the only one against it and managed to convince the others that it was a bad idea.

Bumped.

ALS

Wow, sweet thread man spells it out....Next will be Iran! FBS!

Originally posted by OPUFO3257142119
Wow, sweet thread man spells it out....Next will be Iran!

FBS!

Yeah maybe. I'll have to add it after.

ALS

Check out this map and understand we have been living through a nuclear "war" for the last 60+ years.

2053 Detonations and counting...

reply to post by METACOMET


I'm guessing these were test detentions. That map was really cool, thanks.

ALS

1983 was a very bad year in the Cold War. It may well have been its true climax, though most of it happened covertly. There was an article I read many years ago, and it may have related to Able Archer, but supposedly there was in 1983 an enormous amount of pressure within the Kremlin to perform a preemptive strike on the U.S. because they feared we were preparing to hit them immanently. A lot of that fear came from the U.S.'s massive military build-up started as soon as Reagan came into office. They really thought Reagan was preparing to attack them. It essentially came down to a decision by Andropov to not hit us, but had he said "go," the support was apparently there within the Politburo.

reply to post by ALOSTSOUL

I believe we can all safely say the Stanislav Petrov is the saviour of the world and without him we would likely not be here.

Indeed. In 1983 there was something like 35 000 nukes in the Soviet Union/US.

There's also countless incidents were new radars or computers were installed and they were set wrong and it showed incoming missiles... every time people refused to believe it was real and didn't launch.

At least there are humans that are not warmongers sociopaths in the nuclear armed forces... which is good to know.

reply to post by Vitchilo

There's also countless incidents were new radars or computers were installed and they were set wrong and it showed incoming missiles... every time people refused to believe it was real and didn't launch.

This makes me wonder if any nuclear powers have, or have ever had an "automatic nuclear response" system.

In other words, if the US preemptively launched on the USSR, would the USSR have a system in place that would counter launch without (or with very little) human mediation?

I saw the movie "By Dawn's Early Light" for the first time last night. The movie is about the Soviets being attacked by an ICBM by a rogue faction in Turkey. However, the soviets believe the attack is from a NATO ICBM and as a result, launch dozens of ICBMs at the US. The Russian president calls the US president and states that when their systems confirmed the initial ICBM launch from turkey, their systems "AUTOMATICALLY" counter launched.

I found this a very interesting concept. It's not a string I prefer to hang from; at the same time it would not really surprise me.

I remember reading about an old Soviet transmitter signal that still exists today. It transimts the dsame code over and over. People speculate that the signal is an "auto-trigger". Basically, if the transmitter stops transmitting, the Soviets would conclude that the location of the signal was destroyed, and thus launch.

Anyways, if anyone knows i'd appreciate it if you might elaborate on it here.

reply to post by METACOMET

This makes me wonder if any nuclear powers have, or have ever had an "automatic nuclear response" system.

Yes but it was not totally automatic. It would only be activated when there's a crisis... then if sensors detected nuclear blasts and couldn't communicate with the high command, then it would send launch orders to nuclear missiles... which can launch automatically.

The Soviet had that kind of system. I don't know if the US had anything like it, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Russia's 'Doomsday Machine' Still Ready for Action?

Inside the Apocalyptic Soviet Doomsday Machine

And about the number of nukes... it reached 65 000 nukes for several years during the cold war... can you imagine a nuclear war with 65 000 nukes going off?

I don't doubt at all that we've been sitting at one minute to midnight with someone holding their finger on the red button far too many times for us to even fathom, and we will never know about it.

I'm also of the belief that at some point in time, most likely sooner than later, someone somewhere is going to use their precious weapons of mass destruction causing annihilation of either a small area or, gawd forbid, a large area of land mass and its populace.

So long as these damn things are in existence, the temptation to eventually use them is inevitable given the right circumstances.

We are our own worst enemies.

reply to post by METACOMET


The signal you are referring to is the UVB-signal. It was transmitting for 30 years, and know one knew why. It stop transmitting in 2010. Theres a large thread on it you might like to read.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

ALS