I was surfing on wikipedia a few days ago and I came upon a mini biographical about Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov, a Soviet officer. Apparently he correctly summarised that an American nuclear strike showing up on his sensors was a computer malfunction and an alarm for a retaliatory strike was not to be raised.
After reading that article, I am wondering how many more such people who have influenced the course of human history in such a huge way are out there. People who have remained relatively unknown and often, unsung or unblamed.
Here are a few that I could find, seniors please do feel free to add more content or comment on the existing one:
These are basically some people that I feel are relatively unknown by the public at large vis-a-vis their actions, good or bad as they may be.
After reading that article, I am wondering how many more such people who have influenced the course of human history in such a huge way are out there. People who have remained relatively unknown and often, unsung or unblamed.
Here are a few that I could find, seniors please do feel free to add more content or comment on the existing one:
- Gavrilo Princip:
Gavrilo Princip was a Yugoslav nationalist associated with the freedom movement Mlada Bosna (Young Bosnia). Princip assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his pregnant wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914.
- Richard Sorge:
Sorge supplied the Soviet Red Army with information about the Anti-Comintern Pact, the German-Japanese Pact and warned of the Pearl Harbor attack. In 1941, Sorge is said to have informed them of the exact launch date of Operation Barbarossa.
- Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov:
Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov was a Soviet naval officer. During the Cuban Missile Crisis he prevented the launch of a nuclear torpedo and therefore a possible nuclear war.
- Oleg Penkovsky:
Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky, codenamed "Agent Hero", was a colonel with Soviet military intelligence (GRU) in the late 1950s and early 1960s who informed the United States about the Soviet Union placing missiles on Cuba, which led to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
- Stanislav Petrov:
Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov is a retired Soviet Air Defence Forces lieutenant colonel who deviated from standard Soviet doctrine by correctly identifying a missile attack warning as a false alarm on September 26, 1983. This decision most likely resulted in preventing an accidental retaliatory nuclear attack on the United States and its Western Allies.
These are basically some people that I feel are relatively unknown by the public at large vis-a-vis their actions, good or bad as they may be.
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