Inside the Apocalyptic Soviet Doomsday Machine

[cykoe6]

Really interesting article about the Russian "doomsday device".

http://www.wired.com/politics/securi...urrentPage=all

Yarynich is talking about Russia's doomsday machine. That's right, an actual doomsday device?a real, functioning version of the ultimate weapon, always presumed to exist only as a fantasy of apocalypse-obsessed science fiction writers and paranoid über-hawks. The thing that historian Lewis Mumford called "the central symbol of this scientifically organized nightmare of mass extermination." Turns out Yarynich, a 30-year veteran of the Soviet Strategic Rocket Forces and Soviet General Staff, helped build one.
Chart source: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Natural Resources Defense Council

The point of the system, he explains, was to guarantee an automatic Soviet response to an American nuclear strike. Even if the US crippled the USSR with a surprise attack, the Soviets could still hit back. It wouldn't matter if the US blew up the Kremlin, took out the defense ministry, severed the communications network, and killed everyone with stars on their shoulders. Ground-based sensors would detect that a devastating blow had been struck and a counterattack would be launched.

The technical name was Perimeter, but some called it Mertvaya Ruka, or Dead Hand. It was built 25 years ago and remained a closely guarded secret. With the demise of the USSR, word of the system did leak out, but few people seemed to notice. In fact, though Yarynich and a former Minuteman launch officer named Bruce Blair have been writing about Perimeter since 1993 in numerous books and newspaper articles, its existence has not penetrated the public mind or the corridors of power. The Russians still won't discuss it, and Americans at the highest levels?including former top officials at the State Department and White House?say they've never heard of it. When I recently told former CIA director James Woolsey that the USSR had built a doomsday device, his eyes grew cold. "I hope to God the Soviets were more sensible than that." They weren't.

[Marcus Aurelius]

"Perimeter ensures the ability to strike back, but it's no hair-trigger device. It was designed to lie semi-dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosions. Before launching any retaliatory strike, the system had to check off four if/then propositions: If it was turned on, then it would try to determine that a nuclear weapon had hit Soviet soil. If it seemed that one had, the system would check to see if any communication links to the war room of the Soviet General Staff remained. If they did, and if some amount of time—likely ranging from 15 minutes to an hour—passed without further indications of attack, the machine would assume officials were still living who could order the counterattack and shut down. But if the line to the General Staff went dead, then Perimeter would infer that apocalypse had arrived. It would immediately transfer launch authority to whoever was manning the system at that moment deep inside a protected bunker—bypassing layers and layers of normal command authority. At that point, the ability to destroy the world would fall to whoever was on duty: maybe a high minister sent in during the crisis, maybe a 25-year-old junior officer fresh out of military academy. And if that person decided to press the button ... If/then. If/then. If/then. If/then"


Odds are that one guy would have never followed through. Imagine having the fate of the world as we know it at your fingertips..

[SpaProd]

Seen this yesterday, a great read.

[Marcus Aurelius]

If I'm reading correctly, the decision to push the button was irrelevant. It was the fourth IF/THEN sequence. So how long once the decision came down to human hands in a bunker would the machine wait before pushing the button for them.

[u-Bob]

"I know you're upset Dimitri. How do you think I feel?" lol

[spider_x]

Mein fuhrer! I can walk!!!!!

[cykoe6]

If I'm reading correctly, the decision to push the button was irrelevant. It was the fourth IF/THEN sequence. So how long once the decision came down to human hands in a bunker would the machine wait before pushing the button for them.

The way I read it a person would still have to make the final decision to launch.

Perimeter, he points out, was never a truly autonomous doomsday device. "If there are explosions and all communications are broken," he says, "then the people in this facility can?I would like to underline can?launch."

Yes, I agree, a human could decide in the end not to press the button. But that person is a soldier, isolated in an underground bunker, surrounded by evidence that the enemy has just destroyed his homeland and everyone he knows. Sensors have gone off; timers are ticking. There's a checklist, and soldiers are trained to follow checklists.

Wouldn't any officer just launch? I ask Yarynich what he would do if he were alone in the bunker. He shakes his head. "I cannot say if I would push the button."

[pr0]

Odds are that one guy would have never followed through. Imagine having the fate of the world as we know it at your fingertips..

Assuming this person thought ANY human beings would survive at all. I'd bet my money on them hitting the button.

They would go down in history as "the one man". The person everyone would know, forever, until the end of human history.

Would you pass up that spot in history, even if known as a mad man?

I can go through a list of very famous, well known people, who did just that.

[DaddyHalbucks]

Great read, some scary stuff.

[GregE]

Assuming this person thought ANY human beings would survive at all. I'd bet my money on them hitting the button.

They would go down in history as "the one man". The person everyone would know, forever, until the end of human history.

I don't know about that, but if that person had reason to believe that his country was destroyed (and all of his loved ones were dead) he'd sure as hell press the button.

[Hentaikid]

And what exactly was this doomsday device? Cobalt bomb?

[cykoe6]

And what exactly was this doomsday device? Cobalt bomb?

There is a link provided to the article. You could try reading it and find out.