The Russian man who saved the world

In 2002, historians and diplomats from Russia, the USA and Cuba met to revisit the events surrounding the Cuban missle crisis in 1963.

Noam Chomsky tells this story from the meeting:

The nature of the threats was dramatically underscored last October at the summit meeting in Havana on the 40th anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis, attended by key participants from Russia, the U.S., and Cuba.  Planners knew at the time that they had the fate of the world in their hands, but new information released at the Havana summit was truly startling. We learned that the world was saved from nuclear devastation by one Russian submarine captain, Vasily Arkhipov, who blocked an order to fire nuclear missiles when Russian submarines were attacked by U.S. destroyers near Kennedy’s “quarantine” line. Had Arkhipov agreed, the nuclear launch would have almost certainly set off an interchange that could have “destroyed the Northern hemisphere,” as Eisenhower had warned.

Where is the Nobel Peace Prize for Vassily Arkhipov?

You can read more about the summit meeting in this interview with Thomas S. Blanton, executive director of the National Security Archive at the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.