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| Vasili Arkhipov |
He saved the world from the dangers of nuclear war in the past five decades. He single-handedly prevented World War III. However, he died as a humiliation, wasted, and not famous. Only now his story into the spotlight.
A documentary that was shown on Tuesday (25/09/2012) night told how for 13 days in the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, the world held its breath as the Soviet Union and the United States are on the verge of nuclear war. At the height of the Cold War, when the paranoia on both sides are in the condition in which even the slightest provocation could trigger a nuclear war, four Russian submarine secretly sailed to Cuba.
Only a handful of the submarine crew who knew that their ships carrying nuclear weapons, each with a power bomb like the one dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima in 1945.
Vasili Arkhipov, who was in the submarine B-59, is one of them. When the ship approached Cuba, a number of helicopters, aircraft, and U.S. warships to explore the ocean to look for submarines Russian.
"At that time the weapon is named 'special weapons', not 'nuclear torpedoes'," said Viktor Mikhailov, a junior at the submarine navigator Sub B-59. "In those days we could not even imagine a nuclear torpedo."
In the romp game of cat and mouse at high risk, shortly Russian ships visible. Arkhipov carrying submarines forced to make an emergency dive.
When the submarine was trying to stay hidden from the U.S. hunt, conditions deteriorated in the submarine. During the week they are under water, in the heat of the ship 60 degrees celsius. The day they just rationed glass of water. Above them, on the surface of the water, the U.S. Navy continued to hunt. U.S. navy tries to force Soviet submarines came to the surface to recharge their batteries.
The U.S. did not know that the submarines were no weapons capable of destroying the entire U.S. fleet.
Gary Slaughter, a signal officer on board the USS Cony, said, "We know they may have difficulty breathing.'s Hot in there, they suffer. They are made miserable, and they have been under pressure for a long time. Basically what we're trying to do is implement a passive torture. Frankly I have no sympathy at all for them. they are the enemy. "
The Americans decided to raise the pressure and dropped a grenade warning to the sea. Inside the submarine, the Soviet submariners think they are attacked. Valentin Savitsky, the captain of the submarine B-59, believe nuclear war has already begun. So he requested the submarine crew to launch their torpedoes in order to save a little face Russia.
The documentary that aired Channel 5 revealed that, under normal circumstances Savitsky command will be followed, and World War III was certainly not inevitable.
Ryurik Ketov, another submarine commander, the Sub B-4, said, "Vasili Arkhipov submariners and a close friend of mine. He was a family friend. He is level-headed. He's in control."
Savitsky not account Arkhipov. As commander of the fleet, Arkhipov had the final veto. Although his men against him, he insisted, they should not be fired. Instead, they gave up.
That is definitely an embarrassing step, but a step that is saving the world. Soviet submarines were forced to return to Russia. Of course, they were greeted not as a hero.
Historian Thomas Blanton told The Sun, "What is heroism, what a job, they are halfway there and back, and is still alive. Yet, in fact, a Russian admiral told the crew of the submarine was, 'It is better if you go down with your ship. "Extraordinary."
Four decades passed before the story of what really happened to the submarine B-59 was revealed. It happened after Arkipov died in 1998 due to radiation poisoning.
But for Olga, wife of Vasili Arkhipov, her husband was a hero. Olga said, "He knows that it is madness to fire nuclear torpedoes. In Cuba, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the crisis, the people gathered. They say that the person who prevented a nuclear war was the Russian submariners, Vasili Arkhipov. I am proud and I am always proud of my husband. "
source : Google
