Skip to main content

The Power of Sticking to Your Decision

Have you ever had an opinion about something that was mocked and laughed at by others who held different views on the topic? Have you ever contemplated changing your opinion just because those other people told you that you were in the wrong? Then let me narrate a story to you real quick.

Vasily Aleksandrovich Arkhipov- yeah, you might not have heard this name ever in your life but trust me when I say that he's the reason you're alive and well today. Arkhipov was a Soviet Naval officer who was credited by Thomas S. Blanton in 2002 as "the man who saved the world." On 27th October, 1962, during the period of the Cold War, a nuclear-armed Foxtrot-class submarine B-59 was located near Cuba by a group of 11 US Navy destroyers and the aircraft carrier USS Randolph. Even though the submarine was in international waters, the US Navy started dropping depth chargers which were intended to force the submarine to rise to the surface for identification.

By that time, the contact from Moscow had ceased to exist for several days. As the submarine was trying to hide from its American pursuers, it was too deep to monitor any radio traffic. Those on board did not know if the Cold War had ended, and an actual combat had begun. The captain of the submarine, Valentin Grigoryevich Savitsky believed that the hot war had started without any solid evidence backing this and decided to launch a T-5 nuclear torpedo. Unlike the other Soviet submarines armed with special weapons, where only the captain and the political officer were required to authorize a nuclear launch, the authorization of three officers was required on the B-59 because Arkhipov was also the chief of staff of the brigade. The three men here were Captain Savitsky, Political Officer Ivan Semyonovich Maslennikov, and Executive Officer Arhkipov. Both Savitsky and Maslennikov wanted to initiate the nuclear launch but Arkhipov stood against their decision and held off his approval. Arkhipov managed to eventually persuade Savitsky to surface and await orders from Moscow.

If he had fallen victim to peer pressure and given his approval on the matter, then the course of events following such a nuclear launch would have been unimaginable. It could've advanced up to a global thermonuclear war as many speculators suggest. And the world as we know it today would cease to exist. We all know what the nuclear bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki brought to those regions and how the population there still suffer because of it. Now imagine what even more advanced nuclear weapons could've done to the whole entire world. Yeah, that's precisely why Arkhipov is called the man who saved the world.

Stick to your decision. If you know in your heart that what you believe is right and just, stick to it and do not let anyone steer you away from it. Because the domino effect of what you believe in might be even more profound than you could possibly imagine.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Significance of Jo March's Monologue in 'Little Women'

'Little Women', a classic novel by Louisa May Alcott was adapted into a movie under the direction of Greta Gerwig (one of my absolute favourite directors of all time) in the year 2019. It portrays the lives of four sisters- Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy- navigating love, aspirations, and societal expectations during the Civil War era. The film beautifully captures their individual journeys and the evolving dynamics of sisterhood. Jo March, who is the second of the four March sisters, is the protagonist who aspires with every fibre in her to become a well-acclaimed writer. It's even more interesting how the character of Jo is actually based on Louisa May Alcott herself, making the story sort of a semi-autobiography. Played by Saoirse Ronan, Jo is portrayed as an extremely independent woman, challenging the gender roles and the restraints placed upon women in society.  Even though the whole movie is something that strikes the very depths of our hearts, there is one particular monolo...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lost in the Waves

Beaches have always been a favourite of mine. It's almost like the sea calls my name, beckoning me to embrace its folds. To throw myself into the waters and have no care in the world is something too special to me. Because when I'm neck-deep in there, I'm nothing. My weight against the force of the waves becomes irrelevant. And I'm not just speaking of the weight of my body but of my heart too. In fact, I think my heart is far more heavy than my body ever will be. After all, it is a museum of everything I have loved and lost and loved again. And the artefacts within it weigh down on me- it makes me slump my shoulders and drag my feet while I should be floating around with ease. It makes even the easiest tasks undoable. But the moment I step into the water, I'm free of it all. Maybe it is an inherent nature of mine- to dive into something that is ragingly unpredictable. But rage is so dear to me. Unpredictability is so dear to me. It's something I've grown up...
Post a Comment
Read more

Embracing My Mundane

Mundane things bore people. It bores me. When something becomes a part of my schedule, I lose my enthusiasm for it. That's how I stopped posting here. Because I couldn't keep up the quality of my content every single day as I grew more and more uninterested. But then today, I attended an event. A programme organised by the Indian Medical Association to educate the common folk about basic first-aid treatments. During this programme, the doctor explaining it all to us mentioned a fact that I had heard once and not given much thought to. But it stuck with me today. It stuck like gum on shoe soles. It refused to leave my head even as I walked out of that hall. When the oxygen supply to the brain is cut off, your body will start to shut down in five minutes. Within the next ten to fifteen minutes, you will be rendered a corpse if you're not given proper medical attention.  And I sat there thinking- fifteen minutes . It is the time I take to drag myself off the bed and into the w...
Post a Comment
Read more