This is what a real hero looks like, the Russian Submarine Captain Vasili Arkhipov, he saved the world during the Cuban crisis.
In times of the Nobel Peace Prize I always think about this amazing hero that is so unjustly kept in anonymity. The Nobel Peace Prize has been criticized for being a political venue instead of giving the prize to those who really deserve it. This year it was awarded to the European Union.
In my mind, as long as the Nobel Peace Prize is NOT awarded to the memory of Vasili Arkhipov, it is awarded to the wrong guy. He is without a doubt the one man in history, any time period included, that to his merits can add: ”I single handedly saved the world!” Not only that, he also showed us something else, he showed us that ”the buck stops here.” He is an excellent example of that every person has the possibility to choose and change the world, in 1962, the buck stopped with Vasili Arkhipov.
In accordance to this my question is: What is the Nobel comity doing?
Captain Vasili Arkhipov, refused to follow orders during the Cuban crisis in 1962. He refused to fire a nuclear weapon against the United States. For this he was punished in the Soviet Union. His heroism was kept a secret for 40 years, and he has suffered for it and died humiliated as an outcast in 1998. How does the world thank him? It doesn’t. The Nobel Prize goes to the European Union!
Every organization depend on the chain of command and in a way even society does the same. In the Armed forces to refuse an order is not appreciated to say the least. I have myself served as a green beret, an order is meant to be followed and our lives actually depend on it. But as Captain Vasili Arkhipov showed our lives also depend on our ability to be able to determine when not to follow orders. Captain Arkhipov did not by his action endorse anarchy or civil disobedience, he endorsed humanity. If we would put ourselves in his shoes, it is easy to realize that by making this decision he knew his next stop would probably be Siberia and the Gulag.
One needs to put this in perspective. In 1962, during he Cuban crisis everything was under tension. Basically The U.S. and the Soviet were staring each other down from the barrel of a gun and the Soviets lost their nerve. That’s what happened, they ordered Captain Vasili Arkhipov to fire a nuclear weapon. They meant business, they didn’t start of with mortars or conventional bombs. For some reasons the Soviets were freaking out and went for the big guns right away.
The immediate result of an attack like that considering the political climate of the times would probably have meant the annihilation of the human culture as we know it. President Kennedy would have been forced to retaliate and Europe would have seized to exist more or less, it probably would have been vaporized in a nuclear cloud.
So every year at ”Nobel” times, I thank this great man in my mind for his heroism and for my life and health, and for everything else I have in my life that would have been extinct or wiped of the map. The Nobel comity gives the Peace Prize to pop politicians and super organizations, peacefully killing the great symbolical and inspirational meaning of the prize in the process.
Make October 27 "Vasili Arkhipov” day in memory of this extraordinary man and the gifts his heroism has granted us all.
