How often have we been on the brink of World War III?

The Turkish air force has shot down a SU-24, a Russian fighter Soviet-made, while he is flying over Syrian airspace. The incident is part of the Syrian Civil War and the competing interests of Turkey and Russia, each supporting various factions. The tension between the two countries had grown in recent days. Today has culminated in, for the first time since the '70s, an aircraft of a country belonging to NATO toppling another Russian.

3 world guerrra

Given the complex political and diplomatic relationship with Russia the Western bloc, has floated the idea all morning both social networks and media: Third World war. A mantra that has repeated almost since the end of the Second World War and has been about to be declared, at least in our memory, in a handful of historic occasions. Is this the latest chapter in a long list of incidents that spurred the perverse imagination of humanity? Possibly. Only if you stay there, as appears.

Worth, in any case, review other historical incidents and severity of high tension over the future of mankind with another world-scale war. At the heart of the action, provided the Soviet bloc and the Western found, opposing powers throughout the Cold War. Stage, in return, various: from a civilian aircraft flying over the Sea of ​​Japan to a Caribbean island. The end result was constant: World War remains a clue, perhaps now it framed within the context of a new Cold War.

In any case, we see how previous.

The Berlin Blockade, 1948

Except for the beginning of the 60s, World War III was never closer to rid it in the days of World War II, Nazi troops still detained in camps Allied prisoners. Shortly after the fall of Hitler, the clash of interests between Stalin and allied forces was imminent, to the point that leaders like Churchill considered the possibility of arming the German soldiers in anticipation of an imminent armed and land conflict with the USSR.

Berlin Blockade

A C-54 unloading groceries in Berlin.

It did not happen, but the months and years following the end of the war not lightened the tension. In the eye of the storm, Berlin: German capital had been divided into four sectors, but it was surrounded by Soviet land. The Allies and the USSR ceased to work soon after the end of World War II. Provisions, political and administrative organization, security: both followed divergent paths.

AFTER THE END OF WORLD WAR II, THE POSSIBILITY OF A WEST-SOVIET CONFLICTS seemed imminent

When Allied forces introduced a new currency in their respective sectors of Berlin, the Soviet Union blockaded the city and blocked railway traffic and transport vehicles throughout their territory. That made it virtually impossible to supply the population and soldiers in the German capital except for the air. He began the Berlin Airlift, yearlong. Again, the shadow of conflict seemed close, Given the seeming inability of both sides to cooperate mutually and effectively establish agreed in previous conferences.

The Korean War, 1950-1953

The consequences of the Second World War were felt not only in Europe, but also on the Pacific coast of continental Asia. It was in the Korean peninsula where the first large-scale battle was fought between the Soviet Union and the Western bloc. After the surrender of Japan, Korea empire owned before World War II, the country was divided into two: North was occupied by the Soviet Union and southern US, by agreement. In 1948 two separate states were created, both claiming sovereignty over the entire peninsula.

Korean war

Korea was the only scenario where US forces faced SOVIET AND FACE TO FACE

Two years later, Communist North Korea, under the shelter of China and the USSR, declared war on the capitalist South Korea, and proceeded to invade. The North violation was condemned by UN, and a force of British and American soldiers came to the aid of South Korea. The war lasted three years and, to completion, kept the status quo before the conflict. For the first and last time, the USSR and the US met face to face.

Hence the chronicles of the time saw more imminent than ever before the outbreak of World War III. Korea was ranked the world into two camps exhaustively: on one hand the communist bloc; for another, the capitalist. American and Soviet fighters would never again come face to face in any other armed conflict, but indirectly. Korea marked the starting point, and one of the most delicate postwar.

The missile crisis in Cuba, 1962

WWIII never seemed so imminent as during the four days of October 1962 in which Cuba, Communist regime supported by the USSR, It became the epicenter of world attention. There the crisis originated quintessential Cold War, finally solved with a historic anticlimax: nothing happened, but the outbreak of a nuclear war was very close to be. Neither side dared to take the final step.

missiles

Place of installation of Soviet missiles in Cuba.

THE POSSIBILITY OF A NUCLEAR WAR was feared by both sides: It was BRAKE prevented the outbreak of World War III REPEATEDLY, BUT ESPECIALLY IN CUBA

What would have been to that step? Both countries had a nuclear shot his enemy: US had missiles in Turkey, at that time the country bordering the Soviet Union, and the USSR had just installed its own missiles in Cuba, trying to protect the newly established Castro regime and threatening a few kilometers south of Florida on US territory. The Kennedy administration opted for Block Island, something that the Soviet authorities understood as a provocation.

In a few days, diplomacy had to solve a huge crisis. United States agreed not to try to overthrow Castro in Cuba again, while the Soviet Union dismantled missiles shortly after the crisis. United States did the same in Turkey.

It was achieved, to a large degree, because nuclear threat slowed throughout the Cold War the possibility of direct real clashes. But in those days of October, they were very, be very close: a Soviet submarine, incommunicado for days in crisis and beset by depth charges from an American destroyer, not a nuclear torpedo launched only by the refusal of one of the three officials of protocol required to do so,Vasili Arkhipov, convinced that the war had not yet begun. Your deduction, en realidad, He prevented the.

The demolition of KAL007, 1983

The 80s recovered the ghosts of the past: Soviet actions in Afghanistan and the coming to power of Ronald Reagan, in favor of maintaining a hard line against communism and the Soviet Union, provoked new escalation of hostility between the two powers. During those years, one of the most serious incident was the shooting down of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 in the Sea of ​​Japan, while New York was traveling – Seoul. A passenger plane shot down by a Soviet fighter Sukhoi Su-15: an action in which they died 269 people, all civilians.

Avion Korean

Un Boeing 747-230B, dejected identical to the Soviet fighter.

Soviet authorities claimed that the KAL007 had trespassed in the airspace of the USSR, and they interpreted the incident as a provocative maneuver US. The mutual recriminations continued over the months and years, while the investigation of the facts took its course. On the death of many civilians, the possibility of a direct conflict between two countries, given the unique moment of political sensitivity, again he placed on the board.

Petrov, the man who saved us all, 1983

Three weeks after the downing of KAL007, the threat of World War III again reached a historic peak. On this occasion, It was not about any military or civilian large-scale incident, but a malfunction of missile detection system of the Soviet Union (About). Mistakenly,He identified the release of two LGM-30 Minuteman missiles from US, aimed at Soviet territory. The protocol indicated that, then, the USSR had to respond. Who should give the order? Stanislav Petrov, Air Force Lt..

MinutemanLGM-30G Minuteman, Version III.

Petrov, supervisor in charge of the Soviet warning system, He guessed correctly that it was a mistake, Being only two isolated missile and not a large-scale offensive. From the viewpoint of the USSR, the proximity of the incident KAL007 the US attack was feasible. Nonetheless, Petrov chose not to respond, interpreting the warning as a false alarm system. He made, and the lack of Soviet response prevented an almost certain large-scale nuclear conflict.

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