One of the most unsung heroes of the 20th century was Stanislav Petrov, a Soviet officer who prevented a nuclear war in 1983. On September 26, Petrov was in charge of monitoring the early warning system that detected incoming missiles from the US. He received a report of five missiles heading towards the USSR, but he decided to ignore it, believing it was a false alarm. He later said that he had a "funny feeling in my gut" that something was wrong. He reasoned that if the US really wanted to start a war, they would launch more than five missiles. His intuition saved millions of lives, as it turned out that the report was indeed a false alarm caused by a malfunctioning satellite. Petrov was not rewarded for his actions, but rather reprimanded for not following the protocol. He died in 2017, but his legacy lives on as the man who stopped World War 3.

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