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US-Russia Joint Force to Monitor Missiles' Y2K Problems

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the now-do-you-feel-safe? dept.

Hapster sent in the link to a New York Times story (free reg. req. to read) about how the US and Russia are setting up a joint task force to make sure we don't accidently get into a nuclear exchange because of Y2K bugs in missle warning and launch software. According to the article, "The confidence-building operation will use U.S. early-warning satellites and advanced computers, and could reassure Moscow if Y2K computer problems in Russia mistakenly signaled a missile launch somewhere in the world."

2 of 64 comments (clear)

  1. Just the PR departments revving up by anticypher · · Score: 5

    I mentioned this sometime earlier on slashdot, the U.S. and Russia have an exchange program for defence analysts to keep an eye on each others silos and command centres.

    During the mini-revolution that almost unseated Gorbachev, the russian missile command centre opened all the doors on the silos so the CIA (actually the NRO) could peer into them with the spy satellites and confirm that rogue forces hadn't taken over the government and ordered a launch. They even grabbed a CIA analyst from the moscow embassy and flew him to one of the military bases so he could report back on what was going on. It kept the U.S. in a "peaceful posture".

    There were some small announcements in defence magazines more than a year ago that both sides would be monitoring each other, and were working to get the chinese involved as well. Now they also have to worry about India and Pakistan, although only India has orbital technology and isn't currently pissed at anyone other than neighbor Pakistan.

    But its nice to see a splashy PR piece to calm Y2K fears.

    the AC

    --
    Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
  2. Someone's doing a masterful job preventing panic.. by TrevorB · · Score: 5

    It's amazing that the majority of the American populace isn't bracing for the end of the world... Forget Y2K. In 1899, there was a huge dip in the stock market, and there was way more panic by September a century ago than there is today. (The stock market did jump back within a few months in 1900).

    I think by focusing everyones attention on Y2K, we're not panicing! A modern day apocolypse myth can be explained away as a technical problem to be solved. "Yes, there is a problem with the end of the century, but our best technicians are working on it and we'll have it fixed just in time!". I bet they couldn't say that in 1899...

    It doesn't matter how bad y2k is. It's the end of the millenium! Where are the thousands of doomsday cultists committing suicide? Where is that stock market panic? Why haven't end of the millenium trinkets shown up everywhere?

    Well, I guess I could be wrong about the trinkets... :)