Mumbai, April 19 -- On the morning of 26 September 1983, alarms went off at Serpukhov- 15, the secret command centre of the Soviet Air Defence Forces. Soviet satellites that comprised Russia's early warning system were reporting that five Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) had just been launched from an American base and were headed for the Soviet Union. Russia had just a few minutes to respond before the missiles- which were no doubt aimed at its own strike capabilities- destroyed the country's ability to retaliate. It was the height of the Cold War. Both the Soviet Union and the US were bristling with nuclear weapons and relations between the two global superpowers were at an all-time low. Just three weeks earlier, the ...