The False Alarm That Almost Started a Nuclear War. Plus: the Tupac Trial, With Joel Anderson.

October 1, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

In November 1979, a technician at NORAD loaded the wrong tape—a training tape simulating a full-scale Soviet attack—into the early warning system. Suddenly, warning consoles at NORAD, the Pentagon, and Strategic Air Command all lit up with the same picture: 1,400 Soviet missiles inbound. Fighter jets scrambled. The plane built to carry the president through a nuclear war took off. It took several minutes to realize it was a false alarm. That incident directly inspired the 1983 movie War Games. But as this episode of Wait a Second makes clear, the real story of nuclear close calls in the early 1980s is far stranger and more frightening than any screenplay—and it unfolded during a period of maximum tension that very nearly turned catastrophic.

The Paranoia That Built a Doomsday Machine

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What you'll learn

1 Timestamped Outline
2 (00:00) **Episode Introduction & Host Welcome** - Jason Concepcion introduces the episode's theme of nuclear close calls and welcomes back Joel Anderson for a "month of terror" series
3 (10:17) **Cold War Context: 1979-1981** - Setting the stage for the tensions that would lead to the 1983 near-miss
4 (14:48) **Soviet Paranoia and Operation RYAN** - The KGB becomes convinced the US is planning a nuclear first strike
5 (18:01) **1983: The Year of Maximum Danger** - Multiple events converge to push the world toward nuclear brinkmanship
6 (20:20) **Korean Airlines Flight 007 Shootdown** - September 1, 1983: Soviet fighter jet destroys a civilian airliner, killing 269 people
7 (28:17) **The Petrov Incident: September 26, 1983** - Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov prevents nuclear war by trusting his instincts over the warning system

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

Wait a Second… is kicking off Terror Month with the most terrifying idea of all: nuclear annihilation. Following news last month that an AI chatbot nearly got us into a war with China, Jason and Tyler look back at the early-’80s incidents that nearly brought the Cold War to a boil. With the help of The Ringer’s Joel Anderson, they talk NORAD and real-life war games.

Later, they break down the Tupac murder trial and conviction of Duane “Keefe D” Davis, which Joel wrote about on The Ringer last week.

Today’s agenda:

(00:00) The real-life ‘WarGames’

(02:39) Our guest today: Joel Anderson

(04:00) Could AI accidentally start a war?

(08:17) Setting the stage for a nuclear near-miss

(26:17) The Cold War gets very, very close

(39:13) The Soviet “Dead Hand” System

(42:30) The Tupac murder verdict and the conspiracy theories

(53:56) The LAPD, Keefe D, and the case against him

(58:08) The American Idol Murder Case

(01:03:17) A Bob Iger COVID conspiracy

(01:06:59) Hackers breach the FBI. What did they want?

(01:09:49) The mysterious Milwaukee “bad boy” sound

Read Joel’s piece on the Keefe D verdict here: https://www.theringer.com/2026/09/23/music/tupac-shakur-murder-trial-keffe-d-davis-conviction-conspiracy-theories

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Hosts: Jason Concepcion and Tyler Parker

Guest: Joel Anderson

Producer: Justin Sayles

Video editing: Jordan Satmary

Engineering: Jason Arreola

Social media: Paige Ransbury

Thumbnail: Matt James

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