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[1] -- Karsan Chanda (talk) 06:34, 13 March 2022 (UTC)
References
I was reading the Dead Hand article after the discussion following my earlier question above. From what it says in there:
- it's *not* fully automated and can be manually overridden
- it can be turned on and off as required
- plans to make it fully automated were considered, but then rejected as insanity
Just one thing that wasn't clear. Was the whole concept of "any attempt to disable the machine, once activated would trigger the machine" ever seriously considered - IOW, that the Dead Hand was completely beyond human control and the Russians themselves would be unable to switch it off, let alone the enemy?
I suppose that the logic being that in a time of war, spies or rogue elements within the Russian military would be unable to stop it, or even IDK, say if the most senior military officers, or even the Soviet Leader himself was captured in some sort of commando raid and forced to give up the codes to shut it down. --Iloveparrots (talk) 22:40, 13 March 2022 (UTC)