新研究指出世界如何能避免灾难的边缘。但这并非易事。在1962年10月那惊心动魄的两周里，世界距离核末日仅一步之遥。
New research points to how the world could stop short of the brink of disaster. But it won’t be easy. Over the course of two harrowing weeks in October 1962, the world came within an eyelash of nuclear Armageddon.
冷战军备竞赛期间，美国和苏联拼命争夺优势。在美国于意大利和土耳其部署中程核导弹后，担心遭到先发制人打击的苏联试图在古巴部署自己的核武器。随之而来的紧张两周对峙——古巴导弹危机——几乎升级为核战争。
The United States and the Soviet Union were jockeying desperately for advantage during the Cold War arms race. After the United States stationed intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Italy and Turkey, the Soviets, fearing a first strike, sought to station their own nuclear weapons in Cuba. The tense two-week standoff that ensued, the Cuban Missile Crisis, nearly escalated into nuclear war.
但最终没有。双方不仅从悬崖边缘退了回来，这场危机还成为冷战本身的转折点。
But it didn’t. Not only did the parties step back from the brink, the crisis proved to be a turning point in the Cold War itself.
达特茅斯学院研究国家安全与国际关系的政治学家威廉·沃尔弗斯表示，那次与灾难的擦肩而过改变了双方领导人的思维。“我们立即达成了热线协议，这样就能相互沟通。我们开始朝着测试协议努力。随后几年里，我们逐渐建立了一个庞大而复杂的双边军控进程。”美国和苏联仍然是死敌。但在一个共同利益点上——不毁灭人类——它们可以合作。
That brush with calamity changed the thinking of leaders on both sides, said William Wohlforth, a political scientist at Dartmouth who studies national security and international relations. “Right away we got the hotline agreement, so we could talk to each other. We began to work toward the testing agreement. And slowly, in the subsequent years we got a big, complex bilateral arms-control process.”The United States and the Soviet Union remained bitter enemies. But on one point of shared interest — not obliterating humanity — they could work together.