Dead Hand: The Soviet Doomsday Code

What if the end of the world could be triggered by silence?

Deep in the architecture of Soviet nuclear defense, a system was built to ensure retaliation—even if no one was left to authorize it. This episode of Unsettled: The Hidden Record examines “Dead Hand”, also known as Perimeter: the USSR’s semi-automated doomsday mechanism designed to launch a full nuclear strike if top command was ever wiped out.

The system monitored seismic activity, radio silence, and radiation levels. If triggered, it could pass launch authority to machines. And for decades, the world never knew it existed.

Is it still active? Could it be turned on again? How close did we come to a machine-initiated apocalypse?

What you’re about to hear isn’t theory. It’s the closest we’ve ever come to building a button that no one had to push.