Jamestown crisis

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General Information

Participants

Place

Earth (USA / USSR)
Moon
- Mining site 357 Bravo
- Jamestown base
- Low lunar orbit

Start date

End of May 1983

End date

End of September 1983

Outcome
Peaceful resolution Moderate casualties on both sides Sea Dragon 17 destroyed Peace treaty signed by both leaders

Losses

USSR:

2 Soviet cosmonauts

USA:

The Jamestown crisis was a diplomatic crisis between the Soviet Union and the United States over an incident at a mining site on the Moon, which later culminated with a Soviet lunar blockade and an armed attack on the American Jamestown base at Shackleton Crater by cosmonauts. It took place between May and September 1983 and led the two superpowers to the brink of a nuclear war.

History[]

Origins[]

The crisis took its roots when the Soviet Union learned about the assumed presence of huge amounts of lithium^W at a mining site designated 357/Bravo thanks to a listening device hidden inside the Jamestown base a decade earlier. The site itself was first claimed by the United States on May 21, 1983,^[1] but was taken by Soviet cosmonauts only a few days later.^[2] In response, the White House instantly ordered to take the site back.^[2] This lead to the building of the Moon Marines, the first armed forces in space under the command of Colonel Vance Paulson, which were ready to be sent to the Moon by August 1983 with the mission to retake and secure 357/Bravo and other American assets.^[3]

On Earth, the destruction of Korean Air Lines Flight 007, which killed NASA Administrator Thomas Paine and an US Congressman, increased tensions between the US and the USSR and prompted President Reagan to move up the assault. Since Moon Marine Charles Bernitz was not ready to pilot the LSAM on his own yet, it was Tracy Stevens who served as pilot. As soon as the marines dropped on them, the cosmonauts immediately fell back, resulting in a total U.S. victory.^[4]

Incident at 357/Bravo[]

During a relief of patrol at 357/Bravo, Moon Marine Jason Wilhelm noticed movement on a ridge near the mining site. Colonel Paulson, Major Helena Webster, and Lieutenant Colonel Steven Lopez went to investigate. They discovered two Soviet cosmonauts with crates of material. With Lopez covering them, Webster and Paulson advanced towards the cosmonauts and Webster recited a translated phrase in Russian which claimed the site as US territory and ordered the Soviets to fall back.

The cosmonauts then walked toward a crate, opening it and searching in it. Thinking they were reaching for weapons, Webster and Paulson fired on them. In doing so, they accidentally triggered a fire inside Ilya Yozhkin's spacesuit, and wounded Rolan Baranov. Despite Yozhkin's screams and cries of anguish over the radio, there was no possible way to rescue him from burning to death alive. When the marines later looked into the crate, they discovered that the cosmonauts weren't reaching for weapons, but for a cheat sheet to communicate with them. Both cosmonauts were brought back to Jamestown.^[5]

Escalation of tensions[]

On Earth, the incident caused a worldwide uproar, and the USSR demanded the return of its cosmonauts. Colonel Viktor Tsukanov and Dr. Dimitri Mayakovsky were allowed to enter Jamestown to look after the two cosmonauts, berating the Americans for what they called an "unprovoked act of aggression". Mayakovsky reviewed briefly Baranov's condition who was lying in the infirmary without consciousness, and requested to prepare him for transportation. However, the station's physician, Dr. Kouri, did not allow a transport at that time as this would put Baranov's life on risk. Accordingly, they were then presented the remains of Ilya Yozhkin's burnt body, which they took back to their own base, Zvezda.^[6]

Later, Baranov finally woke up with Webster at his bedside, and asked for political asylum in the United States, which was granted by the US government.^[6] This worsened the tension with Moscow, who believed that the asylum was just a cover-up for an interrogation.

Lunar blockade[]

Under the pretense that Sea Dragon 17 was carrying nuclear weapons to the Moon, Moscow decreed a blockade around the Moon lead by the Soviet armed space shuttle Buran. In response, NASA ordered their second generation shuttle Pathfinder, which was also armed some time before,^[4] to escort Sea Dragon 17 and, if Buran tried to stop them, to destroy the Soviet shuttle.

The Kremlin warned the White House that the destruction of Buran would trigger a nuclear strike on the south of the United States, a warning that was met with the threat of complete extermination of the Soviet Union. The two shuttles came into a standoff while in the dark face of the Moon, worsened by the news of the Soviet attack on Jamestown.^[7]

Attack on Jamestown[]

Main article: Attack on Jamestown

In response to the death of one of their comrades and what they thought to be the interrogation of the other, the crew of the Soviet base launched an attack on Jamestown, successfully taking the control room, disabling comms, and taking Colonel Alex Rossi hostage.^[8] They demanded Baranov's return in exchange of Rossi's safety. However, Jamestown crew was fairly certain that Rossi would be executed anyway, and decided to retake their station on their own.

Paulson and Lopez tried to take the Soviets by surprise with a flank attack, but on their way, they met Tracy and Gordo Stevens locked in the kitchen, who were able to warn Houston by reactivating an old disused comm array of Jamestown. The meeting was interrupted when a cosmonaut attacked the marines, executing Paulson and wounding Lopez, but he was killed by Webster, who brought back Lopez to safety.

However, the firefight damaged the control computer of the nuclear reactor coolant system, triggering a rise of the core temperature that, left unfixed, would lead to a nuclear meltdown and therefore would make Shackleton completely uninhabitable for at least a millennia.^[7]

Resolution[]

The crisis was resolved thanks to Danielle Poole, commander of the American side of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Program, and Stepan Alexseev, commander of the Soviet spacecraft. Indeed, while both Moscow and Washington ordered their respective crews to abort the mission, both crews decided to ignore their orders and to proceed with the meeting. The worldwide diffusion of the handshake between Poole and Alexseev inspired the leaders of the two superpowers to try to find a peaceful resolution.

Meanwhile, on the dark side of the Moon, Admiral Ed Baldwin on Pathfinder finally shot its missiles, but directed them at the Sea Dragon instead of Buran, defusing the orbital part of the Jamestown crisis. In Jamestown itself, Tracy and Gordo Stevens used made-up space suits to get to the reactor controls hardware, which were at the outside face of the station hull, and connected the coolant system to the emergency control, which prevented the meltdown at the cost of their own lives. At the same time, the crew of Zvezda received the order from Moscow to withdraw from Jamestown and release their hostages.^[7]

Aftermath[]

Back to Earth, Gordo and Tracy were buried with honour. Soon after Ronald Reagan met with Yuri Andropov for diplomatic negotiation for defusing the tension between their two countries.^[7]

In 1984, US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Yuri Andropov signed the Lunar Peace Agreement, a bilateral treaty^W to split up the Moon and its resources between the two countries.^[9]