Because of his decision not to launch a retaliatory nuclear strike amid this incident, Petrov is often credited as having "saved the world".

According to the Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the UN, nuclear retaliation requires that multiple sources confirm an attack.

[10][11][12] Petrov later indicated that the influences on his decision included that he had been told a U.S. strike would be all-out, so five missiles seemed an illogical start;[2] that the launch detection system was new and, in his view, not yet wholly trustworthy; that the message passed through 30 layers of verification too quickly;[13] and that ground radar failed to pick up corroborating evidence, even after minutes of delay.

He said that his colleagues were all professional soldiers with purely military training and, following instructions, would have reported a missile launch if they had been on his shift.

"[15] In a later interview, Petrov stated that the famous red button was never made operational, as military psychologists did not want to put the decision of initiating a nuclear war into the hands of one single person.

[20] In 2006, when Petrov was first honored for his actions at the United Nations, the Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations issued a press release contending that a single person could not have started or prevented a nuclear war, stating in part, "Under no circumstances a decision to use nuclear weapons could be made or even considered in the Soviet Union or in the United States on the basis of data from a single source or a system.

For this to happen, a confirmation is necessary from several systems: ground-based radars, early warning satellites, intelligence reports, etc.

"[9] But nuclear security expert Bruce G. Blair has said that at that time, the U.S.–Soviet relationship had deteriorated to the point where "the Soviet Union as a system—not just the Kremlin, not just Andropov, not just the KGB—but as a system, was geared to expect an attack and to retaliate very quickly to it.

[2] Petrov himself states he was initially praised by Votintsev and promised a reward,[2][22] but recalls that he was also reprimanded for improper filing of paperwork because he had not described the incident in the war diary.

[2][24][22][23] He was reassigned to a less sensitive post,[23] took early retirement (although he emphasized that he was not "forced out" of the army),[22] and suffered a nervous breakdown.

[25][26] After leaving the military in 1984, Petrov was hired at the same research institute that had developed the Soviet Union's early warning system.

[32] The next day, he met American journalist Walter Cronkite at his CBS office in New York City.

It premiered in October 2014 at the Woodstock Film Festival in Woodstock, New York, winning "Honorable Mention: Audience Award Winner for Best Narrative Feature" and "Honorable Mention: James Lyons Award for Best Editing of a Narrative Feature.

"[34] Various internet communities commemorate 26 September as Stanislav Petrov day, following Eliezer Yudkowsky's blog post highlighting the story: "Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, take a minute to not destroy the world.".

Let us resolve to work together to realize a world free from fear of nuclear weapons, remembering the courageous judgement of Stanislav Petrov."

[15] In an interview for the film The Man Who Saved the World, Petrov says, "All that happened didn't matter to me—it was my job.