On September 1st 1983 Korean Air Lines civilian Flight 007 deviated from it's course. It was en-route from Anchorage, AK to Seoul, South Korea. The deviation caused it to stray toward Soviet airspace. The navigation error was likely caused by an auto-pilot error. The Soviets dispatched three Su-15 Flagon fighters and a MiG-23 to intercept. The exact details of what transpired vary based on the account, but the result is uniform. Flight 007 was shot down killing 246 passengers and 23 crew members. There were no survivors. It was one of the tensest moments of the Cold War.
President Reagan took one step, with a major impact, to prevent this kind of navigation error from occurring again. On September 16th 1983 President Reagan announced that the Global Positioning System (GPS) would be available for civilian use free of charge. The GPS system allows a computer to triangulate location anywhere on the Earth within a very small margin of error. It was developed for the military, however as a civilian tool it has been integrated into most cell phones as well as a variety of navigation tools such as vehicle GPS and On-Star. Now anyone can get from point A to point B with one of these navigation devices.
-Professor Walter