Tales of a West German football supporter in the Soviet bloc

You will remember Karl-Heinz from our episode  218 where he talked about being a signaller on the West German destroyer “Hamburg” in the late 70s.

Today we follow his post navy life as a travelling supporter of football club HSV Hamburg where he followed them all over the Soviet bloc talks about watching them play Dynamo Berlin the Stasi side and drinking with Liverpool, Newcastle and Hamburg legend Kevin Keegan in a hotel bar in Tiblisi.

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And his Cold War encounters don’t stop there. While working in Chile he met General Pinochet, the military dictator of Chile from 1973 to 1990  and living across the street from Margot Honecker the wife of East German leader Erich Honecker who was also an influential member of that country’s Communist regime until 1989.

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I am delighted to welcome Karl-Heinz to our Cold War conversation…

Thank you very much for listening. It is really appreciated.