Eyewitness

A boy soldier in the Cold War Royal Engineers

Paul joined the Royal Engineers in 1977, aged 16 as an apprentice. We hear of his experience of joining the army at such a young age and being away from home for the first time. After initial training, his first posting was to Osnabruck in 1979. Shortly after his arrival Paul is appointed to the … Read more

US Navy Cold War airborne electronic reconnaissance

KC flew the US Navy’s airborne Electronic Reconnaissance during the 1980s in the Lockheed EP-3 which is electronic signals reconnaissance version of the P-3 Orion. He flew as a Navigator, Senior Electronic Warfare Evaluator and Mission Commander. We hear about several missions he was involved in including his first detachment  to Athens the then  main … Read more

The man who built his own Cold War nuclear bunker

Graham Bate was 30-year-old Civil Servant when he built his own nuclear bunker in the garden of his rural home 20 miles outside Hull in the UK. It was here that the Bate family expected to survive for at least 3 weeks after a nuclear attack. We speak with Graham Bate and his son Conrad … Read more

Flashpoints – Air warfare in the Cold War

  The Cold War years were a period of unprecedented peace in Europe, yet they also saw a number of localised but nonetheless very intense wars throughout the wider world in which airpower played a vital role. I speak with former Cold War Tornado pilot and acclaimed aviation historian Michael Napier who has written Flashpoints: … Read more

My life laid bare through secret police files

  What is it like to be under secret police surveillance? On 10 March 1983, 12 year old Carmen Bugan returned from school to find Romanian secret police in her living room. Her father’s protest against the regime had changed her life for ever. In recent years Carmen gained access to the files of the … Read more

Arrested by the KGB and taken to the Lubyanka prison

Marti Peterson was the first female CIA operative to be assigned to Moscow, probably the most challenging posting during the Cold War. Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! This second episode turns to TRIGON, the code name for Alexandr Ogorodnik. He was an official in the Soviet Embassy in Bogota, … Read more

The first female CIA officer in Cold War Moscow

Marti Peterson was the first female CIA operative to be assigned to Moscow, probably the most challenging posting during the Cold War. Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! Her story begins in Laos during the Vietnam War where she accompanied her husband John, a CIA officer. She describes their life … Read more

The 1989 World Festival of Youth and Students in Pyongyang, North Korea

The 13th World Festival of Youth and Students was held from 1–8 July 1989 in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea. It was the largest international event staged in North Korea up until then. Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google Podcasts The event took four years of preparation by the North Korean government, … Read more

Flying for the CIA’s Air America in South East Asia

In 1964, pilot Captain Hansen found himself unemployed. He began to send out feelers to several companies including one that had placed an ad in the Washington Post called Air America. When he was called in for an interview which primarily consisted of two questions – can you fly good and do you drink a … Read more