Eyewitness

Cold War Canadian airborne anti-submarine missions

    Colonel Terry Chester’s flying career spanned some 42 years, and 10,000 flying hours. He joined the RCAF in Sept 1964 and in 1968 was awarded Navigator Wings. Terry flew for 3,000 hrs on the Argus Maritime patrol aircraft where he spent a good portion of his RCAF career hunting for Soviet Submarines in both … Read more

Discovering your husband is a KGB spy

Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! The second part of Svetlana’s story starts shortly after her arrival in West Germany with her husband Oleg who is the Chief Editor of the Russian Service of Radio Liberty a CIA-financed station beaming Western propaganda into the Soviet Union. To Svetlana’s horror, Oleg … Read more

From Soviet Latvia to the BBC Russian Service

  Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! Svetlana came from a dissident Jewish family opposed to Soviet rule in Latvia. Her parents survived World War 2, but during the Stalin era two members of her family were held in the Gulags. The family never resigned themselves to Latvia’s occupation by … Read more

Transferring from the East German Army (NVA) to the unified German Army (Bundeswehr)

  Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! We continue Steffen’s story where he tells of serving in three armies – firstly, the NVA, secondly the East German Army between the first free elections and unification, and finally the unified Bundeswehr. Listen to his previous episode here https://coldwarconversations.com/episode286/ We start the … Read more

Drafted into the East German Army

  Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! Steffen was born in Karl Marx Stadt and was conscripted into the NVA (East German Army) in 1988. When he left school he started an apprenticeship in electronics learning how to build radio receivers at REMA, a then-famous producer of HiFi equipment. Steffen … Read more

A British kid transferred to a Soviet school

wwListen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google Podcasts   Richard was 6 years old when he was uprooted from a school in the United States to a Soviet school 700 miles East of Moscow. In 1988 the Soviet Union was opening up following Michael Gorbachev’s policy of Perestroika and American firms began looking at … Read more

How Cold War Britain Prepared for Nuclear War

During the Cold War, the awesome power of nuclear weapons and its deadly fallout meant that every town, village and home in Britain fell under the nuclear shadow, and the threat of annihilation coloured every aspect of ordinary life. Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! I chat with author and … Read more

Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990

In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany simply ceased to be. Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyListen on Google PodcastsBecome a Patron! For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the GDR presented a radically different German identity to … Read more

Cold War conscientious objector in the Dutch Army

In 1987 Martin received a letter informing him of his conscription into the Dutch Army. A number of European NATO countries had conscription during the Cold War. Holland’s applied to men over the age of 18 and included service for about a year, after which you were placed on the reserve.   Martin objected to … Read more