The British war-time leader played a key role for the allies throughout World War 2, and in the war-time conferences when the Allied Powers were deciding how the post-war world would look. But, there was so much more to Winston Churchill than that. He had a long and distinguished career before then.

The episode looks at what happened as a result of the changes that Gorbachev unleashed in the USSR. Last time we saw how Cold War tensions rose before the world changed once more - the policies of Reagan and Gorbachev led to a breakthrough on nuclear weapons. However, it would be the reforms that came from the Eastern bloc that led to a world transformed and the end of the Cold War.

The episode looks at how relations between the super-powers fell to levels not seen since the Cuban Missile Crisis. Following growing tensions in the late 1970s, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. This led to a large increase in US defense spending from US President Carter. But this wasn’t enough for many in the US, and a much more aggressive US-government led by Ronald Reagan came in to power. The consequences were a world where fear once again dominated people’s thinking.

We look at the key trends in the capitalist and Communist economies up to the 1980s and set the scene for what was to happen in the final years of the Cold War. Economic growth was key to the battle between the super-powers – more growth meant that they could spend more on the military in a sustainable way. But, military spending had to be traded-off against allowing people in these countries to have improved living standards. It would be the country that could keep their public happy and spend significant amounts on defence that would be in a much stronger position to win the Cold War..

We look at the ever-evolving Cold War relationships between the Great Powers during the 1960s and 1970s, the detente period. We shall see how relations changed between the USSR and the USA after the Cuban missile crisis. Then we’ll discuss the events that led to the USSR and China fighting each other. And we’ll also look at change in the Eastern bloc and a historic meeting between the US and China.

We’re going to pick up on the story of many countries in a Continent that had become divided by an Iron Curtain. The Continent had the USA’s most important and strongest allies, and was the area of many of the USSR’s key allies. It was of course Europe. We left the story of Europe with one of the most dramatic events of the Cold War - the Berlin blockade. This time, we will be back in Berlin for another shocking event. And previously we also saw another very topical event for this episode – how the Soviets were invited to East Germany to end an internal uprising against the government. Something more brutal was to happen very soon..

It’s on that generation-defining war, a war that spanned the central years of the Cold War. We are going to be looking at a war in which US involvement lasted more than double the whole length of World War II, and one that spans over a quarter of a century. It also involves many key trends in the Cold War – decolonization, the ever-changing role of China, and the US policy of containment. The podcast is on the Vietnam War.

With hindsight, many historians see this crisis as the time that the world flirted most closely with nuclear destruction. By the time of the crisis, 1962, we shall see how both the USA’s and USSR’s nuclear weapons had become terribly powerful, but this was in a world where the rules of the game for nuclear war were still being made..

The main focus of the episode is on the first major international war since World War II, and one that saw the Cold War battle lines grow stronger – the Korean War. This was not just a war among Koreans though - as with many major international events in the Cold War years, it ended up becoming caught up in the battle between Communism and capitalism..

The period saw World War II coming to a close. Europe and many parts of the world were coming out of the most devastating war in their histories. Only two countries had the power and ability to support a recovery – the USA and the USSR. The old European powers were shadows of their former selves.