Before they were enemies, the US and Iran used to have a thing. In fact, we started their nuclear program.

Like any failed relationship… it’s not just one thing that led us all here. Years of misinformation, politics, greed, reality tv, and some real security interests on both sides brought us to this point.

This is the story of how the US and Iran broke up -- because you can’t truly understand the Iran deal without first understanding why the US and Iran have bad blood.

Jake Sullivan is no James Bond. He's a nice kid from Minnesota. But Sullivan's top secret diplomacy may have staved off catastrophe as the U.S. pursued the Iran nuclear deal.

On this episode, we dig into how diplomacy gets done -- and, not the Hollywood-movie version. (Diplomacy, it turns out, isn’t as sexy as Bond.) This is the real-life version, where sleep-deprived people pore over thousands of pages of technical documents, sleep on couches and floors, and lose their cool more than once. There are even a few broken bones.

It’s not glamorous, it’s grueling. But when it works, it can stop a war.

Time magazine called Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster a “pre-eminent warrior-thinker.” President Trump called him a pain.

So when McMaster left the White House to be replaced by the hawkish John Bolton, foreign policy experts saw the writing on the wall. The Iran nuclear deal was next on the chopping block.

In this episode, we track how advisors clashed right up to the moment Trump yanked the United States out of the deal. Some wanted to push for a better deal. Others seemed intent on pressuring Iran until it breaks. Was Trump right to walk away? Or, was there something else -- something more political -- motivating the president’s decision?

Prepping a fallout shelter might sound like an exercise from an era of soda fountains and hula hoops. But for Ron Hubbard, president of Atlas Survival Shelters, business is, well… booming.

Ron says he sold a shelter a month when he started out in 2011. Now he sells about one a day — from a barebones hideout to a luxury model that doubles as a wine cellar. So, why are 60s-style underground fallout shelters no longer so, well, underground?

Nuclear expert Sharon Squassoni tells us the threat of nuclear war is as grave now as the darkest days of the Cold War. One reason for the heightened concern is President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Iran Nuclear Deal. But that decision also tells us a lot about how US foreign policy is shifting. Could the decision to withdraw render the US irrelevant? Did it make us safer? Or should we all be building fallout shelters in our backyards?

It’s been called President Obama’s signature foreign policy achievement -- so why does the Trump administration think it was the “worst deal ever” made?

On this season of Things That Go Boom, we’ll take a look at the Iran deal -- but this isn’t an Iran deal explainer. This is a story about how America stays out of a nuclear war. And the answer is messier than you might think. The government does not have it all figured out. Even good deals can be flawed. And swampy dynamics in Washington have the potential to send us all down a dangerous path fast.

We don’t always talk about the things that scare us most. First, Ally Harpootlian's grandmother Betty kept a secret life of poetry locked away. Then, a whole new way to look at Shakespeare - and his relationship to war. Stephan Wolfert tells Laicie how he helps veterans open up and talk.

How Nancy Sinatra’s #1 hit, "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'," became a military anthem. Then, a bunch of students at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) try to change the world —  and eliminate the threat of nuclear weapons — with design.

In this episode, Laicie explores white nationalism, the Haitian revolution, and the impacts of nuclear weapons production on the Navajo Nation – and goes all the way back to America’s founding to ask, “What is this thing we call national security? And who does it protect?”

Turns out, there’s no easy answer.

Two true stories about nuclear false alarms. Plus, what deterrence has to do with being an eleven-year-old boy, and a deeper dive into the Trump administration’s assault on diplomacy. 

One year ago, Donald J. Trump became the President of the United States. Since then, it seems like the world has exploded. North Korea, Russia, Charlottesville. The threats are all around.

Enter Things That Go Boom, a new podcast from PRI and Inkstick Media. Hosted by Laicie Heeley, Things That Go Boom digs deeper into US foreign policy and the ins, outs, and whathaveyous of what keeps us safe. Full episodes coming January 22, 2018!