HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2024-11-01T20:17:07.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: The Cuban Missile Crisis: the road to resolution
items: The Cuban Missile Crisis: dangerous days
items: Max Hastings on the Cuban Missile Crisis: "If the Americans had bombed Cuba in 1962, escalation would have been almost inevitable"
items: The Cold War: 9 key questions
items: How close to nuclear war did the Cuban Missile Crisis get?
items: Alternate history: what if the Cuban Missile Crisis had escalated?
items: The Cold War: everything you wanted to know
items: Castro and the trip that shaped the 1960s
items: The Cuban Missile Crisis: everything you wanted to know
items: Coronavirus: what might we learn from pandemics in the past?

The Cuban Missile Crisis: the road to resolution
type: item
date: 2022-11-24T16:34:29.000Z
creator: Elinor Evans
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Cuban Missile Crisis podcast
description: In the fourth and final episode of our series on the Cuban Missile Crisis, we chart the final tense days of the Cold War standoff, investigating how it was eventually resolved
encoded: In the concluding episode of our series on the Cuban Missile Crisis, we trace how a tentative compromise coincided with the most dangerous moments of the stand-off, in an exchange of letters that threatened disaster. Elinor Evans speaks to expert historians Alex von Tunzelmann, Mark White and William Taubman to find out how the crisis reached a resolution, and the diplomatic fall-out from the 13 days. Plus, we track revelations that have come to light in the 60 years since the world was brought to the edge of a nuclear war. Want to hear more? Browse more episodes in our podcast series on the Cuban Missile Crisis

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The Cuban Missile Crisis: dangerous days
type: item
date: 2022-11-24T16:29:42.000Z
creator: Elinor Evans
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Cuban Missile Crisis podcast
description: In the third episode of our series on the Cuban Missile Crisis, we chart the first phase of the Cold War standoff – from panicked secret meetings to risky naval manoeuvres
encoded: In the third episode of our series on the Cuban Missile Crisis, we chart the first phase of the Cold War standoff. Elinor Evans speaks to expert historians Alex von Tunzelmann, Mark White and William Taubman to uncover how top-secret meetings descended into chaos, the American public was plunged into panic and a US naval ‘quarantine’ threatened to push the Soviets to the brink. Want to hear more? Browse more episodes in our podcast series on the Cuban Missile Crisis

Max Hastings on the Cuban Missile Crisis: "If the Americans had bombed Cuba in 1962, escalation would have been almost inevitable"
type: item
date: 2022-11-14T16:53:18.000Z
creator: Elinor Evans
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: In his new book, Max Hastings turns to one of the most dangerous fortnights in history, when the United States and Soviet Union took the world to the brink of Armageddon
encoded: Cuban Missile Crisis: In context In July 1962 the USSR premier Nikita Khrushchev, in agreement with Cuba’s leader Fidel Castro, made the fateful decision to place nuclear warheads in Cuba, just 90 miles from the US mainland. The Americans’ discovery of the weapons in October 1962 sparked a 13-day standoff between the superpowers of east and west that became known as the Cuban missile crisis. It is widely regarded as the most dangerous period of the Cold War. On 16 October, US president John F Kennedy convened his closest advisors in a secret body later known as ExComm (Executive Committee of the National Security Council), to discuss a response to the Soviet act of aggression. “Go to general war,” was the advice of some of the president’s closest advisors, who pushed for air strikes or a full-scale invasion of the island. After nearly six days of top-secret meetings, Kennedy – who had come to regard a nuclear strike and descent into war as “a final failure” – favoured a naval blockade. He delivered the news to the world in a televised speech on 22 October 1962; Cuba was cut off from any military aid from its communist ally in the east, and America had avoided a declaration of war. A tense series of letters between the leaders followed, with Khrushchev and Kennedy eventually reaching a diplomatic compromise in which the Soviets agreed to remove missiles from Cuba, and in return Kennedy secretly agreed to remove American nuclear missiles stationed in Turkey. The crisis was diffused, and the world was brought back from the brink of nuclear war. Can you introduce readers to your narrative of the crisis and how it seeks to handle this episode, 60 years on? When I started to write this book, it seemed like simply a piece of history or archaeology. One thing that has been extremely spooky is that – as I researched and wrote this account of how the world, in the midst of the Cold War, came closer than at any time in its history to Armageddon, to a nuclear war – President Vl…

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The Cold War: 9 key questions
type: item
date: 2022-08-16T15:06:47.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Period
subject: Espionage
description: Professor Michael Goodman answers key questions about the decades-long rivalry between the US and the Soviet Union
encoded: What was the Cold War and why do we refer to it as such? To put it simply, the Cold War was a political, ideological and economic conflict that broke out in the years after the Second World War and lasted up until 1991. The two main protagonists were the United States and the Soviet Union, along with their respective allies (the western and eastern blocs). Of course, it was much more complex than that. Read more | The CIA’s most unlikely Cold War weapon? A secret smuggling operation that terrified Soviet censors As to the name: a war will turn ‘hot’ when it involves open fighting, whereas a ‘cold war’ is a battle of ideology. The Cold War of the second half of the 20th century did, in various instances, become a physical conflict as there were lots of wars by proxy, such as in Korea and Vietnam. But fundamentally it remained peaceful and certainly was not what the two world wars had been. What were the ideologies of the two opposing sides? The United States, and its chief ally Britain, were capitalist and democratic countries, while the Soviet Union was a communist state – the first significant communist country to come out of the First World War. The Soviet ideal was an internal system for making life more equitable and level, but more broadly there was a belief that if communism was to succeed then the Russians would have to export that mentality to other countries around the world. So, in the interwar years – particularly after Joseph Stalin came to power – the idea of a global communist revolution took hold. This was strongly opposed by the west, but the two sides would become allies in the Second World War. In the aftermath of the war, Soviet expansion took on a renewed vigour and became more overt: not just in a political-ideological way, but increasingly in a military way, too. The east and west became embroiled in a battle for ideas, for people, for land and for territory. And later, this battle would become characterised by the threat of nuclear war. Read m…

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How close to nuclear war did the Cuban Missile Crisis get?
type: item
date: 2021-05-03T11:08:54.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Serhii Plokhy discusses the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, and reveals just how close the world came to nuclear disaster
encoded: The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 saw a confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union escalate to the edge of nuclear war. Historian Serhii Plokhy, author of a new account of the crisis, explores the factors that led the two sides back from the brink. Serhii Plokhy is the author of Nuclear Folly: A New History of the Cuban Missile Crisis (Allen lane) Buy now on Amazon Buy now on Waterstones Buy now on Bookshop.org

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Alternate history: what if the Cuban Missile Crisis had escalated?
type: item
date: 2021-03-18T14:06:36.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: What might have happened if the Cuban Missile Crisis escalated? Jonny Wilkes talks to Professor Mark White about how the world stood on the brink of World War III and nuclear Armageddon in October 1962 – all it needed was a single push...
encoded: The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was just one rash judgement, one communication breakdown, or one incident getting out of control from turning the Cold War hot – and risking a nuclear war that would change the fate of the entire world in the 20th century. The Soviets had clandestinely deployed nuclear missiles to Communist-friendly Cuba to level the playing field against the US, which had placed Jupiter missiles on the Soviet Union’s doorstep in Turkey. When the US discovered the presence of a medium-and intermediate-range ballistic missile launch sites under construction just 90 miles from Florida, tensions immediately began to rise. President John F Kennedy convened a special group of senior advisers, the Executive Committee of the National Security Council (ExComm) to decide on a course of action – from doing nothing to an invasion. On 22 October, JFK declared a naval quarantine of Cuba. What if JFK had lived? While the Soviet leadership, under Nikita Khrushchev, could order their ships bound for Cuba to sail through the quarantine, they knew they would be at a severe disadvantage if war broke out and escalated into a nuclear shootout. Mark White, professor of history at Queen Mary University of London and author of The Cuban Missile Crisis, says: “The US had a huge lead in terms of nuclear weapons in the early 1960s. It wasn’t until the 1970s that the Soviets roughly achieved parity in the Cold War.” In context On 14 October 1962, a US spy plane obtained photographic evidence that nuclear missiles had been secretly shipped to Cuba, and that the Soviets were building medium-and intermediate-range launch sites. The US, even with an overwhelming nuclear superiority, could not tolerate anything this close – with Cuba just 90 miles from Florida – so President John F Kennedy and his advisory body, ExComm, considered a number of responses. In a television address on 22 October, JFK announced a naval blockade, or quarantine, and his commitment to retaliation if …

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The Cold War: everything you wanted to know
type: item
date: 2021-03-07T12:23:04.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Everything you wanted to know about history (podcast series)
description: Michael Goodman responds to your questions on the decades of geopolitical tension that shaped relations between east and west in the second half of the 20th century
encoded: From espionage across the Iron Curtain, to the global struggles between communists and capitalists, Michael Goodman responds to your questions on the decades of geopolitical tension that shaped relations between east and west in the second half of the 20th century, in the latest in our series tackling the big questions on major historical topics. The Cold War: 9 key questions

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Castro and the trip that shaped the 1960s
type: item
date: 2020-12-10T12:31:22.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Simon Hall explores why Fidel Castro’s visit to New York City in 1960 shaped the rest of the decade
encoded: In September 1960, Fidel Castro visited New York City to give the opening address at the United Nations General Assembly. Historian Simon Hall, author of Ten Days in Harlem, explores the impact of this trip, and how it was to shape an entire decade.

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The Cuban Missile Crisis: everything you wanted to know
type: item
date: 2020-07-12T11:15:23.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: Cold War
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Everything you wanted to know about history (podcast series)
subject: US presidents
description: Mark White responds to listener queries and popular search enquiries about the Cold War nuclear confrontation between the US and the USSR
encoded: In the latest of our series tackling the big questions on major historical topics, historian Mark White responds to listener queries and popular search enquiries about the Cold War nuclear confrontation between the US and the USSR. Listen to more episodes in our 'Everything you wanted to know' podcast series

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Coronavirus: what might we learn from pandemics in the past?
type: item
date: 2020-03-16T15:57:32.000Z
subject: 20th Century
subject: 21st Century
subject: General Modern
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Pandemics
subject: Podcast transcripts
description: As Covid-19 dominates the news, read our interview with Laura Spinney (author of Pale Rider, an account of the 1918 influenza pandemic known as Spanish flu) from the HistoryExtra podcast. In the interview, Spinney draws historical parallels with other pandemics in history and asks what we might learn from disease outbreaks in the past
encoded: Note: this is an unedited transcript of our recent podcast Coronavirus – a historical perspective Matt Elton, editor of BBC World Histories Magazine: Obviously, Coronavirus is something that’s hitting a lot of headlines at the moment. Why does it strike such a chord, why are we so afraid of pandemics? Laura Spinney: Well, I think it’s something very primitive in us really. I mean, we’ve had to deal with epidemics of infectious disease, plagues if you like, to use a more kind of ancient and Biblical term, since we settled down in kind of semi-permanent settlements, since we started farming, that is, about 10, 12,000 years ago. And, you know, these diseases that kind of adapted to big groups of densely-living people, we call them the crowd diseases, and they kind of evolved in parallel with us as we adopted those new, more sedentary lifestyles. So it’s been a kind of arms race for a very long time, they know us very well and unfortunately because they’re small and they reproduce much faster, they tend to be a step ahead. They can just mutate and adapt and, you know, they’re just wherever we don’t want them to be before we can do anything about it and we’re seeing that again now. In some ways, there are many aspects, I think, of a pandemic which don’t change over time. There are many that do but there are many that don’t and those are the ones that speak to our, obviously speak to our most ancient fears. ME: And, of course, it’s natural for humans to look back at past examples of a similar thing to see if there’s any parallels or any lessons that could be drawn. Do you think there are particular pandemics from history that are most useful to look at in terms of parallels or is it just not a useful exercise generally? LS: No, I do think it’s a useful exercise, I just don’t know why we immediately rush to pick the worst possible example. Given that the Spanish Flu, or the not Spanish Flu, we should really call it the 1918 Flu, was pretty much forgotten for most of the la…

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