In life, whether personally or professionally, you need to have credible leadership. Credibility creates trust – that this is the right thing to do, that when challenges arise people will trust you to navigate them safely through. Whether it is teaching your son or daughter to ride a bike or leading a complex project, credible [...]

It has been 214 years to the day that the worlds greatest poet died. Robert Burns is a poet often mentioned in Cold War Fiction as the Russians seemed to have an affinity towards him, and in celebration of his life ( yes, Burns Nicht is in January) I thought I would do a wee [...]

I am one of those sad individuals who lives the life of a spy in my head, so when I go out I tailor the environment I am in to my internal spy narration. I would like to point out that I am not one of those people who mumble to themselves or give an [...]

The first time I was aware of this song was on a trivial pursuit card which asked: “What is the most played song in British jukeboxes, yet never released as a single in the UK?” Released in 1978 by Cold Chisel, this song is about an Australian Vietnam Veteran who is disgruntled with the world [...]

This is a book which covers modern day Vietnam and the War. Let me start off by saying I’m a big fan of Mr DeMille, even though I’ve only now read four books of his, and this one delivers yet again. The story follows Paul Brenner, a former combatant then who became a military policeman in [...]

The Stasi has never actually seen the whole of Platoon or Apocalypse Now or Full Metal Jacket and gave up after the first 10 mins of Heaven and Earth and so we decided to do a review on a film that is a bit left-field but still about the Vietnam War. This is a short [...]

In the effort to read the forgotten or underground works of the Cold War, and to try and get as much of a wide point of view as possible, not just the Flemings and the Deightons, I thought it would be very interesting to see what fictional books, posters, fliers etc were produced by the Ku [...]

This blog is solely interested in Cold War Fiction, whether it is by novelists, film studios, music composers or governments. This propaganda cartoon, released in 1972 by the USSR, is very powerful and quite shameful. Shameful in the sense that I am embarrassed to be a human and yet, be so inhumane. I realize that this [...]

old eye injury flared up and I can’t really see.
However, I believe member RedBanner will be posting a travel report soon.

We all love a bit of Red Terror, especially if it is a training film made for the US Department of Defence. This short (28 minutes long) propaganda masterpiece is well worth finding and watching. The plot is rather simple, an American man, Jerry Donovan who is taking his freedom for granted, wakes up one morning [...]

With The Goons, you either love them or don’t. I’m simply not a fan. I know that David at the excellently designed and written Permission to Kill loves them, but I just don’t find them funny, and I know this may offend some of you, I don’t find Peter Sellers funny. Maybe it is a generational [...]

In another post on Cold War songs – I have been busy with other stuff and frankly it is easier to write posts on songs, than finish the 20 drafts I have on books and movies. Speaking/writing of which, I watched Crimson Tide this morning and is it better than The Hunt for Red October? [...]

The music industry is always aimed at teenagers dreaming or wanting to be or are in love. Hormonal changes mixed with cash and cheap consumer goods is a gold mine. However, I don’t think this record would have sold many as this song is about a boy who loved Agnes who was a spy – [...]

Produced in (I think) 1966, this song is a classic of the Red Menace that stalks America. A decade after the excesses of McCarthy-ism, this song was sung by Marty Robbins warning about Reds in our midst and how they will corrupt, how our feeble-brained and opportunistic politicians will let us down and that God, [...]

For awhile I’ve been meaning to do reviews of the James Bond soundtracks of the films which were made during the Cold War, but I just haven’t got round to it, and there is a part of me which thinks let Bond be reviewed by the professional Bond websites, however like the weather I am [...]

Recently my spirit for the site has been flagging. When I started I thought this site would be more interactive, people would write in the forums, I would have at least one other person writing a blog on the site, and out of all the absolute dross on the internet people would recognise my genius, take [...]

Google analytics always show that one of the search terms that my site falls under is CIA fiction cold war. However, I rarely read books about the CIA, as I think the European spies are better. European spies, are grubbier, more inventive, more morally ambiguous where the American cold war fiction books are more military. For [...]

My biggest communist novelty mistake was not realising Castro was in Hanoi the same day I was. Instead of having the joy of listening to the man ramble on for X amount of hours, I did the sights and the tomb of Ho Chi Minh. ‘Uncle’ Ho’s mausoleum was quiet, respectful and you had to dress [...]

Libya, the country with the laziest flag, have always been seen, and rightly so, as a nation state sponsor of terrorism. This was especially true in the 1970 and 80s and the West never did more than lob a few missiles at Gaddafi, which missed, before they welcomed him back into the worlds community as he [...]

For being really light on posts recently, but it has taken a lot of time working on the new layout and the backend of the site: – some stuff still to do – a few css quirks still floating about – the background which is hacked. if the screen doesn’t go red press ctrl-f5 – [...]