The Radical Romanticism of Piracy
In Western popular culture, pirates have emerged as dashing heroic figures.Despite the fact that, on the periphery, most people are vaguely aware that there is a profound disconnect between the realities of piracy and the popular fantasy, we choose to...
Star Trek, the Politburo, and the Power of Irony
Back in June of 1987, as the Cold War was winding down, the World Wildlife Fund and Paramount Pictures organised a public screening of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home in Moscow to celebrate the Politburo’s recent decision to ban...
Interpreting the Unthinkable
In September 2018 the UK’s newest Holocaust exhibition opened to the public.
‘Though Our Eyes’ tells the story of the Holocaust as experienced by 16 Jewish men and women who escaped or survived the genocide and made new lives in...
Why the Cold War Ended
The end of the Cold War was surprising and profound in equal measure.
In late 1988, everything was, relatively speaking, the same as it had always been: students of International Relations were avidly dissecting the latest texts by Kenneth Waltz...
The Bomber Always Gets Through? Airpower Theory and the Second World War
“We fly, but we have not ‘conquered’ the air”
— Beryl Markham
Much to the consternation of modern-day strategists, the first generation of aviation specialists were indifferent to academic convention. In the years following the Wright brothers’ first powered flight...
Thomas Schelling and the Diplomacy of Violence
Thomas Schelling originally worked in the field of economics, focussing on international political economy, trade policy, and tariffs.
In the 1950s and 1960s, he was associated with the RAND Corporation and its leading lights, including Herman Kahn, Bernard Brodie, and...
MAD Men
A lot happened in 1967.
Israel went to war with Syria, Egypt, and Jordan for a grand total of six days; the Soviet Union, United Kingdom, and United States ratified a treaty banning the placement of nuclear weapons in outer...
The Problem with Apollo
The American ‘moonshot’ is arguably one of the most memorable moments of the Cold War, if not the 20th century.
It captured the world’s attention with record global viewing figures on live television and cemented the success of America’s military-industrial-scientific...
Soviet Military Doctrine, the Winter War, and Operation Barbarossa: A (Partial) Exercise in Counterfactual History
“Even bees have venom—how much the more do nations. If you are unprepared, even if there are many of you, mere numbers cannot be counted on.”
—Zhuge Liang
During the 1930s, the principal goal of Soviet foreign policy was to...
Channel Islander Victims of Nazi Persecution: A Legitimate Heritage?
A casual stroll through any village or town in France will reveal memorials to those who died in concentration camps.
Examine any war memorial and alongside those who died on the battlefield are lists of the glorieux martyrs de la...
The Fashionable Form of Holocaust Denial
What do Holocaust deniers deny?
The most extreme among them deny that the Nazis’ the extermination of the Jews ever happened—or, if some portion of it did take place, the Jews were behind it. These include such notorious figures as...
The Politics of the World Cup
It was a magnificent finale to a tense group stage encounter.
Standing at five and a half feet, Xherdan Shaqiri’s run wasn’t graceful, but with legs pumping like pistons, the Switzerland midfielder surged past the defender and stuck the ball...
Behind Enemy Lines: The Life and Death of Diana Rowden
On July 6th, 1944, Diana Rowden, Andree Borrell, Vera Leigh, and Sonya Olschanezky were executed by the SS at Natzweiler-Struthof, a concentration camp located near the foothills of the Vosges Mountains in Alsace.
They had been transferred from a prison...
Pride in Perspective: Homosexuality in Britain Since 1967
In July 1967 the Sexual Offences Act decriminalized homosexual acts between men, making it legal between two men over 21 in private (though not in Scotland or Northern Ireland—those laws were finally abolished in 1980 and 1982 respectively).
This legislation...
Britain and the Second World War: Identity and Remembrance
The anniversary of VE (Victory in Europe) Day on 8th May marks the end of the war in Europe and Germany’s unconditional surrender to the Allies.
As it coincides this year with the final year of centenary commemorations of the...
VE Day Through the Eyes of East Prussian Refugees
"I did not know then that the 8th of May 1945 was a special day. Whatever happened in the world ‘outside’, did not apply to us. Here, everything revolved around food, the acquisition of food and sheer survival… We did...
Women and Protest in 19th Century Britain
Does women’s history actually exist?
If the lives and achievements of just over half of the population were fully acknowledged as a vital part of the human story then, by definition, it wouldn’t.
The tendency to see women’s experiences as...
The International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade
25 March marks The International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, a moment to remember those who suffered under slavery and to reflect upon slavery’s legacy in contemporary society.
Between 1526 and 1867,...
Black History Month with British Online Archives
Black History Month is celebrated every February in the United States and Canada, as well as here in the United Kingdom in October. The idea started as a way of remembering significant people and events in African history.
Black History...
