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St. Basil's Cathedral spire about to pierce the world like a balloon.

Why Would Anyone Want to Run the World?

The warnings in Cold War history.
by John Lewis Gaddis via Foreign Affairs on June 7, 2024
Collage of photos of musicians.

How a Saxophonist Tricked the KGB by Encrypting Secrets in Music

Using a custom encryption scheme based on musical notation, US musicians smuggled information into and out of the USSR.
by Lily Hay Newman via Wired on June 8, 2022
A naval cap with Soviet and American flags beneath the Pepsi logo

The Doomed Voyage of Pepsi’s Soviet Navy

A three-decade dream of communist markets ended in the scrapyard.
by Paul Musgrave via Foreign Policy on November 27, 2021

Mikhail Gorbachev’s Pizza Hut Thanksgiving Miracle

In 1997, the former Soviet leader needed money, and Pizza Hut needed a spokesman. Greatness ensued.
by Paul Musgrave via Foreign Policy on November 28, 2019
A woman driving a tractor with a man, with mechanized farming in the background, drawn in the Soviet style.

The American Housewives who Sought Freedom in Soviet Russia

A forgotten chapter in the history of feminism: why American women chose to flee the West for ‘freedom’ in Soviet Russia.
by Julia L. Mickenberg via Aeon on July 6, 2017
Agronomist George Tynes, flanked by Soviet army cadets
partner

Brave New World

In the 1930s, 16 African-American families from the South rejected the American experiment and looked to Communist Uzbekistan for a chance to build a new world.
via BackStory on November 11, 2016
Black and white Washington DC.

Between Existential Fear and Isolationist Exhaustion: The United States on the Eve of the Cold War

Dean Acheson, President Truman’s prim, patrician undersecretary of state, was sitting in his office on February 21, 1947, when he received a visitor.
by Clay Risen via Literary Hub on March 21, 2025
Meeting of delegates to approve the Charter of the United Nations, San Francisco, 1945.

Origins of the UN: The US and USSR

The genesis of the United Nations came from the nations united as Allies against the Axis powers, but who really pushed the institution into being?
by Stephen Wertheim, Matthew Wills, Geoffrey Roberts via JSTOR Daily on February 9, 2025
An illustration of space, with two silhouettes of heads overlapping.

The Fraught U.S.-Soviet Search for Alien Life

During the Cold War, American and Soviet scientists embarked on an unprecedented quest to contact extraterrestrials.
by Sophie Pinkham via The New Yorker on February 6, 2025
Paper and an ink pen.

Call Me Comrade: Cold War Pen-Pals

The correspondence of Soviet and American women during the Cold War.
by Miriam Dobson via London Review of Books on October 17, 2024
Members of the American Communist Party march with signs at a protest.

The Communist Party Helped Shape US History

A new book tells the story of American communism as an integral part of 20th-century US history, with Communists “as social critics and social change agents.”
by Daniel Colligan via Jacobin on September 16, 2024
Communist Party USA members march for unemployed relief during the Great Depression in San Francisco.

Bring American Communists Out of the Shadows — and Closets

In the 20th century, American Communists were seen as an enemy within. In reality, they were ordinary people with complex lives that deserve to be chronicled.
by David Bacon via Jacobin on August 15, 2024
Angela Davis standing at podium, speaking at Communist Party USA event.

How and Why American Communism Failed

Plus: One historian’s about-face on the Communist record.
by Ronald Radosh via The Bulwark on August 2, 2024
Parade of U.S. Olympic team members, 1960.

At the 1960 Olympics, American Athletes Recruited by the CIA Tried to Convince Soviets to Defect

Al Cantello, a star of the U.S. track and field team, arranged a covert meeting between a government agent and a Ukrainian long jumper.
by Erik Ofgang via Smithsonian on August 1, 2024
Broken hammer and sickle illustration.

The Cause That Turned Idealists Into Authoritarian Zealots

The history of American Communism shows that dogma and fervor are no substitute for popular support.
by Maurice Isserman via The Atlantic on June 17, 2024
A column of Soviet armored vehicles arrives to reinforce the military presence in Kabul on Jan. 30, 1980.

The Forgotten World War III Scare of 1980

Moscow and Washington trapped themselves in a cycle of fear over Iran.
by James M. Acton, Nicole Grajewski via Foreign Policy on June 9, 2024
Man and woman testing buttons on machine at Duke University Parapsychology Laboratory

Tomorrow People

For the entire 20th century, it had felt like telepathy was just around the corner. Why is that especially true now?
by Roger Luckhurst via Aeon on June 3, 2024
Collage of Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Ted Kennedy on the campaign trail.

The Debate Gaffe That Changed American History

And cost Gerald Ford the presidency.
by Jeff Greenfield via Politico Magazine on May 9, 2024
From left: snow, three men, and several vehicles with large tires.

The U.S. Army Tried to Build a Secret Nuclear City under Greenland’s Ice

Long before Greenland’s shifting ice threatened sea level rise, it doomed one of the military’s most audacious Cold War projects.
by George Bass via Washington Post on November 13, 2023
George Kennan sitting at his desk.

George Kennan, Loser

The American foreign policy sage was driven as much by pessimism about the US as antipathy to the Soviet Union.
by Ivan Krastev, Leonard Benardo via New Statesman on August 10, 2023
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn in March 1949.

New Hampshire Removes Historical Marker For Feminist With Communist Past

The state removed the educational marker after Concord Republicans complained about Elizabeth Gurley Flynn's communist ties.
by Andrew Jeong via Retropolis on May 17, 2023
A pole vaulter pointing the end of the pole at the camera.

Pole Vaulting Over the Iron Curtain

When it became clear that the United States and its allies couldn’t “liberate” Eastern Europe through psychological war and covert ops, they turned to sports.
by Matthew Wills, Toby Rider, Kevin Witherspoon via JSTOR Daily on May 12, 2023

The Liberal Discontents of Francis Fukuyama

“The End of History?” was an announcement of victory. But a quarter-century later, its author remains unsure if liberalism truly won.
by Daniel Bessner via The Nation on April 17, 2023
A hammer is shown breaking several chunks of the earth into smaller pieces. In the background, black space.

The Wonderful Death of a State

For market radicals and neo-Confederates, secession is the path to a world that’s socially divided but economically integrated—separate but global.
by Quinn Slobodian via The Baffler on April 4, 2023
Photos of UFO and the Chinese Spy Balloon.

Why Americans Are So Unsettled by the Chinese Spy Balloon

China’s balloon, whatever its purpose, became a physical and observable reminder of the often-invisible work nations do to keep tabs on one another.
by Kelsey D. Atherton via Slate on February 10, 2023
An image of George Kennan with some of his letters superimposed over his face.

Kennan’s Warning on Ukraine

Ambition, insecurity, and the perils of independence.
by Frank Costigliola via Foreign Affairs on January 28, 2023
George Kennan.

George Kennan’s False Moves

The great grand strategist of the Cold War believed he failed in his most important task.
by Patrick Iber via The New Republic on January 12, 2023
The Almanac Singers playing various instruments, including guitars, a banjo, and an accordion.

"Which Side Are You On, Boys..."

Watching the Ken Burns series on the U.S. and the Holocaust and thinking about American folk music.
by William Hogeland via Hogeland's Bad History on October 3, 2022
A Coca-Cola billboard in Moscow in 1997.

Capitalism Triumphed in the Cold War, but Not by Making People Better Off

In the wake of economic crises, liberal democracies proved most adept at imposing austerity.
by Andre Pagliarini via The New Republic on September 29, 2022
A Ukranian peasant family poses with sacks of grain.

'The New York Times' Can't Shake the Cloud Over a 90-Year-Old Pulitzer Prize

In 1932, Walter Duranty won a Pulitzer for stories defending Soviet policies that led to the deaths of millions of Ukrainians.
by David Folkenflik via NPR on May 8, 2022
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