The Michael Knowles Show - Michael's Podcast Pick - The Cold War： What We Saw

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00:00:30.400 Back in July last year, I told you about this show, Apollo 11, What We Saw.

00:00:35.020 The host, our pal Bill Whittle, took you back in time

00:00:38.480 to what it was like to live through the space age

00:00:40.820 and one of the greatest endeavors of mankind, the moon landing.

00:00:44.620 And now Bill has hosted a new season of the show, The Cold War, What We Saw.

00:00:50.060 If you are a highfalutin scholarly academic or even just a plain old history buff,

00:00:54.900 then you will want to check it out.

00:00:56.940 Bill captures what it was like to live through major events

00:00:59.320 like the Berlin Airlift, the Korean War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Space Race.

00:01:04.580 And the story ties all of these milestones together

00:01:07.140 to give us a clear picture of the apocalypse that never happened.

00:01:11.480 If you're close to my age, you weren't here for any of those events.

00:01:14.920 But the story is so well told and the setting is so brilliantly descriptive

00:01:18.420 that as you go through these events,

00:01:20.600 you start to understand the battle not only for economic freedom,

00:01:23.600 but for civilization itself.

00:01:26.420 They've already released two episodes of this 12-part series,

00:01:29.320 so you already have some to catch up on.

00:01:31.660 This is a perfect time to listen as the 2020 election starts to heat up

00:01:35.080 and we can see where the left has gone full-blown communist

00:01:38.220 in so many of their policies and in their language.

00:01:41.860 Take a listen to this 10-minute preview of episode 1.

00:01:44.480 And if you like what you hear, just go to dailywire.com slash coldwar

00:01:48.780 and start listening to this incredibly important story.

00:01:52.260 You can also find it on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:01:59.720 Thirty years ago, the Berlin Wall was torn down by the people

00:02:03.800 that it had divided for three decades.

00:02:07.000 Berliners were euphoric.

00:02:08.340 They were euphoric because the Berlin Wall was not merely a wall

00:02:11.820 between East and West Berlin.

00:02:13.500 It was the wall between East and West, period.

00:02:17.340 It was the division of humanity into two different camps.

00:02:20.640 And since names and labels are always changing and morphing,

00:02:23.520 not to mention carrying decades of emotional baggage,

00:02:26.500 let's reduce it to the most simple, emotionally neutral terms.

00:02:30.640 On one side of the wall, the Eastern side, were the collectivists,

00:02:34.360 who believe that society takes precedent over the person.

00:02:37.420 This collectivism was advertised as new and scientific,

00:02:40.540 but the fact is that collectivism has been the default condition of humanity

00:02:44.600 since humanity began.

00:02:46.600 No, the actual newcomer to this clash of visions

00:02:49.280 were the individualists on the Western side.

00:02:52.220 The first government in history dedicated to the idea

00:02:54.980 of the individual being more worthy of protection than the state

00:02:58.500 had just turned 170 years old when the 40-year conflict known as the Cold War began.

00:03:06.040 With the world in ruins after the defeat of Nazi Germany, 0.89

00:03:09.120 Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy,

00:03:11.500 these two ideologies had come into head-on conflict here in Berlin.

00:03:15.740 It quickly became evident that Soviet leaders were not interested

00:03:19.160 in a free, unified Germany

00:03:21.000 and were determined to induce or force the Western powers to leave Berlin.

00:03:27.240 Certainly, the American and Western people do not want war,

00:03:31.580 but all history has taught us the grim lesson

00:03:34.200 that no nation has ever been successful in avoiding the terrors of war

00:03:38.780 by refusing to defend its rights,

00:03:41.380 by attempting to placate aggression.

00:03:43.800 From the East, the collectivist idea known as Communism

00:03:47.060 had slugged its way for mile after bloody mile,

00:03:50.620 limping, then striding, and then running across Eastern Europe

00:03:54.540 from the Nazi high-water mark at Stalingrad.

00:03:58.320 The individualist ideology arrived by sea,

00:04:01.540 storming ashore on the beaches of Normandy,

00:04:03.740 and after being staggered once or twice,

00:04:06.020 was racing across Western Europe in a gasoline-fueled Red Ball Express.

00:04:11.520 Now, part of this idea was known as Capitalism,

00:04:13.460 but that was merely the economic system.

00:04:15.780 Politically, morally, economically, and practically,

00:04:19.380 these were called the forces of freedom

00:04:21.000 for the simple reason that that's what they were.

00:04:24.160 And as the collectivist nightmare known as German National Socialism 0.58

00:04:27.500 wavered, collapsed, and then imploded,

00:04:30.340 these two antithetical ideologies met in Berlin,

00:04:33.580 for it was in Berlin, where one world war had just ended,

00:04:37.280 that the next world war was about to begin.

00:04:39.460 Now, no one felt this divide more than the defeated Germans themselves.

00:04:44.880 To them, the wall, this war of ideologies,

00:04:47.980 had an immediacy not felt anywhere else.

00:04:50.820 The nation and former capital Berlin split in half,

00:04:54.080 one camp occupied by the armies of the Soviet Union

00:04:56.760 and the others by the armies of the United States,

00:05:00.320 Great Britain, and in a rather generous gesture, France.

00:05:03.500 There was nothing theoretical about the Berlin Wall.

00:05:07.660 It was cold, thick, high, and deadly,

00:05:11.100 and it was a daily reminder to those on both sides

00:05:13.800 of the sheer monumental luck,

00:05:16.940 the city block you lived on,

00:05:18.600 determining the fate of you,

00:05:19.960 your children, and their children.

00:05:22.240 No wonder they went at it with hammers and crowbars

00:05:24.880 and even bare and bloody hands.

00:05:26.500 But all of us who watched it happen

00:05:28.760 felt that giddy, euphoric, mind-boggling sensation

00:05:32.440 that had nothing to do with living in Berlin

00:05:35.080 or even in Germany.

00:05:35.980 In our top story,

00:05:37.700 the Iron Curtain between East Germany and West Berlin

00:05:40.340 has come tumbling down.

00:05:41.900 This has been a city physically divided for 28 years,

00:05:44.860 but now it's come together, East and West,

00:05:47.480 in a spontaneous outburst of emotion.

00:05:49.480 We all cried when the wall came down

00:05:56.040 because with it collapsed from our shoulders

00:05:58.580 the death sentence that we'd all been living under.

00:06:01.380 Because you cannot possibly understand

00:06:03.380 how the world could be locked

00:06:04.600 in a life-and-death struggle for half a century

00:06:06.660 unless you can put yourself in the position

00:06:08.440 of those of us who lived through it

00:06:10.240 or lived through any part of it.

00:06:12.500 You see, when the Berlin Wall fell,

00:06:14.080 it began to dawn on me

00:06:15.100 like it began to dawn on all of us.

00:06:17.220 There was going to be an actual future

00:06:19.300 and despite all odds,

00:06:21.200 we were going to live to see it.

00:06:23.160 And this is what we saw.

00:06:29.640 Today, in the world of freedom,

00:06:32.020 the proudest boast is

00:06:33.580 Ich bin ein B-Liter.

00:06:35.520 Iron Curtain has descended across the country.

00:06:38.040 The only answer to communism

00:06:39.800 is a massive offensive.

00:06:41.540 Communism must be a system

00:06:43.220 of international control and conformity.

00:06:45.400 You and I have a rendezvous with death.

00:06:47.120 Never give in.

00:06:48.060 Never, never, never.

00:06:49.300 Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.

00:07:02.200 From Stettin in the Baltic

00:07:04.800 to Trieste in the Adriatic,

00:07:06.900 an iron curtain has descended

00:07:08.780 across the continent.

00:07:10.080 Behind that line

00:07:11.400 lie all the capitals

00:07:12.760 of the ancient states

00:07:14.000 of Central and Eastern Europe.

00:07:15.940 If you had grown up

00:07:19.700 during the Cold War

00:07:20.620 like I did,

00:07:21.620 then we both have something in common.

00:07:24.120 Didn't matter which side you were on

00:07:25.680 because what we all shared

00:07:26.980 was universal.

00:07:28.020 If you were a kid

00:07:28.860 when I was a kid,

00:07:30.080 the one thing you were pretty certain of

00:07:31.820 is that you were never going to get

00:07:33.240 to be an adult.

00:07:34.560 My dad was a hotel manager

00:07:35.980 and so I grew up in Bermuda.

00:07:37.820 That meant I never got subjected

00:07:39.520 to those civil defense films

00:07:41.060 that featured rows of bright-eyed

00:07:43.000 American kids at their school desks

00:07:44.660 who, an instant after

00:07:46.200 the brilliant flash of light

00:07:47.420 coming through the window,

00:07:48.700 would immediately

00:07:49.400 and automatically

00:07:50.360 duck beneath their desks

00:07:52.040 and cover their heads

00:07:53.040 with school books.

00:07:54.600 You remember.

00:07:55.680 Duck

00:07:56.020 and cover

00:07:57.200 I didn't have to deal

00:08:08.660 with Saturday tests

00:08:09.700 of the air raid siren

00:08:10.740 and I was nearly an adult

00:08:12.060 when I first saw training films

00:08:13.600 that showed what to do

00:08:14.780 if you were caught in the open

00:08:16.300 without time to get to a bomb shelter,

00:08:18.220 namely,

00:08:19.040 lying on the grass

00:08:19.980 and covering yourself

00:08:21.120 with a newspaper.

00:08:22.280 Now, I was old enough

00:08:23.060 by that time

00:08:23.720 to laugh off the absurdity

00:08:25.100 of using a newspaper

00:08:26.060 to protect you

00:08:26.760 from the heat flash

00:08:27.580 of a thermonuclear weapon

00:08:28.900 and I wasn't yet old enough

00:08:30.960 to realize that

00:08:31.700 wrapping yourself

00:08:32.340 with a newspaper

00:08:33.080 was, in fact,

00:08:34.600 excellent advice

00:08:35.360 as was duck and cover.

00:08:37.440 We'll get to all of that later.

00:08:39.560 I didn't have to deal

00:08:40.380 with any of that

00:08:41.100 since I was not going

00:08:42.020 to American public schools

00:08:43.360 in American suburbs

00:08:44.320 but rather attending

00:08:45.660 British public schools

00:08:46.760 while growing up

00:08:47.880 in one of the last

00:08:48.840 of the British colonies.

00:08:50.740 That nuclear war stuff 0.67

00:08:52.100 barely registered at all.

00:08:53.800 I was on an island

00:08:54.880 in the middle

00:08:55.480 of the Atlantic.

00:08:56.460 It all had nothing

00:08:57.380 to do with me.

00:08:58.780 Now, of course,

00:08:59.300 the fact that the

00:09:00.080 20-mile-long

00:09:01.180 fishhook-shaped island

00:09:02.540 that was my home

00:09:03.300 at the time

00:09:03.780 housed both

00:09:04.440 a United States

00:09:05.160 Air Force Base

00:09:05.920 at one end

00:09:06.460 and a United States

00:09:07.980 Naval Station

00:09:08.620 at the other,

00:09:09.380 well, that was all

00:09:09.840 far too theoretical

00:09:10.720 for me.

00:09:11.640 But surely,

00:09:12.660 it was not lost

00:09:13.440 on my parents

00:09:14.180 that if the nightmare

00:09:15.280 did come true,

00:09:16.620 that tiny island

00:09:17.500 and everything

00:09:18.420 and everyone on it

00:09:19.700 would soon become

00:09:20.800 radioactive dust

00:09:21.860 in the upper stratosphere.

00:09:23.340 Unlike millions

00:09:25.100 of other American kids

00:09:26.120 back in the suburbs

00:09:27.000 who, as a result

00:09:27.700 of good luck

00:09:28.280 or bad maybe,

00:09:30.160 were not within

00:09:30.940 the lethal blast radius

00:09:32.200 of multiple Soviet

00:09:33.420 thermonuclear warheads,

00:09:35.220 those of us

00:09:35.720 who grew up

00:09:36.200 on a beach in Bermuda

00:09:37.040 would not have had

00:09:38.240 even the slimmest chance.

00:09:41.980 You know,

00:09:42.500 many times a day

00:09:43.220 I get asked,

00:09:43.980 Bill, you suave

00:09:45.040 and handsome devil,

00:09:45.940 how is it that you

00:09:46.780 know so much

00:09:47.360 about everything?

00:09:48.060 And the answer

00:09:48.580 is very simple.

00:09:49.300 I have a very high

00:09:50.300 level of confidence

00:09:51.180 and a very low

00:09:52.140 level of awareness.

00:09:53.500 But there's some good news.

00:09:55.000 I had to spend

00:09:55.540 25 years poking around

00:09:56.800 trying to get

00:09:57.360 all this stuff together

00:09:58.200 and mostly I just

00:09:59.060 pretty much fake it

00:09:59.900 but you won't have to.

00:10:01.300 There's a streaming service

00:10:02.340 out called

00:10:02.780 The Great Courses Plus.

00:10:04.520 What it is

00:10:04.960 is a bunch of

00:10:05.580 unique perspectives

00:10:06.540 from engaging experts

00:10:07.980 in their fields

00:10:08.780 on a wide range

00:10:09.920 of topics.

00:10:10.620 You know,

00:10:10.820 there's subjects

00:10:11.260 like American presidents,

00:10:12.480 you can get one

00:10:13.080 on exoplanets

00:10:14.120 or travel photography,

00:10:15.500 stress relief.

00:10:16.400 And with The Great Courses

00:10:17.300 you have the flexibility

00:10:17.980 to watch them

00:10:18.580 or just listen to them

00:10:19.300 just about anywhere.

00:10:20.240 Just as one example,

00:10:21.280 they've got a featured

00:10:21.920 course out now

00:10:22.640 called The Skeptic's Guide

00:10:23.880 to American History.

00:10:25.480 And if you've seen

00:10:26.160 what they've been doing

00:10:26.760 to history

00:10:27.220 in the public sector

00:10:28.140 out there,

00:10:28.680 it's about time

00:10:29.420 somebody asked questions

00:10:30.400 like,

00:10:30.940 was the Cold War inevitable?

00:10:32.820 Yes.

00:10:33.280 And you can get

00:10:33.980 all kinds of in-depth

00:10:34.980 objective understanding

00:10:36.020 about the past

00:10:36.680 and how it still

00:10:37.340 affects us today.

00:10:38.420 Now right now

00:10:38.840 they've got a special offer.

00:10:40.000 You can get that

00:10:40.580 awesome feeling of pride

00:10:41.620 that I often feel

00:10:42.520 but you'll actually

00:10:43.400 have earned yours

00:10:44.500 if you sign up

00:10:45.480 for The Great Courses Plus.

00:10:46.740 Plus, they're offering

00:10:47.780 my listeners

00:10:48.280 this amazing deal.

00:10:49.500 It's three months

00:10:50.180 of unlimited access

00:10:51.100 for just $30.

00:10:52.280 That's $10 a month.

00:10:53.960 But it's a limited time offer

00:10:55.340 so you're going to have

00:10:56.160 to sign up today

00:10:56.800 using my special URL.

00:10:58.540 Get all the details

00:10:59.340 at thegreatcoursesplus.com

00:11:02.280 slash cold.

00:11:03.580 That's thegreatcoursesplus.com

00:11:05.800 slash cold.

00:11:07.560 A few years ago

00:11:08.640 I met a guy

00:11:09.200 who was about my age

00:11:10.260 which to my amazement

00:11:11.460 happens to be 60.

00:11:12.940 And like me

00:11:13.820 he was an American boy

00:11:14.820 growing up overseas

00:11:15.820 on an island.

00:11:17.420 Only he was an Air Force brat.

00:11:19.500 The island he grew up on

00:11:20.620 was Okinawa

00:11:21.240 and his father

00:11:22.400 was a B-52 pilot

00:11:23.700 based at Kadena Air Force Base.

00:11:27.180 He told me

00:11:27.960 how he and his family

00:11:28.840 would go to see movies

00:11:29.700 at the base

00:11:30.220 just like any other family.

00:11:31.740 Dad and Mom

00:11:32.520 and the kids

00:11:33.060 and the popcorn

00:11:33.700 and the sodas

00:11:34.480 and the good,

00:11:35.420 the bad and the ugly

00:11:36.140 up there on the screen.

00:11:37.260 But every now and then

00:11:38.120 in the middle of a Saturday

00:11:39.280 afternoon double feature

00:11:40.360 let's say

00:11:40.860 all of a sudden

00:11:41.980 two huge red signs

00:11:43.940 labeled ALERT

00:11:44.820 would suddenly light up

00:11:46.320 on either side

00:11:47.200 of the screen.

00:11:49.740 And before you even

00:11:50.740 had a chance

00:11:51.300 to look around

00:11:52.020 the movie had stopped

00:11:53.100 the lights had come up

00:11:54.340 and every grown man

00:11:55.840 in the audience

00:11:56.480 was climbing over

00:11:57.380 the rows of seats

00:11:58.260 carefully pushing aside

00:11:59.640 women and children

00:12:00.320 and running like hell 0.69

00:12:01.720 for the exits. 0.98

00:12:02.400 Just go to

00:12:05.580 dailywire.com

00:12:06.580 slash cold war

00:12:07.480 and start listening

00:12:08.560 to this incredibly

00:12:09.620 important story.

00:12:11.000 You can also find it

00:12:11.800 on iTunes,

00:12:12.760 Spotify,

00:12:13.480 YouTube

00:12:13.800 or wherever you

00:12:15.060 get your podcasts.

The Michael Knowles Show - February 08, 2020

Michael's Podcast Pick - The Cold War： What We Saw

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