Nuclear explosion: August 1945 - A renactment of the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshim in 1945. The USA did not tell the USSR at the time (even though they were supposed to be allies). The USSR became suspicious of the USA.


The Berlin Blockade/ Airlift: quite useful for seeing the size of the task that lay ahead for Britain, France and the USA (worth watching just for the funny British accents)



Nuclear Arms race: Shows how the USSR and the USA competed against each other to develop the Hydrogen bomb and better and faster ways of deploying them. From WW2 planes – to Jet planes – to the Russian and then American



The U2 Crisis: The summit that this video talks about is the peace summit of 1960. It was the brginning of a new decade where the USA and USSR wanted to improve relations between them. However, just before they were about to meet – the Russians shot down the USA’s U2 spy plane. This increased tensions between them even further.



The Cuban Missile Crisis: Good background knowledge. Useful points about why Krushchev put nuclear missiles on Cuba, it shows the real danger of WW3 and explains key details of the crisis.