The Cold War and The Third World War?

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This makes for pretty depressing reading so I completely understand if you want to skip this week’s newsletter.

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You have to know the past to understand the present.

Carl Sagan

The comparisons between my childhood and now, are in many ways all too depressingly easy at the moment. Whether it be the Russian invasion of Ukraine, compared to the late 70’s and early 80’s when it felt to me like the possibility of a nuclear war was very real. Or the current cost of living crisis and the levels of inflation, power cuts and general strike also of the 70’s and 80’s. I can still remember my parents talking about mortgage interest rates that hit the high-teen percentage points when they were trying to raise me, provide food etc. Now we are contending with not only inflation levels moving in to similar domains but also fuel bills that are completely out of control. We still managed to have the odd “staycation” in the school holidays but I can remember never venturing very far from home during those years.

I’ve written before about comparison on the weather now and in 1976, and then there’s the sewage on beaches and rivers and a whole mirriad of other quite uncanningly comparable events. Does history repeat itself? Seems like whilst they might not be quite repeats they’re maybe reboots. Sadly you’d think with a reboot we might get a better outcome or perhaps even avoid the situation in the first place? No it seems that certain ideologies don’t learn from their past mistakes, they just make them all over again.

It might be that it’s far enough back that whilst many of us can point to similar times when the same experiences were had, our knowledge of them is vague enough or wasn’t experienced in the same way as now. For example I can remember planned power cuts when I was a kid, but I didn’t know they were planned, I just remember the power being off. If that happens this winter I’ll have a little more context as to why it’s happening and where the fault lies.

Similarly with the invasion of Ukraine, I have more knowledge of the background than I did in the cold war times when the two largest superpowers were trying to build the biggest arsenal of weapons to assure mutual annihilation and pop singers were writing songs about it (and re-releasing the same song now).

In some ways the media was a little obsessed with the idea, and trying to make people think about how close they might be to a “primary” target. I can remember hiding under the bed clothes at night worried about a so called “First Strike”, (not that I think I actually knew what that meant) but looking back now and remembering that if it were to happen hopefully the bed clothes would mask the bright light.

In truth it doesn’t really matter how close you are, if you’re unlucky enough to survive the initial blast then the resultant nuclear winter, fallout and general collapse of society will probably get you. That hasn’t changed in all that time and the media is still obsessed about it. Actually maybe you’d be better off being close to a primary target? Given that I live less than ten miles from one of the biggest naval bases in the country I probably won’t be able to come back on here and tell you whether I’m right or not.

That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.

Aldous Huxley

It’s impossible to know what the future will hold, and whether a mad man with a nuclear arsenal is more dangerous than historical precedent. It’s impossible to know whether a government that made the same mistakes before will learn from them and be able to turn the fate of a country around without having to be forced from office by the people at an election (assuming of course that they don’t try and prevent there being democratic elections).

The origins of the phrase “May you live in interesting times” are somewhat contested but given one alternative of its origin is that of an ancient Chinese curse it certainly seems fitting at the moment because although the times might be interesting they certainly ain’t fun.

Take care and stay safe, and thanks for reading.