0:00:03 > 0:00:07DUSTY SPRINGFIELD: # How can I be sure
0:00:07 > 0:00:11# In a world that's constantly changing?
0:00:11 > 0:00:15# How can I be sure
0:00:15 > 0:00:19# Where I stand with you? #
0:00:19 > 0:00:22It's easy to forget that for almost 50 years,
0:00:22 > 0:00:26Britain stood on the brink of Armageddon.
0:00:26 > 0:00:34# Whenever I... Whenever I am away from you
0:00:34 > 0:00:37# I want to die... #
0:00:37 > 0:00:41There was a war that shaped our society.
0:00:41 > 0:00:45# How do I know? #
0:00:45 > 0:00:48Welcome to Cold War Britain.
0:00:49 > 0:00:53The nuclear stand-off between East and West
0:00:53 > 0:00:55took us all to the edge of destruction.
0:01:00 > 0:01:04But the Cold War was also touched with a dark glamour.
0:01:06 > 0:01:09It was fought on surprising new battlefronts
0:01:09 > 0:01:12amidst a growing moral murkiness.
0:01:14 > 0:01:16But there was much more to this great conflict
0:01:16 > 0:01:18than secrets and spies.
0:01:20 > 0:01:24It was a war between two different ways of life.
0:01:24 > 0:01:25A war of ideas.
0:01:27 > 0:01:28A war of shadows.
0:01:29 > 0:01:32And a war of the imagination.
0:01:49 > 0:01:53If there's one moment that captures the Cold War in our imagination,
0:01:53 > 0:01:56it's the early 1960s.
0:01:57 > 0:02:02On Berlin's frontline, its presence hung heavy.
0:02:02 > 0:02:07Armed soldiers, barbed wire, military checkpoints.
0:02:11 > 0:02:14But in Britain, the struggle between East and West
0:02:14 > 0:02:18was moving onto a surprising new front.
0:02:22 > 0:02:24And at the heart of this new battleground
0:02:24 > 0:02:26was the suburban household.
0:02:29 > 0:02:30Hello.
0:02:30 > 0:02:31I think in this programme,
0:02:31 > 0:02:34I'd better tackle a job that I've been putting off for a long time.
0:02:34 > 0:02:39In 1962, this house in Ealing, West London,
0:02:39 > 0:02:41had a glamorous TV makeover,
0:02:41 > 0:02:46at the hands of DIY expert, Barry Bucknell.
0:02:46 > 0:02:51Fairly new, this idea having the adhesive actually on the tile,
0:02:51 > 0:02:55so there is no spreading of adhesive over the floor.
0:02:57 > 0:02:59In the hands of Barry Bucknell,
0:02:59 > 0:03:02this place became a temple to modernity.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10At its peak, the show was watched by some seven million viewers -
0:03:10 > 0:03:13the kind of aspirational young people
0:03:13 > 0:03:16who dreamed of making the very best of their homes.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20But as part of Britain's new army of DIY enthusiasts,
0:03:20 > 0:03:24they'd also been recruited as foot soldiers
0:03:24 > 0:03:29in the great ideological struggle between capitalism and communism.
0:03:29 > 0:03:32MUSIC: "Dream, Dream, Dream" by the Everly Brothers
0:03:32 > 0:03:34# Dream...
0:03:34 > 0:03:36# Dream, dream, dream... #
0:03:36 > 0:03:40Half a century before our love of property porn,
0:03:40 > 0:03:43more and more ordinary families
0:03:43 > 0:03:46were falling in love with home improvement
0:03:46 > 0:03:51and getting a kick out of buying shiny, new mod-cons.
0:03:51 > 0:03:55This was a genuine watershed in our modern story.
0:03:55 > 0:04:00The moment when we began to define ourselves less as citizens
0:04:00 > 0:04:05than as consumers - active members of the affluent society.
0:04:06 > 0:04:09But the home furnishings boom
0:04:09 > 0:04:13was also a sign of just how much more the capitalist West
0:04:13 > 0:04:17could offer its people than the Communist East.
0:04:18 > 0:04:21In 1959, most ordinary people
0:04:21 > 0:04:23were more likely to live somewhere like this
0:04:23 > 0:04:26than in one of the ideal homes in the brochure.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29But if they worked hard and put money by,
0:04:29 > 0:04:33then they could reasonably hope to live somewhere much, much better.
0:04:33 > 0:04:38And that was one of the key things that divided them from their counterparts in the Eastern Bloc.
0:04:38 > 0:04:39Since the late '40s,
0:04:39 > 0:04:45the welfare state had given people support and security.
0:04:45 > 0:04:49And in an age of full employment and soaring living standards,
0:04:49 > 0:04:55Marxism appealed only to a tiny minority of idealistic intellectuals.
0:04:56 > 0:04:58So, by the end of the 1950s,
0:04:58 > 0:05:03it wasn't Communism that seemed likely to deliver a better future,
0:05:03 > 0:05:07but for the first time, another C-word - consumerism.
0:05:07 > 0:05:09You know, Karl Marx once said
0:05:09 > 0:05:11that religion was the opium of the people.
0:05:11 > 0:05:15But who needs religion when you've got white goods?
0:05:22 > 0:05:25In just two years after 1957,
0:05:25 > 0:05:28the number of British homes with a fridge
0:05:28 > 0:05:30rose by a staggering 60 per cent.
0:05:30 > 0:05:34And even at the highest diplomatic level,
0:05:34 > 0:05:40the world's leaders recognised the importance of the domestic front.
0:05:40 > 0:05:43In 1959, the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev
0:05:43 > 0:05:46took on American Vice President Richard Nixon,
0:05:46 > 0:05:49at a Moscow trade fair.
0:05:49 > 0:05:51KHRUSHCHEV SPEAKS IN RUSSIAN
0:05:51 > 0:05:53NEWSREEL: 'Mr Khrushchev is telling Mr Nixon
0:05:53 > 0:05:57'that Russia will catch up to America and wave as she passes us by.'
0:05:57 > 0:06:00'So he says in words and actions.'
0:06:00 > 0:06:02HE CONTINUES TO SPEAK IN RUSSIAN
0:06:05 > 0:06:08LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
0:06:10 > 0:06:14In the West, few people were convince by Khrushchev's bravado.
0:06:14 > 0:06:16But while the capitalist powers
0:06:16 > 0:06:18were confident of winning the contest
0:06:18 > 0:06:21for consumer's hearts and minds,
0:06:21 > 0:06:24they were increasingly worried that in other fields,
0:06:24 > 0:06:26they were falling behind.
0:06:32 > 0:06:35Over the pursuit of material satisfaction
0:06:35 > 0:06:39loomed the dark shadow of the Cold War.
0:06:41 > 0:06:45Each side was hunting for the technological breakthrough
0:06:45 > 0:06:47that could mean global domination.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52And at the beginning of the 1960s,
0:06:52 > 0:06:58Russian scientists pulled off a feat so impressive, so historic,
0:06:58 > 0:07:02than even the West couldn't help but applaud.
0:07:02 > 0:07:04Suddenly, it was the Soviet Union
0:07:04 > 0:07:08that looked glamorous and sophisticated -
0:07:08 > 0:07:10the crucible of modernity.
0:07:10 > 0:07:12CHEERING
0:07:15 > 0:07:21In July 1961, Manchester came out to greet a very special visitor.
0:07:22 > 0:07:24Major Yuri Gagarin.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28MUSIC: "Destination Moon" by Dinah Washington
0:07:32 > 0:07:33# Come and take a trip
0:07:33 > 0:07:35# In my rocket ship... #
0:07:35 > 0:07:40As the first man in space, Gagarin had shot to international fame
0:07:40 > 0:07:43on both sides of the Iron Curtain.
0:07:43 > 0:07:46# Destination, moon!
0:07:47 > 0:07:49# We'll travel fast as light... #
0:07:49 > 0:07:53A century earlier, Communism's founding fathers,
0:07:53 > 0:07:56Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels,
0:07:56 > 0:08:00had seen Manchester as the epitome of cutthroat capitalism.
0:08:00 > 0:08:05But now the city turned out to applaud Communism's latest pin-up.
0:08:05 > 0:08:10When Gagarin arrived on his goodwill tour,
0:08:10 > 0:08:13despite the inevitable Mancunian rain,
0:08:13 > 0:08:16he was hailed as a local hero.
0:08:18 > 0:08:21# So away we'll steal In my space mobile... #
0:08:21 > 0:08:26Gagarin was driven here - to Manchester Town Hall -
0:08:26 > 0:08:30for a grand civic reception in his honour.
0:08:30 > 0:08:34Outside, more than 6,000 people were waiting -
0:08:34 > 0:08:38many of them wearing little pins with the hammer and sickle.
0:08:38 > 0:08:41The Police said it was the biggest crowd here since VE day.
0:08:42 > 0:08:44And as his car drew up,
0:08:44 > 0:08:47they hoisted the red flag alongside the Union Jack,
0:08:47 > 0:08:50and the band struck up the Soviet anthem.
0:08:50 > 0:08:57Moscow could hardly have wished for better propaganda.
0:08:57 > 0:08:59Man in space, official!
0:09:01 > 0:09:06The people of Manchester weren't alone in falling for the Major.
0:09:06 > 0:09:09You thought he was handsome? I certainly did.
0:09:09 > 0:09:11He gave me a big heart throb.
0:09:11 > 0:09:13I say, very best British good luck to the chap.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16I liked his uniform, it's the best uniform I've ever seen,
0:09:16 > 0:09:19and he's good looking and all that.
0:09:19 > 0:09:22You've been listening to the girls, haven't you? Yeah.
0:09:26 > 0:09:29For most people, the sheer thrill of conquering space
0:09:29 > 0:09:34transcended the ideological divisions of the Cold War.
0:09:36 > 0:09:41But not everyone was so enthused by the Kremlin's achievements.
0:09:41 > 0:09:46I still feel that um the Western world is very much in advance
0:09:46 > 0:09:48and that this thing
0:09:48 > 0:09:51is just a matter of trying to get there first every time.
0:09:51 > 0:09:56But I think it's going to make the people very nervous of what's going to happen next.
0:10:02 > 0:10:05The Soviet Union's conquest of the skies
0:10:05 > 0:10:09upped the ante in an intensely competitive arms race.
0:10:13 > 0:10:15Following our American allies' lead,
0:10:15 > 0:10:18Britain was investing in increasingly sleek
0:10:18 > 0:10:21and sophisticated arms and aircraft.
0:10:21 > 0:10:24And many people took pride and reassurance
0:10:24 > 0:10:28from our independent arsenal of atomic hardware.
0:10:32 > 0:10:35But some were becoming increasingly critical
0:10:35 > 0:10:40of Britain's dangerous infatuation with high-tech tools of death.
0:10:46 > 0:10:51In January 1958, a group of high-minded activists
0:10:51 > 0:10:55made their way to the heart of the City of London.
0:10:55 > 0:10:58Meeting in the shadow of St Paul's Cathedral,
0:10:58 > 0:11:02they committed themselves to a new mass campaign
0:11:02 > 0:11:05against Britain's nuclear obsession.
0:11:07 > 0:11:10As the playwright JB Priestly put it,
0:11:10 > 0:11:15three glasses too many of vodka or of Bourbon on the rocks,
0:11:15 > 0:11:17and the wrong button might be pressed,
0:11:17 > 0:11:21so Britain, they thought, should lead the world.
0:11:21 > 0:11:23"We must give up our nuclear weapons
0:11:23 > 0:11:26"and persuade other countries to follow suit
0:11:26 > 0:11:29"by the force of our moral example."
0:11:30 > 0:11:32AIR-RAID SIREN
0:11:37 > 0:11:42The idea that we might only be the push of a button away from Armageddon
0:11:42 > 0:11:45would dominate the nightmares of a generation.
0:11:50 > 0:11:51And this was the inspiration
0:11:51 > 0:11:56behind the new campaign for nuclear disarmament.
0:11:57 > 0:12:02That Easter, CND's idealists marched from Trafalgar Square
0:12:02 > 0:12:06to the atomic weapons research establishment at Aldermaston.
0:12:08 > 0:12:10CND was a classic movement
0:12:10 > 0:12:15of the well-meaning, Guardian-reading middle classes.
0:12:15 > 0:12:22And almost by accident, they came up with a unique British contribution to the iconography of the Cold War,
0:12:22 > 0:12:27and one of the most successful pieces of branding of the 20th Century.
0:12:27 > 0:12:33All thanks to the CND supporter and graphic designer, Gerry Holtom.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38Now, there's different explanations of where he got the idea from.
0:12:38 > 0:12:41One is that it's a version of the Christian cross.
0:12:41 > 0:12:45Another is that it incorporates the semaphore symbols for N and D.
0:12:45 > 0:12:49But Holtom himself said that his inspiration was rather more artistic.
0:12:49 > 0:12:54Specifically, this painting - the Third of May 1808 -
0:12:54 > 0:12:57by the Spanish artist, Francisco Goya.
0:12:57 > 0:13:02"I was in despair," Holtom said, "Deep despair, so I drew myself -
0:13:02 > 0:13:05"the representative of an individual in despair.
0:13:05 > 0:13:08"Hands outstretched, palm outwards and downwards,
0:13:08 > 0:13:12"in the manner of Goya's peasant before the firing squad."
0:13:12 > 0:13:16And when you formalise that in a drawing, you get this.
0:13:19 > 0:13:21Gerry Holtom's even better at it than I am.
0:13:21 > 0:13:24Now, if it had been me, I would have trademarked this
0:13:24 > 0:13:26and moved to the Caribbean on the proceeds,
0:13:26 > 0:13:30but Gerry Holtom was quite a nice guy, so he didn't,
0:13:30 > 0:13:32and the result was one of the most iconic
0:13:32 > 0:13:36and recognisable international symbols of the last half-century.
0:13:42 > 0:13:45The arrival of CND triggered an urgent debate
0:13:45 > 0:13:50about perhaps the biggest moral quandary Britain had ever known,
0:13:50 > 0:13:53and provoked passionate disagreements
0:13:53 > 0:13:57between hand-wringing idealists and hard-headed realists.
0:13:57 > 0:14:01If we have an atomic war of this kind, it's the finish for Britain.
0:14:01 > 0:14:04And I personally feel that it is time people of Britain realised it.
0:14:06 > 0:14:08Do you think we should keep the H bomb?
0:14:08 > 0:14:12Well, as long as the other countries do, I think we should, yes.
0:14:14 > 0:14:17If we really are interested in the future of our children,
0:14:17 > 0:14:20it is the smallest thing we can do to join this procession.
0:14:22 > 0:14:25Russia's got it and she's producing it on mass production, really,
0:14:25 > 0:14:28and what with what we've got, why should we stop it?
0:14:28 > 0:14:31MUSIC: "Optimistic" by Skeeter Davis
0:14:39 > 0:14:44# How long is the river...? #
0:14:44 > 0:14:48The strange paradox of British life in the early 1960s
0:14:48 > 0:14:53is that most people were both more secure and less secure than ever.
0:14:53 > 0:14:57We were richer, more comfortable, better fed and better housed.
0:14:57 > 0:15:02And yet, the world might end at the touch of a button.
0:15:04 > 0:15:09Nothing captured the tension between prosperity and paranoia
0:15:09 > 0:15:16better than the adventures of post-war Britain's most enduring and most dashing hero.
0:15:16 > 0:15:22A man who became synonymous with the superficial glamour of the Cold War.
0:15:22 > 0:15:26On the 10th of October 1963, the Times announced
0:15:26 > 0:15:30the latest development in the Cold War's nuclear game.
0:15:30 > 0:15:36With the news that France's Mirage 4 atomic bombers had just come into commission.
0:15:36 > 0:15:39But interestingly, it devoted rather more attention
0:15:39 > 0:15:41to a very different kind of story.
0:15:41 > 0:15:43The review of a new film -
0:15:43 > 0:15:45a second outing for a secret agent
0:15:45 > 0:15:48who, according to the Times's reviewer,
0:15:48 > 0:15:51acts out our less reputable fantasies
0:15:51 > 0:15:53without ever going too far.
0:16:02 > 0:16:07And the extraordinary, record-breaking success of From Russia with Love
0:16:07 > 0:16:11is a reminder that the Cold War wasn't just the stuff of nightmares,
0:16:11 > 0:16:14but could also be the stuff of fantasy.
0:16:14 > 0:16:16You're one of the most beautiful girls I've ever seen.
0:16:16 > 0:16:20Thank you but I think my mouth is too big.
0:16:20 > 0:16:22No, it's the right size.
0:16:32 > 0:16:38Ian Fleming's James Bond had little time for moral introspection.
0:16:38 > 0:16:41Mind you, wrestling with your conscience isn't easy
0:16:41 > 0:16:44when you're also fighting off a woman with daggers in her boots.
0:16:45 > 0:16:48SHE GASPS AND CHOKES
0:16:48 > 0:16:52Bond is an old-fashioned, square-jawed British hero,
0:16:52 > 0:16:56updated for the modern world of the Cold War.
0:16:58 > 0:17:00Horrible woman.
0:17:00 > 0:17:02Yes.
0:17:02 > 0:17:03She's had her kicks.
0:17:03 > 0:17:07But the Bond phenomenon also reflected a society
0:17:07 > 0:17:13that was more aspirational and more materialistic than ever.
0:17:13 > 0:17:16Even before the first Bond film had been released,
0:17:16 > 0:17:18the books were enormously popular,
0:17:18 > 0:17:20selling more than 1.5 million copies.
0:17:20 > 0:17:24But the real key to their success was this cheap paperback format
0:17:24 > 0:17:27which made them immediately accessible.
0:17:27 > 0:17:29As Fleming himself put it,
0:17:29 > 0:17:33"The lower classes find them equally readable,
0:17:33 > 0:17:37"although one might have thought that the sophistication of the background and detail
0:17:37 > 0:17:41"are outside their experience and in part incomprehensible."
0:17:41 > 0:17:44But this was a newly affluent Britain,
0:17:44 > 0:17:48in which Fleming's cocktail of sex, snobbery and sadism
0:17:48 > 0:17:50was a winning formula.
0:17:56 > 0:17:59Hello. Hello. Agent Bind.
0:17:59 > 0:18:01James? No, Charlie.
0:18:01 > 0:18:04Number? Double-oh, "oh".
0:18:07 > 0:18:10Bond rapidly became a fixture of British popular culture.
0:18:10 > 0:18:14And an obvious candidate for the Carry On treatment.
0:18:14 > 0:18:17I am Doctor Crow. You are surprised?
0:18:17 > 0:18:21Yes, I am, I expected you to be a man.
0:18:21 > 0:18:23Or a woman. I am both.
0:18:27 > 0:18:31Britain's manufacturers were also quick to cash in
0:18:31 > 0:18:33on Bond's famous gadgets.
0:18:33 > 0:18:38The message being that in the technological field, Britain still held its own.
0:18:40 > 0:18:44But not everybody bought into Bond.
0:18:44 > 0:18:48It's the consumer goods ethic, really.
0:18:48 > 0:18:52That everything around you, all the dull things of life,
0:18:52 > 0:18:56are suddenly animated by this wonderful cachet of espionage.
0:18:56 > 0:18:59The things on our desk that could explode.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02Er, our ties, which could suddenly take photographs.
0:19:02 > 0:19:07These give to a drab and materialistic existence a kind of magic.
0:19:12 > 0:19:16The man who saw through Bond's glittering veneer
0:19:16 > 0:19:19to the moral void beneath
0:19:19 > 0:19:21was another spy novelist.
0:19:21 > 0:19:24The former British intelligence officer, John Le Carre.
0:19:26 > 0:19:30And he had no truck with Fleming's crude world view
0:19:30 > 0:19:32and materialistic fantasies.
0:19:40 > 0:19:45In 1961, the year the Communists built the Berlin Wall,
0:19:45 > 0:19:47John Le Carre was stationed in Bonn,
0:19:47 > 0:19:50and with one of his British embassy colleagues,
0:19:50 > 0:19:54he travelled here to Berlin, to see the situation for himself.
0:19:54 > 0:19:57Now, Le Carre knew better than anybody
0:19:57 > 0:20:01the kind of ethical compromises required by the Cold War.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04And he realised at once that the coming of the Berlin Wall
0:20:04 > 0:20:09would only make the moral fog murkier than ever.
0:20:14 > 0:20:18The atmosphere of Le Carre's most powerful novel,
0:20:18 > 0:20:24The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, hangs heavy with existential doubt.
0:20:24 > 0:20:29It was published in 1963, at the height of Bond-mania,
0:20:29 > 0:20:31but it could hardly be more different
0:20:31 > 0:20:35from one of Ian Fleming's escapist thrillers.
0:20:35 > 0:20:37Le Carre's book doesn't really have a hero.
0:20:37 > 0:20:40It has an anti-hero - Alec Leamus -
0:20:40 > 0:20:44a very different kind of character from the dashing James Bond.
0:20:44 > 0:20:46Bond is tall and debonair.
0:20:46 > 0:20:49Leamus is grey and shambling.
0:20:49 > 0:20:55Bond lives in fashionable Chelsea, Leamus in rundown Bayswater.
0:20:55 > 0:21:01Bond's flat is smart and modern, Leamus's is small and squalid.
0:21:01 > 0:21:05Bond drives an Aston Martin, Leamus catches the bus.
0:21:10 > 0:21:13The grubby reality of Cold War espionage
0:21:13 > 0:21:16was underlined by the film adaptation.
0:21:18 > 0:21:22Deliberately shot in black-and-white,
0:21:22 > 0:21:25it starred a haggard Richard Burton,
0:21:25 > 0:21:29his legendary good looks, now worn and weary.
0:21:31 > 0:21:33What the hell do you think spies are?
0:21:33 > 0:21:35Moral philosophers measuring everything they do
0:21:35 > 0:21:37against the will of God or Karl Marx?
0:21:37 > 0:21:41They're not, they're just a bunch of seedy, squalid bastards like me.
0:21:41 > 0:21:44Little men, drunkards, queers, hen-pecked husbands,
0:21:44 > 0:21:46civil servants playing cowboys and Indians
0:21:46 > 0:21:48to brighten their rotten little lives.
0:21:48 > 0:21:50Do you think they sit like monks in a cell
0:21:50 > 0:21:52balancing right against wrong?
0:21:58 > 0:22:03The story ends at the Berlin wall.
0:22:03 > 0:22:06His mission accomplished, Leamus has the chance
0:22:06 > 0:22:09to return from the East and come in from the cold.
0:22:09 > 0:22:14But by now our faith in his moral mission has been fatally eroded
0:22:14 > 0:22:18because amid the twists and turns of le Carre's narrative,
0:22:18 > 0:22:22Alec Leamus has left the ethical high ground far behind.
0:22:26 > 0:22:30In 1966, Le Carre gave an interview to the the Listener magazine.
0:22:30 > 0:22:32"We in the West," he said,
0:22:32 > 0:22:36"Have always argued that in a non-Communist world,
0:22:36 > 0:22:38"the one thing we have in common
0:22:38 > 0:22:43"is our belief in the individual, rather than the idea."
0:22:45 > 0:22:49"And yet, in the Cold War, we are sacrificing the individual
0:22:49 > 0:22:52"in the battle against the collective."
0:22:52 > 0:22:56And this, of course, was the dilemma that Britain was facing.
0:22:56 > 0:22:59The moral quandary at the heart of the Cold War.
0:23:09 > 0:23:13During the 1960s, these ethical contortions
0:23:13 > 0:23:15were brought home to the British public
0:23:15 > 0:23:20by a wave of genuine and very seedy spy scandals.
0:23:20 > 0:23:24And more than any other, it was the story of John Vassall
0:23:24 > 0:23:29that felt like it might have come straight from one of John Le Carre's novels.
0:23:31 > 0:23:34If there's one sex and spying scandal
0:23:34 > 0:23:37that most people remember from the 1960s,
0:23:37 > 0:23:41it is, of course, the Profumo scandal of 1963.
0:23:41 > 0:23:44But I think it was the Vassall case a year earlier -
0:23:44 > 0:23:48with its illicit homosexuality and its unambiguous treachery -
0:23:48 > 0:23:50that did most damage.
0:23:50 > 0:23:52Not just to Harold Macmillan's Conservative government,
0:23:52 > 0:23:55but to the British establishment more generally.
0:24:00 > 0:24:05It all began when a young clerk working at the British embassy in Moscow
0:24:05 > 0:24:10visited a high-class hotel for a private dinner party.
0:24:10 > 0:24:15After dinner, the British clerk began to feel a little bit woozy,
0:24:15 > 0:24:19so his host suggested that he lie down on a convenient divan.
0:24:19 > 0:24:24And then, the tone of the evening began to change.
0:24:28 > 0:24:31"I can recollect," the clerk said later,
0:24:31 > 0:24:34"Having my underpants in my hand.
0:24:34 > 0:24:37"And holding them up in the air at the request of others.
0:24:37 > 0:24:42"Then I was lying on the bed, naked.
0:24:42 > 0:24:46"And as far as I can recollect, there were three other men on the bed with me.
0:24:46 > 0:24:50"I cannot remember exactly what took place."
0:24:54 > 0:24:58But the clerk's little memory lapse was neither here nor there,
0:24:58 > 0:25:00because unfortunately for him,
0:25:00 > 0:25:04the whole thing had been photographed by the KGB.
0:25:05 > 0:25:10The Russians used the explicit images
0:25:10 > 0:25:14to blackmail John Vassall into giving them top-secret documents,
0:25:14 > 0:25:18first in Moscow, and later, back in London.
0:25:18 > 0:25:24Years afterwards, he ruefully reflected on his plight.
0:25:24 > 0:25:26Er, it's rather like a spider's web.
0:25:26 > 0:25:31Er, once you are inside the web, there is no way of getting out.
0:25:31 > 0:25:36The finesse and the way with which they do these things
0:25:36 > 0:25:39is beyond the comprehension of most people.
0:25:39 > 0:25:41In fact, I would say that the Russians
0:25:41 > 0:25:43do it better than anybody in the world.
0:25:50 > 0:25:56That was how Vassall signalled when he wanted to arrange an urgent meeting with his Russian contact,
0:25:56 > 0:25:59it was alleged at Bow Street today.
0:25:59 > 0:26:03A chalk circle on this plane tree here in Duchess of Bedford Walk,
0:26:03 > 0:26:06just half a mile away from the Russian embassy.
0:26:08 > 0:26:12To the British press, this was a new kind of front-page scandal.
0:26:12 > 0:26:19Prurient voyeurism dressed up as pious concern for our national security.
0:26:19 > 0:26:22And of course, Fleet Street loved it.
0:26:22 > 0:26:26As one sensational headline followed another,
0:26:26 > 0:26:28Britain's prime minister, Harold Macmillan,
0:26:28 > 0:26:33seemed completely adrift, but he couldn't say that he hadn't been warned.
0:26:35 > 0:26:38The story goes that in the spring of 1962,
0:26:38 > 0:26:43Macmillan's cabinet secretary warned him that a clerk from the admiralty
0:26:43 > 0:26:47was selling state secrets in the clubs around Victoria.
0:26:47 > 0:26:49But Macmillan was having none of it.
0:26:49 > 0:26:54"Nonsense," he said. "There are no clubs around Victoria."
0:26:56 > 0:27:01Macmillan's rather off-hand remark would come back to haunt him
0:27:01 > 0:27:03because when Vassall's treachery became public,
0:27:03 > 0:27:07the prime minister's greatest strength -
0:27:07 > 0:27:09his reassuringly tweedy, patrician persona -
0:27:09 > 0:27:12became his greatest weakness.
0:27:13 > 0:27:15At Vassall's trial,
0:27:15 > 0:27:17it emerged that for years,
0:27:17 > 0:27:20he had been living in a fashionable apartment
0:27:20 > 0:27:23well beyond his civil service means -
0:27:23 > 0:27:26all thanks to his Soviet paymasters.
0:27:26 > 0:27:30And yet, nobody had smelt a rat.
0:27:30 > 0:27:35Vassall went down for 18 years.
0:27:35 > 0:27:38And although Harold Macmillan clung on to his job,
0:27:38 > 0:27:42in many people's eyes, he was now on probation.
0:27:47 > 0:27:52But in the autumn of 1962, Macmillan had other things on his mind.
0:27:54 > 0:27:57MACMILLAN: Hello, can you hear me now? Over.
0:27:57 > 0:28:01AMERICAN MALE VOICE: Yes, sir, I hear you very clearly
0:28:01 > 0:28:03and I'll hand the phone to the President. Over.
0:28:05 > 0:28:07For one week in October,
0:28:07 > 0:28:13the Prime Minister was in almost daily conversation with the President of the United States
0:28:13 > 0:28:19as the Cold War came terrifyingly close to turning hot.
0:28:19 > 0:28:23I call upon Chairman Khrushchev to halt and eliminate
0:28:23 > 0:28:28this clandestine, reckless and provocative threat to world peace.
0:28:29 > 0:28:34On the 22nd of October, the very day Vassall was sentenced,
0:28:34 > 0:28:40John F Kennedy revealed that Soviet missiles had been discovered in Cuba.
0:28:41 > 0:28:47Hello, er, Prime Minister. Hello, what's the news now? Over.
0:28:49 > 0:28:52The Cuban crisis plunged East and West
0:28:52 > 0:28:56into a deadly game of high stakes poker.
0:28:57 > 0:28:59As the nation watched and waited,
0:28:59 > 0:29:06Macmillan was desperate to ensure that Britain would have some say over the fate of the world.
0:29:07 > 0:29:12Now, Macmillan was almost 70, whereas Kennedy was just 45,
0:29:12 > 0:29:15but Macmillan was well aware that in this conflict,
0:29:15 > 0:29:19it was the younger man, the American, who was really calling the shots
0:29:19 > 0:29:22and that he himself was basically just a junior partner.
0:29:22 > 0:29:26But Macmillan always liked to see himself as the wise old counsellor
0:29:26 > 0:29:29offering all the benefits of his experience.
0:29:29 > 0:29:32The Greek to Kennedy's Roman.
0:29:32 > 0:29:36MUSIC: "A Mushroom Cloud" by Sammy Salvo
0:29:38 > 0:29:41# I want to be happy... #
0:29:41 > 0:29:45The world stood at the edge of darkness
0:29:45 > 0:29:49and this wasn't one of Ian Fleming's escapist fantasies.
0:29:49 > 0:29:52This was a genuine doomsday scenario
0:29:52 > 0:29:57that might mean the end of civilisation itself.
0:29:57 > 0:30:00# It haunts my future and threatens my schemes... #
0:30:00 > 0:30:04Some people could only think of their nearest and dearest.
0:30:04 > 0:30:08Among all the stories about British reactions to the Cuban crisis,
0:30:08 > 0:30:10this one strikes me as particularly moving.
0:30:10 > 0:30:15A father of six kept his three eldest children from school yesterday
0:30:15 > 0:30:19so that the whole family could be together during the Cuban crisis.
0:30:19 > 0:30:22Mr Peter Gardner, a 44-year-old company director
0:30:22 > 0:30:25from Shoreham, Sussex, explained,
0:30:25 > 0:30:28"I could not protect my children in a bomb raid -
0:30:28 > 0:30:29"nor could anyone else -
0:30:29 > 0:30:33"but I feel we should all be together at this dangerous time."
0:30:35 > 0:30:39# We pray, we party, we laugh and we pray... #
0:30:39 > 0:30:43With the Third World War apparently only moments away,
0:30:43 > 0:30:48this was as close as Britain ever came to nuclear annihilation.
0:30:48 > 0:30:51# I cling to my baby
0:30:51 > 0:30:54# And she clings to me... #
0:30:54 > 0:30:57And then, the Kremlin blinked.
0:30:57 > 0:31:01The Soviet Union agreed to dismantle the missiles.
0:31:01 > 0:31:03The crisis was over.
0:31:03 > 0:31:07# There's a mushroom cloud That hangs in the way... #
0:31:07 > 0:31:11The people could breathe a great sigh of relief.
0:31:11 > 0:31:14# Peace, peace, peace Where did you go?
0:31:14 > 0:31:17# Where did you go? #
0:31:17 > 0:31:19And so could Harold Macmillan.
0:31:30 > 0:31:33But the reality was much, much more frightening
0:31:33 > 0:31:38than either Macmillan or the British people had ever guessed.
0:31:40 > 0:31:44Because if the missile crisis had escalated,
0:31:44 > 0:31:49we would have been the launch pad for the Americans' attack on the Communist Bloc.
0:31:49 > 0:31:51All thanks
0:31:51 > 0:31:54to a deal struck in the 1950s.
0:31:56 > 0:31:59The arrangement was called project Emily.
0:31:59 > 0:32:01It sounds innocuous enough,
0:32:01 > 0:32:03but under the terms of the deal,
0:32:03 > 0:32:06the Americans installed 60 Thor ballistic missiles
0:32:06 > 0:32:10on RAF sites up a United Kingdom.
0:32:12 > 0:32:14By hosting the Thors,
0:32:14 > 0:32:18the Government had effectively drawn a target on Britain
0:32:18 > 0:32:20and invited the Kremlin to take aim.
0:32:20 > 0:32:23And what neither what the public,
0:32:23 > 0:32:25nor - more shockingly - Macmillan himself,
0:32:25 > 0:32:30knew during those long days and nights in October
0:32:30 > 0:32:35was just how close to that attack Britain almost came.
0:32:35 > 0:32:41When Kennedy talked to Macmillan on the phone, he took care to sound inclusive and considerate.
0:32:41 > 0:32:45"I will talk to you," he promised on the 26th October,
0:32:45 > 0:32:48"Before we do anything of a drastic nature."
0:32:48 > 0:32:53But a month later, in a secret meeting with his intelligence chiefs,
0:32:53 > 0:32:57Macmillan found out that he had been kept in the dark.
0:32:57 > 0:32:59According to Sir Kenneth Strong,
0:32:59 > 0:33:01the director of the joint intelligence bureau,
0:33:01 > 0:33:04the Americans had been prepared to go it alone -
0:33:04 > 0:33:07either irrespective of what their allies thought,
0:33:07 > 0:33:10or without consulting their allies at all.
0:33:10 > 0:33:15According to Strong, the Americans had seriously considered a pre-emptive strike,
0:33:15 > 0:33:19sending their bombers east to hit the key Soviet missile sites.
0:33:19 > 0:33:22And if, as Strong feared, the attack failed,
0:33:22 > 0:33:25then the Russians would have hit back,
0:33:25 > 0:33:27unleashing nuclear Armageddon.
0:33:37 > 0:33:43The Cuban crisis was a chilling reminder of Britain's vulnerability.
0:33:43 > 0:33:47It left many people convinced that a devastating nuclear war
0:33:47 > 0:33:53was now not a possibility, but a terrifying probability.
0:33:53 > 0:33:58The Government's rather rose-tinted hope was that if the worst happened,
0:33:58 > 0:34:03the British people would rediscover the stoical spirit of the Blitz,
0:34:03 > 0:34:06helped by a small army of civil defence wardens
0:34:06 > 0:34:08and a flimsy pamphlet
0:34:08 > 0:34:12telling you how to turn your house into a fallout shelter.
0:34:12 > 0:34:17But the wardens were advised to expect something of a challenge.
0:34:23 > 0:34:27Good morning, Mrs Bells. Right, what is it?
0:34:27 > 0:34:28I'm your civil defence warden.
0:34:28 > 0:34:31Is there any help or advice I could give you?
0:34:31 > 0:34:33Wouldn't know, I'm sure.
0:34:33 > 0:34:35Read the Householders' Handbook, haven't you?
0:34:35 > 0:34:38No. My husband says there's not going to be a war.
0:34:38 > 0:34:41All this panic's going to blow over.
0:34:41 > 0:34:46Anyway, I got plenty to do without sitting around all day reading books, thank you very much.
0:34:52 > 0:34:56The instructions in the Householders' Handbook
0:34:56 > 0:34:57are extraordinarily detailed.
0:34:57 > 0:35:00There's the different kinds of sirens,
0:35:00 > 0:35:02how to prepare your fallout room,
0:35:02 > 0:35:04how to protect yourself against radiation.
0:35:04 > 0:35:07Even what you'll need in your shelter.
0:35:07 > 0:35:10Kettle, towels, rubber gloves.
0:35:10 > 0:35:13Even, poignantly, toys for the children.
0:35:13 > 0:35:15And yet the tone of this pamphlet
0:35:15 > 0:35:18is surprisingly brisk, even a little bit upbeat.
0:35:18 > 0:35:21With all the nice pictures, it feels like a DIY manual.
0:35:21 > 0:35:22And that, I suppose, was the point -
0:35:22 > 0:35:24that with the proper preparation,
0:35:24 > 0:35:28you could get through World War Three almost unscathed.
0:35:30 > 0:35:33That was very far from the truth.
0:35:33 > 0:35:37But in Cold War Britain, the authorities thought it better
0:35:37 > 0:35:42to maintain public confidence than to be absolutely honest.
0:35:47 > 0:35:50But a BBC director called Peter Watkins
0:35:50 > 0:35:53had no time for the Government's half-truths,
0:35:53 > 0:35:58and he set out to show the public the awful reality.
0:35:59 > 0:36:01'Time - 9.13am.
0:36:05 > 0:36:08AIR RAID SIREN
0:36:08 > 0:36:13His film was called the War Game.
0:36:16 > 0:36:17Move! Come on, come on. Quick.
0:36:17 > 0:36:22'This family couldn't afford to build themselves a refuge.
0:36:22 > 0:36:28'This could be the way the last two minutes of peace in Britain would look.'
0:36:28 > 0:36:30Gather the children!
0:36:32 > 0:36:34Peter? Tony? Tony!
0:36:34 > 0:36:37One of Britain's first docu-dramas,
0:36:37 > 0:36:42it showed what might happen if a nuclear bomb landed on Kent.
0:36:42 > 0:36:44And in this scenario,
0:36:44 > 0:36:48there was no dashing secret agent to come and save the world.
0:36:48 > 0:36:50SCREAMING AND COUGHING
0:36:50 > 0:36:55'At this distance, the heat wave is sufficient to cause melting of the upturned eyeball,
0:36:55 > 0:37:00'third degree burning of the skin, and ignition of furniture.'
0:37:00 > 0:37:02SCREAMING
0:37:05 > 0:37:09'12 seconds later, the shock front arrives.'
0:37:09 > 0:37:12THUNDEROUS RUMBLING
0:37:19 > 0:37:22One of the first things that Peter Watkins did
0:37:22 > 0:37:26was to put together this extraordinary list of 112 questions
0:37:26 > 0:37:30for all sorts of scientists and experts and organisations -
0:37:30 > 0:37:33not just here in Britain, but all over the world.
0:37:33 > 0:37:35Some of them are genuinely chilling.
0:37:35 > 0:37:38"Does radio-active dust taste?
0:37:38 > 0:37:41"Is it gritty in the mouth? Can one ever see it?"
0:37:41 > 0:37:45Or this. "What are the effects of mental depression likely to be?
0:37:45 > 0:37:51"An increased wish for suicide? For, perhaps, killing off one's family?"
0:37:51 > 0:37:53Scary stuff.
0:37:53 > 0:37:56You see, Watkins was determined, absolutely determined,
0:37:56 > 0:37:59that nobody was going to discredit his film
0:37:59 > 0:38:02on the grounds of inaccuracy.
0:38:03 > 0:38:10'When the carbon monoxide content of inhaled air exceeds 1.28 per cent,
0:38:10 > 0:38:16'it will be followed by death within three minutes.
0:38:16 > 0:38:19'This is nuclear war.'
0:38:22 > 0:38:25But the War Game's vision of a Britain
0:38:25 > 0:38:27where the unlucky ones survived
0:38:27 > 0:38:31was so horrific that the BBC refused to show it.
0:38:34 > 0:38:37Because the subject was so contentious,
0:38:37 > 0:38:39Whitehall officials had been shown a preview.
0:38:39 > 0:38:43They let it be known that while it wasn't their decision to make,
0:38:43 > 0:38:47they'd prefer the War Game not to be broadcast.
0:38:47 > 0:38:51And so, the BBC was placed in a tricky situation.
0:38:53 > 0:38:55The BBC executives had a lot of respect, a lot of admiration,
0:38:55 > 0:38:59for the power and integrity of Watkins's film.
0:38:59 > 0:39:03And they also felt they had an obligation as an independent broadcaster
0:39:03 > 0:39:05not to be cowed by the Government.
0:39:05 > 0:39:09But they were facing what they saw as a genuine moral dilemma.
0:39:09 > 0:39:12Their greatest duty was to the national interest.
0:39:12 > 0:39:14And in this case,
0:39:14 > 0:39:17they thought that would be served by not showing a film
0:39:17 > 0:39:19that might undermine the nuclear deterrent,
0:39:19 > 0:39:23that might undermine support for something
0:39:23 > 0:39:27they believed was keeping us safe from the threat of Communism.
0:39:29 > 0:39:33Ranging ahead! Tank, on!
0:39:33 > 0:39:34On!
0:39:34 > 0:39:35Loaded! Fire!
0:39:35 > 0:39:37MUSIC: "Downtown" by Petula Clark, in German
0:39:37 > 0:39:40# Bist du allein von allen Freunden verlassen?
0:39:40 > 0:39:42# Dann geh' in die Stadt
0:39:42 > 0:39:44# Downtown. #
0:39:44 > 0:39:46While people at home
0:39:46 > 0:39:49were debating the moral complexities of the Cold War,
0:39:49 > 0:39:53there was one group of British citizens for whom the conflict
0:39:53 > 0:39:57was still very much a matter of us and them.
0:39:57 > 0:40:01# Und hor die Grossstadtmelodie bis in den fruhen Morgen
0:40:01 > 0:40:05# Sei wieder froh Da ist alles fur dich da... #
0:40:05 > 0:40:10Stationed in West Germany were some 55,000 British troops.
0:40:10 > 0:40:13# Come on, downtown... #
0:40:13 > 0:40:16This was the British Army of the Rhine.
0:40:16 > 0:40:19# Downtown, soviele Lichter, oh!
0:40:19 > 0:40:21# Downtown... #
0:40:25 > 0:40:27They were joined by their families.
0:40:27 > 0:40:30Thousands of woman and children,
0:40:30 > 0:40:34for whom bases like this one at Rheindahlen were now home.
0:40:39 > 0:40:42The strange world of the British Army of the Rhine
0:40:42 > 0:40:46captured in microcosm the two fronts of the Cold War.
0:40:46 > 0:40:51A tense military stand-off, and a battle for material satisfaction.
0:40:57 > 0:41:00For the families stationed here at Rheindahlen,
0:41:00 > 0:41:02the facilities were second to none.
0:41:02 > 0:41:06This postcard rather captures the sheer modernity of it all.
0:41:06 > 0:41:11There were schools, churches, swimming pools, even cinemas.
0:41:11 > 0:41:13Indeed, in many ways,
0:41:13 > 0:41:15the families here actually had a much better deal
0:41:15 > 0:41:19than a lot of their friends and relatives back home in Britain.
0:41:19 > 0:41:24And if you were Mrs Grey from Swansea getting this postcard,
0:41:24 > 0:41:27you might actually be a little bit envious.
0:41:42 > 0:41:44Well, social life - we have the messes to go to.
0:41:44 > 0:41:47We go on a Wednesday night when they show a film,
0:41:47 > 0:41:50and on Saturday, when they have some social on.
0:41:50 > 0:41:51And if we lived in Civvy Street,
0:41:51 > 0:41:54probably the nights we were at the mess, we would watch TV.
0:42:00 > 0:42:02The soldiers knew that at any moment,
0:42:02 > 0:42:04they might be called into action.
0:42:04 > 0:42:08But in a sense, their family's roles were just as important.
0:42:11 > 0:42:14While the men on exercise were out shooting,
0:42:14 > 0:42:16their wives were out shopping.
0:42:18 > 0:42:20For although they were living in West Germany,
0:42:20 > 0:42:25they were still playing their part in Britain's consumer revolution.
0:42:27 > 0:42:32Maintaining the British presence in Germany came with a hefty price tag.
0:42:32 > 0:42:34In the late 1960s,
0:42:34 > 0:42:39the cost of keeping the British Army of the Rhine for just 12 months
0:42:39 > 0:42:42was a cool ?180 million.
0:42:44 > 0:42:48And this was only a fraction of Britain's total defence bill,
0:42:48 > 0:42:52which in 1970, came to a whopping 2.8 billion -
0:42:52 > 0:42:56well over a tenth of our entire national budget.
0:42:59 > 0:43:03And beneath all the facts and figures of the balance sheet,
0:43:03 > 0:43:05there was a deeper, more long-term cost.
0:43:05 > 0:43:09You see, while Britain was spending so much money on arms and armaments,
0:43:09 > 0:43:12we were being overtaken economically by our old rivals,
0:43:12 > 0:43:14West Germany and Japan.
0:43:14 > 0:43:17Both of which, ironically, were effectively prohibited
0:43:17 > 0:43:19from spending so much money on defence.
0:43:19 > 0:43:23Now, when you think about the international pressures of the day,
0:43:23 > 0:43:28you can understand why successive British governments felt they had to spend their money as they did.
0:43:28 > 0:43:31Even so, it is tempting to wonder what Britain would be like
0:43:31 > 0:43:33if they had chosen differently.
0:43:33 > 0:43:35And that's something to think about
0:43:35 > 0:43:38next time you're left waiting an hour for your train.
0:43:46 > 0:43:49But while the British economy was beginning to stutter,
0:43:49 > 0:43:52we could console ourselves
0:43:52 > 0:43:55that we now led the world in popular culture.
0:43:55 > 0:44:01And that was to prove just as potent a weapon in the war on Communism
0:44:01 > 0:44:03as any tank or missile.
0:44:06 > 0:44:08In the mid 1960s,
0:44:08 > 0:44:13four young, British men infiltrated the enemy lines...
0:44:18 > 0:44:22NEWSREEL, IN RUSSIAN:
0:44:29 > 0:44:31The Beatles were the most famous example
0:44:31 > 0:44:36of the most dynamic and successful British export of the 1960s...
0:44:36 > 0:44:40# It's been a hard day's night... #
0:44:40 > 0:44:42Pop music.
0:44:42 > 0:44:46In the capitalist West, pop was teenage entertainment.
0:44:49 > 0:44:53But in the East, pop was political dynamite.
0:44:53 > 0:44:58With its unbridled celebration of sex, choice and freedom,
0:44:58 > 0:45:03it seemed a shocking challenge to Communist values.
0:45:03 > 0:45:06Now, the Beatles never played East of the Iron Curtain,
0:45:06 > 0:45:09but here in Moscow, they were seen by many people
0:45:09 > 0:45:12as the supreme champions of Western values.
0:45:17 > 0:45:20Soviet music served the interests of the state.
0:45:20 > 0:45:24It promoted Russian patriotism and ideological conformity.
0:45:28 > 0:45:31But the Beatles were different.
0:45:31 > 0:45:35Theirs was the music of individual self-expression.
0:45:35 > 0:45:37# Do what you want to do... #
0:45:37 > 0:45:41Of course, most ordinary Russians didn't understand the lyrics,
0:45:41 > 0:45:44but what they loved was the sound, the style -
0:45:44 > 0:45:47the sheer youthful exuberance
0:45:47 > 0:45:51that seemed to represent an altogether different way of life.
0:45:56 > 0:45:58To the Kremlin, it appeared that the Beatles
0:45:58 > 0:46:02had opened up a dangerous new front in the Cold War.
0:46:02 > 0:46:06So, the Soviets censors decided to keep them out.
0:46:08 > 0:46:11Despite all the state surveillance,
0:46:11 > 0:46:13some Beatles records did get through.
0:46:13 > 0:46:16What happened was that underground studios
0:46:16 > 0:46:19would cut illicit bootleg flexi discs
0:46:19 > 0:46:21out of old medical X-rays,
0:46:21 > 0:46:25earning them the nickname rock 'n' roll on bones.
0:46:25 > 0:46:28# Baby you can drive my car... #
0:46:28 > 0:46:32But as the black market in Beatles records boomed,
0:46:32 > 0:46:35the Soviet authorities upped the stakes,
0:46:35 > 0:46:39commissioning a film that dismissed the Fab Four
0:46:39 > 0:46:42as degenerate western puppets.
0:46:42 > 0:46:46IN RUSSIAN:
0:47:05 > 0:47:10When this failed, The Kremlin tried to co-opt the Beatles...
0:47:11 > 0:47:16..with the help of the state record label - Melodiya.
0:47:16 > 0:47:19MUSIC: "Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da" - cover version
0:47:20 > 0:47:25RUSSIAN ACCENT: # Desmond had a barrow in a marketplace
0:47:25 > 0:47:28# Molly is a singer in a band
0:47:28 > 0:47:32# Desmond says to Molly, "Girl I like your face"
0:47:32 > 0:47:35# And Molly says this as she takes him by the hand
0:47:35 > 0:47:37# Ob-la-di, ob-la-da... #
0:47:37 > 0:47:39You might recognise this one.
0:47:39 > 0:47:44It's Melodiya's cover version of the Beatles' Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da.
0:47:44 > 0:47:47And personally, I rather prefer it to the original.
0:47:47 > 0:47:50But Melodiya didn't just bring out cover versions,
0:47:50 > 0:47:51they also issued some originals.
0:47:51 > 0:47:55In the late 1960s, they brought out this compilation album
0:47:55 > 0:47:59which had a catchy title, the 8th March International Women's Day.
0:47:59 > 0:48:04And side one, track five, we find Girl -
0:48:04 > 0:48:06credited, here, to the "Beatles Quartet"
0:48:06 > 0:48:10and described, oddly, as "traditional folk music".
0:48:10 > 0:48:14A case, I suppose, of lost in translation.
0:48:16 > 0:48:19None of this washed with Soviet Beatles fans.
0:48:19 > 0:48:22They wanted the real thing.
0:48:22 > 0:48:24MUSIC: Back In The USSR, by the Beatles
0:48:24 > 0:48:30But while Russian fans were daydreaming of life in the West,
0:48:30 > 0:48:35the Beatles wrote a song infused with nostalgia for the East.
0:48:35 > 0:48:37# Man, I had a dreadful flight
0:48:37 > 0:48:38# I'm back in the USSR. #
0:48:38 > 0:48:40Well, sort of.
0:48:40 > 0:48:43# You don't know how lucky you are, boy. #
0:48:43 > 0:48:47In August 1968, here at Abbey Road,
0:48:47 > 0:48:50they recorded Back In The USSR.
0:48:51 > 0:48:54Paul McCartney said later that he imagined the lyrics
0:48:54 > 0:48:59were the thoughts of a Soviet spy stationed for years in America
0:48:59 > 0:49:02and now on his way home to mother Russia.
0:49:02 > 0:49:07And there is something refreshingly unexpected, even a little bit irreverent,
0:49:07 > 0:49:11about taking a quintessentially American sound
0:49:11 > 0:49:15and wrapping it around the details of life behind the iron curtain.
0:49:15 > 0:49:19"Oh show me round your snow-peaked mountains way down south,
0:49:19 > 0:49:22"Take me to your daddy's farm.
0:49:22 > 0:49:26"Let me hear your balalaikas ringing out
0:49:26 > 0:49:28"Come and keep your comrade warm."
0:49:28 > 0:49:30# Back in the USSR
0:49:30 > 0:49:33# Oh, let me tell you, honey... #
0:49:37 > 0:49:40MUSIC: A Day In The Life, by the Beatles
0:49:40 > 0:49:44# I read the news today, oh boy... #
0:49:44 > 0:49:47The Beatles appealed to Soviet youngsters
0:49:47 > 0:49:51because they seemed to embody the very best of the West.
0:49:51 > 0:49:54And yet at home, their appeal was now bound up
0:49:54 > 0:49:59with their increasing scepticism about the western way of life.
0:49:59 > 0:50:03In Britain, they were challenging convention
0:50:03 > 0:50:08and becoming outspoken critics of bourgeois capitalism.
0:50:08 > 0:50:15Our society is run by insane people for insane objects, objectives.
0:50:15 > 0:50:18Half the people watching this are going to be saying,
0:50:18 > 0:50:20"Ah, what's he saying? What's he saying?"
0:50:20 > 0:50:23You know, you are being run by people who are insane
0:50:23 > 0:50:24and you don't know.
0:50:24 > 0:50:28In 1969, John Lennon even returned his MBE
0:50:28 > 0:50:34in protest at Britain's support for the American war in Vietnam.
0:50:34 > 0:50:40An extraordinary gesture coming for the former darling of British pop.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45But his frustration with western capitalist values
0:50:45 > 0:50:50was typical of a new angry and alienated generation,
0:50:50 > 0:50:54bred in affluence and now questioning their own values.
0:50:56 > 0:51:00I'm telling you! Don't make me provoke you! Get onto the pavement!
0:51:00 > 0:51:04# Come on baby, light my fire... #
0:51:04 > 0:51:06The moral compromises of the Cold War
0:51:06 > 0:51:10had turned many young men and women against the West.
0:51:10 > 0:51:16And they focused their anger on the supposed failings of liberal democracy.
0:51:16 > 0:51:18What we have got to do is find out how,
0:51:18 > 0:51:21within the educational sphere, we can smash this.
0:51:21 > 0:51:23They were not, however,
0:51:23 > 0:51:27drawn to the straight-laced socialist realism of the Kremlin.
0:51:27 > 0:51:33Instead, they flirted with the more glamorous exotic elements of the far left.
0:51:33 > 0:51:35Communism as cool.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Min.
0:51:38 > 0:51:45And they rejected the manifold crimes of western governments.
0:51:46 > 0:51:48Militarism.
0:51:49 > 0:51:50Exploitation.
0:51:52 > 0:51:55And the encouragement of mindless consumerism.
0:51:58 > 0:52:01Violence is used constantly by the Americans against the Vietnamese.
0:52:01 > 0:52:02Violence is used by the cops.
0:52:02 > 0:52:05Violence is inscribed on the face of society.
0:52:05 > 0:52:09It's the capitalist society that's got blood under its fingernails the whole time.
0:52:09 > 0:52:13CHANTING: The international army...
0:52:13 > 0:52:16The police are after me. You what?
0:52:16 > 0:52:19It's not funny. I hit one of them.
0:52:19 > 0:52:21You hit a policeman?
0:52:21 > 0:52:27By the 1970s, this new student left had become so vocal and so visible
0:52:27 > 0:52:31that they were irresistible targets for prime-time teasing.
0:52:31 > 0:52:34Yeah, I don't think Lenin would have left it like that.
0:52:34 > 0:52:37Listen, I was the only one who stood up to the police dog.
0:52:37 > 0:52:39Oh! I wasn't frightened.
0:52:39 > 0:52:41I patted it. I got a cheer.
0:52:41 > 0:52:42Oh, yeah...
0:52:42 > 0:52:45Hey, hey, they're here!
0:52:45 > 0:52:46THEY GASP
0:52:46 > 0:52:48LAUGHTER
0:52:54 > 0:52:59But not all TV producers saw comedy in Communism.
0:53:01 > 0:53:04Like Britain's youngsters themselves,
0:53:04 > 0:53:07the BBC had moved with the times.
0:53:09 > 0:53:13Having sided with the establishment over the War Game,
0:53:13 > 0:53:16Britain's public broadcaster now found plenty of room
0:53:16 > 0:53:20for those more interested in the certainties of the class war
0:53:20 > 0:53:23than the complexities of the Cold War.
0:53:23 > 0:53:25MUSIC: "Join Together", by the Who
0:53:25 > 0:53:28# When you hear the sound a-coming... #
0:53:29 > 0:53:33To be a good Communist is not easy.
0:53:33 > 0:53:39Your first loyalty is to the party to its politics and its leadership.
0:53:39 > 0:53:42# And we don't make no collections
0:53:42 > 0:53:47# I want you to join together with the band... #
0:53:49 > 0:53:51If there was one programme
0:53:51 > 0:53:55that was forever exposing the rotten underbelly of bourgeois capitalism
0:53:55 > 0:54:00or celebrating the revolutionary potential of the oppressed proletariat,
0:54:00 > 0:54:03then it was Play for Today.
0:54:03 > 0:54:08No script was too worthy, no subject too depressing.
0:54:08 > 0:54:11MUSIC: "In The Light" by Led Zeppelin
0:54:11 > 0:54:15# In the light... #
0:54:15 > 0:54:19A classic example was "Leeds United".
0:54:19 > 0:54:24A tale of Northern factory workers taking on their exploitative bosses.
0:54:29 > 0:54:31Based on a true story,
0:54:31 > 0:54:36it was one of the most expensive single TV dramas ever produced.
0:54:39 > 0:54:44The real enemy's still up there - the bloody masters -
0:54:44 > 0:54:49the most ruthless, arrogant and vindictive bosses in contemporary industrial Britain.
0:54:49 > 0:54:51CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:54:51 > 0:54:55# We shall not, we shall not be moved
0:54:55 > 0:54:59# We shall not, we shall not be moved. #
0:55:01 > 0:55:08Now, not every Play for Today was a hand-wringing denunciation of the evils of capitalism,
0:55:08 > 0:55:11but to be honest, quite a lot of them were.
0:55:11 > 0:55:14And given the Cold War tensions of the day,
0:55:14 > 0:55:16some observers were genuinely worried
0:55:16 > 0:55:20that more suggestible viewers might be brainwashed
0:55:20 > 0:55:22by all this far-left propaganda.
0:55:22 > 0:55:25MUSIC: "Another Brick in the Wall" by Pink Floyd
0:55:25 > 0:55:27The strident voice of the new left
0:55:27 > 0:55:31was now a potent force in British culture.
0:55:31 > 0:55:35And some of its critics took great delight
0:55:35 > 0:55:40in puncturing the posturing narcissism of the worst offenders.
0:55:42 > 0:55:45Just at the moment of maximum entropy,
0:55:45 > 0:55:48when late capitalist structures are beginning to fall in on themselves,
0:55:48 > 0:55:51those of us in the vanguard of the struggle
0:55:51 > 0:55:55have suddenly been afflicted with an unaccountable paralysis.
0:55:55 > 0:56:00As a famous radical at the university, Howard has a senior lectureship there.
0:56:00 > 0:56:03He is still active in the town radical causes
0:56:03 > 0:56:07and in the radical journals, where he writes often.
0:56:07 > 0:56:10He edits a sociology series for a paperback publisher
0:56:10 > 0:56:15and has published a second book - The Death of the Bourgeoisie.
0:56:15 > 0:56:21For many people, the new trendy lefties of the 1970s were ripe for satire.
0:56:21 > 0:56:24And nobody did it better than Malcolm Bradbury
0:56:24 > 0:56:26in his book, The History Man.
0:56:29 > 0:56:33So, you want to do Sociology?
0:56:33 > 0:56:37It's the only genuinely relevant subject in the curriculum,
0:56:37 > 0:56:41and it's entirely comprehensive - it takes in everything...
0:56:42 > 0:56:48..decimal currency, Rhodesia, abortion,
0:56:48 > 0:56:50Coronation Street, you name it.
0:56:55 > 0:56:58You'll finally begin to learn something about life.
0:56:58 > 0:57:02It's a question of opening your minds.
0:57:09 > 0:57:11The bastards!
0:57:18 > 0:57:22For the likes of Howard, history was on their side.
0:57:22 > 0:57:25Capitalism was doomed, Marxism was the future.
0:57:31 > 0:57:34But of course, most ordinary people didn't think that way.
0:57:34 > 0:57:40They were too busy shopping for a new carpet or buying a new colour TV to worry about world revolution.
0:57:43 > 0:57:45And when they did think about the Cold War,
0:57:45 > 0:57:47they looked back on 15 years
0:57:47 > 0:57:51in which from the marches of CND to the novels of John Le Carre,
0:57:51 > 0:57:55black and white had given way to infinite shadows of grey.
0:57:55 > 0:57:57But things were changing.
0:57:57 > 0:58:01A new political generation was poised to take power,
0:58:01 > 0:58:04spearheaded by a retired Hollywood film star
0:58:04 > 0:58:07and a grocer's daughter from Grantham.
0:58:07 > 0:58:10And under their leadership, the Cold War
0:58:10 > 0:58:14would once again become a battle ground of good against evil.
0:58:14 > 0:58:18MUSIC: "Atomic", by Blondie
0:58:18 > 0:58:22Next time, as a new political generation takes power...
0:58:23 > 0:58:27..Britain revels in rampant consumerism.
0:58:27 > 0:58:29# Atomic! #
0:58:29 > 0:58:33And the gloves come off in the Cold War.
0:58:34 > 0:58:38# Your hair is beautiful
0:58:38 > 0:58:43# Oh, tonight
0:58:45 > 0:58:47# Atomic
0:58:47 > 0:58:50# Oh, Atomic
0:58:50 > 0:58:53# Oh-oh
0:58:57 > 0:59:01# Oh-oh, Atomic. #