In the last episode we talked about how the American half of the Cold War was established in Saudi Arabia. Today, we’re shifting our focus to the other half of that epic conflict: the Soviet Union. What were the Soviet Union’s designs on the Middle East? Or were their forays into Middle Eastern geopolitics simply countermoves in a Cold War chess game, attempts to wrongfoot their American opponent? And now, as the spectre of war between Russia and Ukraine hangs over Europe, to what extent can Soviet history, and indeed the earlier history of imperial Russia, help us to understand what’s going on?

Listen to exclusive bonus content and get all episodes ad-free by subscribing to Conflicted Extra on Apple Podcasts and Spotify for just 99p/month.

In this week’s episode, we focus attention on Aimen’s homeland: Saudi Arabia. Arabia is as old as time, and we explore how the depth and profundity of its history inform the present day. Saudi Arabia is also, as we’ll show, where the Cold War began, and to understand how, we’ll explain the way in which long-standing British power in the region gave way, fitfully and almost without anyone noticing, to those upstart imperialists from Thomas’s homeland: the United States. And we’ll see how the Cold War world of spycraft, ideological conflict, and state paranoia continues into the present, through Aimen’s take on the notorious murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

Listen to Thomas and Aimen travel back in time once again to the Cold War, how the two world superpowers collide, the repercussions on other continents, and how The Middle East is involved..

As the financial crisis moved off the front pages, activists and politicians began to organise around another global emergency: climate change. In the final episode of this season of Conflicted, Aimen and Thomas sweat their way through the swamp of science and politics that surrounds the world’s most flammable issue.

As the financial crisis moved off the front pages, activists and politicians began to organise around another global emergency: climate change. In the final episode of this season of Conflicted, Aimen and Thomas sweat their way through the swamp of science and politics that surrounds the world’s most flammable issue.

From a bomb maker to double agent to… banker?

In this episode, Aimen draws on his experience as a helping banks combat financial terrosism as our hosts explore the 2008 Financial Crisis and its impact on the world order.

From the protests in Hong Kong, to the persecution of the Uighurs and the building of the New Silk Road, this episode explores the role China played in the New World Order.

Conflicted is back with the third episode of Season Two. This episode is a deep dive into Russian foreign policy after the end of the Cold War and the sometimes surprising ways it intersects with the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East.

In 1990, George Bush proclaimed the dawning of a New World Order. The Cold War was over, the nation-state and capitalism had won, and the US was ready to deliver their strategy for global governance of the world. Aimen and Thomas discuss how this played out in the Middle East and where the grand vision fell short.

With the assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, the world found itself teetering on the edge of a conflict, the scale of which has only been threatened a few times since 1945.

Aimen and Thomas kick off Season 2 looking at who Soleimani was, his role in defeating ISIS, as well as the place of privatised espionage and drone technology in modern warfare.