Welcome to Cold War Conversations, the home of real stories of the Cold War.

I mean, it was quite a radical sight, really, to see a Soviet airlin in the countryside of West Berkshire.

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Welcome to episode 18 of Cold War Conversations.

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So, on to the subject of today's podcast. R.A.F. Greenham Common opened in 1942 and was used by both the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces during the Second World War and the United States Air Force during the Cold War. The airfield is probably best known, certainly in the UK, for the controversial deployment of ground launch cruise missiles in the 1980s and the resulting Greenham

Common Women's Peace Camp outside its gates. Today's guest is the author of In Defence of Freedom,

a history of REF Greenham Common, and he's also a director

of Greenham Control Tower Limited. I am delighted to welcome Jonathan Assayers. Can you just

tell us a little bit about yourself? Well, I'm a graduate of international relations and postgraduate international security studies from

the University of Reading and I have also written a history of Greenham Common Airfield

in Berkshire which as many people will remember was a very significant site in the history of the Cold War,

certainly in Britain, and it had international aspects in terms of the late years of the Cold War.

And earlier in the 1950s and 1960s, there was probably slightly lesser known.

So, you know, that's what I've come to talk to you about today, really.

Great, great.

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