All episodes

By the late 1950s, it was becoming clear to Soviet naval planners that the United States was winning the battle beneath the world’s oceans. Over the previous decade, American engineers had developed sophisticated silencing technologies that made the latest generation of submarines so stealthy, they could track Soviet subs for hours, and sometimes days, without being detected. For Soviet naval planners, a nightmare scenario was unfolding. If war broke out, American submarines could find and destroy Soviet submarines before they had a chance to strike back. Simply catching up to American stealth wasn't an option. It wasn't a technology that could easily be copied, it was the result of decades of precision manufacturing, relentless quality control, advances in materials science, and industrial discipline that the Soviet system couldn't support at the time. It would take decades to catch up. Faced with a widening stealth technology gap, Soviet planners stopped trying to play hide and se

In the early 1950s, the British pioneered jet travel with the De Havilland Comet. However, this initial triumph turned into tragedy when the aircraft suddenly began breaking apart in midair. The catastrophic and highly publicized failures convinced the public and major airline executives that passenger jet travel was inherently unsafe.