Here it is!  The finale - the culmination of the other three episodes where we have worked toward an understanding of where political forces stood in the mid-20th century.  I start this episode after the 1936-7 elections in India under the Raj and end it 10 years later with Indian and Pakistan Independence.  That decade packs a wallop for stuff happening.    Primary characters in this episode are Muhammed Ali Jinnah, Mahatma Ghandi, Jawarhalal Nehru, Lord Louis Mountbatten, Sardar Patel if...

After the Mutiny of 1857 by military personnel in the employ of the East India Company, the British Crown took over rule in India.  It would last until Indian independence 90 years later.  It was a long, rocky road to independence - have a listen to find out about what happened in the intervening years.  One more episode to go after this one! Thanks for listening - send me an email at [email protected].

Episode 1 of the India-Pakistan partition was a quick introduction to centuries of Indian history, but I could not ignore all the details of just the 18th century.  There was so much happening!  Afghan invasions, Sikh reprisal on the Mughals, south India allegiances, multiple Mughal emperors, defiance against British expansionism, and all of that probably in the same year!  I know that this episode is an indulgence on my part, but I think it will prompt you to learn more about India.  Episode...

In 1947, Britain effectively abandoned its responsibility to India after a few hundred years of pillaging the wealth from the Asian subcontinent.  We'll get to that... But part of trying to understand the events of 1947, is laying a foundation of what had happened in India and surrounding areas in the previous centuries.  This episode is an introduction to the rich history of India, albeit much abridged, but enough to help understand what happened later.   Learn a little bit about the empires...

In Episode 1, I discussed the different players contributing to the rising tensions in the Spanish Republic in the years leading up to 1936.  They were the same tensions that were growing across Europe during the years of the Great Depression and all of the instability that had come as a result of the poor economy, failing empires as well as growing communist and fascist movements.  Listen now to how the military coup turned into a civil war and how Franco remained the ruler of Spain until...

The civil war that ravaged Spain in the years leading up to World War II has been a footnote to the greater conflicts in Europe in the early 20th century.  But it had much greater implications; in some ways it became an extension of the Russian civil war.   It was a testing ground for the Nazi war machine, and it allowed Hitler to see how far he could push the boundaries with France, Britain and Russia, years before the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact or Chamberlain's infamous "peace in our...

If you have patiently listened to the first 2 episodes of this series, I hope you feel educated about the long history of this region.  The previous hours have been a preparation to help explain what happened in the 1990s.  Yugoslavia is breaking apart in 1991 and there is growing tension between the different Yugoslav republics.  The politicians have started to prey on their citizens' worst fears about each other.  Hundreds of thousands of people will have to live through the worst European...

This is the second of a 3 part series on the Bosnian War of the 1990s.  Please join me as I delve into  the relationship between the nations that make up the former Yugoslavia and give historical context for how those nations have been manipulated by other powers over the decades.  This episode starts in the late 1800's with the results of the Great Eastern Crisis and ends 100 years later in the 1980s, just prior to where we will start episode 3 on what unfolded in the Balkans in the 1990s....

In the late 20th century, as the Iron Curtain fell, the nations that made up the country of Yugoslavia began re-evaluating their relationship to one another and opening some old wounds.  Bosnia, a nation within Yugoslavia, with a long, complex history became a continuation of the atrocities of World War II,  with the rest of the world watching impotently.  Part 1 of the series examines Bosnian history and how it relates to its neighbours. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The...

In the early 1990s, the country of Rwanda jumped into the headlines with horrific images and details of what was to become known as the Rwandan Genocide. Part 1 of this podcast explored what happened in the years leading up to the 1994 genocide. With the help of great journalists and their books, we take a look a what genocide meant to individual Rwandans. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

In the early 1990s, the country of Rwanda jumped into the headlines with horrific images and details of what was to become known as the Rwandan Genocide. This is a walk through the years leading up to Rwanda’s civil war, and what precipitated the Rwandan Genocide. Maybe if we can learn from what happened there, it can be prevented in the future. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app