Uncle Ivan's Bedtime Stories

[Self Loading Freight]

I've been enjoying a fabulous thread on the Mil Aircrews forum about life at the sharp end of Vulcans during the Cold War - if you haven't seen it, scramble the mouse to http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=111797 - and I can't recommend it highly enough. Perhaps it comes of growing up in Plymouth during the 70s and being spoddy enough at primary school to wonder exactly why we were being issued with iodine tablets... anyone else remember those public information broadcasts that went "This Is The Sound... <Tick> <Tick> <Tick> ... Of Peace"?

Anyway, it gives me to wonder. Are there any equivalent sites covering life on the other side? A compare and contrast exercise would be beyond fascinating: while (as has been mooted) writing up the Vulcan stuff as a book would make a compulsive read, having the same stories told by Ivan's purveyors of instant suntan would blow my tiny little mind...

R

[jumpseater]

Being at primary/secondary school in the 70's as well, I can't recall any issue of Iodine or any other similar tablets, or indeed the public info broadcast you mention. I went to school in Herts (uk) perhaps it was a local thing with you being so close to significant Navy bases

[Self Loading Freight]

Jumpseat:

I think it was more to do with the nuclear weapons allegedly stored just up the road from us, and the maintenance done on the nuclear subs at Devonport. There were occasional rumours about mishaps, but who knows...

I did end up with a Geiger counter, but all that showed was plenty of lumps of warm granite on Dartmoor!

R

[Blacksheep]

As a former Cold War Warrior it was interesting to encounter Ivan in the flesh. Since the thaw in relations I've worked with some nice Russian chaps, one of whom used to look after what we called "Bison" over on the other side. Exchanging yarns with him, it transpired that Ivan was an almost exact carbon copy of ourselves - except that we drank beer and they drank vodka. The main difference is that they had better cold-weather gear than we did!

Aviation attracts the same type of people all over the world it seems...

**************************
Through difficulties to the cinema

[BEagle]

When one flew one's Vickers FunBus alongside the odd Bear or two and held up the Sun calendar featuring the curvaceous Miss Samantha Fox, the enthusiastic reactions from the Ivans who appeared in every window of the Bear proved conclusively that they had very similar interests to most RAF aircrew......