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Paul G's CornerWhere monsters dont hide, heroes dont come easy, and the only way to know the difference is to Think Your Way Through It. Author: PAUL G NEWTON
Where monsters dont hide, heroes dont come easy, and the only way to know the difference is to Think Your Way Through It. paulgnewton.substack.com Language: en Genres: History, True Crime Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
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The Night The World Almost Ended… And Nobody Noticed
Tuesday, 25 November, 2025
Nothing says welcome back to Paul G’s Corner like learning the world nearly cooked itself in 1969 while everyone was cheering for astronauts and yelling about Vietnam.History loves to hide the real disasters under a pile of shiny nonsense.That is where I come in. I bring you the stories that tried to stay quiet. I also have no interest in making you feel comfortable while I do it.This week, we look at the Sino Soviet crisis. A moment so intense and so ridiculous that it would feel like fiction if it were not painfully real. China was tearing itself apart. Moscow was convinced Beijing might try to prove something with its new nuclear toys. Nixon was stomping around the globe trying to look dangerous in every direction at once.And the prize that almost triggered a nuclear exchange was a frozen island smaller than a Walmart parking lot. Humanity nearly got reduced to loose atoms because two superpowers could not agree over a chunk of land that barely deserved a name.The best part is simple. Almost no one knows this happened. Your textbooks skipped it. Your teachers did not mention it. The news treated it like a weather report. The world spun on its axis and pretended everything was fine.The truth is harder. The great powers circled one another with real fear in their throats. One of them considered a first strike. The other panicked. Washington watched from the sidelines and acted just threatening enough to spook the right people.Then it ended. Quietly. No moral awakening. No heroic leadership. Just a rare moment in which everyone realized they were not fireproof and backed away from the edge.This episode walks through the entire mess with the exact mix of clarity and sarcasm you expect from me. You will understand what happened and why it mattered and how it shaped Nixon’s trip to China and why the world got lucky with a kind of luck that should never be trusted.And if you want to carry that slightly nauseating truth into daylight, there are shirts on paulgnewton.com that pair nicely with the realization that the human race survives most threats by tripping over them instead of meeting them head on.Go listen.Go learn the story the world forgot to remember.And enjoy the moment you realize how close we came to the kind of ending that does not get sequels.Welcome to the story.Try to sleep after this one.Want more of this madness in your daily life. The shirts at paulgnewton.com are waiting. Bring one home before history gets weird again. Support the show. Look good. Confuse strangers. Visit paulgnewton.com for shirts that fit the exact mood of everything you just read.Paul G's Corner is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to Paul G's Corner at paulgnewton.substack.com/subscribe
