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Episodes
Thursday May 22, 2025
Thursday May 22, 2025
It's more than 100 days into Donald Trump’s second term as America’s 47th president and the world is holding its breath...
In this conclusion to Creating History’s series on international summitry, we dissect how the “disruptor-in-chief” has returned with a vengeance, turbocharging his “America First” doctrine and turning summitry into something like a high-stakes reality show. Listener questions probe the limits of Trump’s power: Can international institutions survive? Is this the end of multilateralism? And where might Trump’s revived bromance with Putin lead?
As the old order crumbles, we ask whether this is the death of diplomacy… or its reinvention. Creating History doesn’t take sides but does try to connect the dots on how history is being rewritten - the privatization of statecraft, summitry as performance art and the rise of a new “transactional world disorder.”
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday May 15, 2025
Thursday May 15, 2025
International diplomacy has been upended since 2017. In the first of a double Creating History episode, we dissect Donald Trump’s unorthodox first-term foreign policy through the lens of historical analysis. How did a reality-TV mogul turned commander-in-chief rewrite the rules of international relations? From his “fire and fury” theatrics with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un to the clandestine charm offensives with Russia’s Vladimir Putin, we unpack Trump’s summit diplomacy: a cocktail of brinkmanship, spectacle and transactional deal-making that left allies and adversaries alike scrambling. We assess Trump’s rejection of traditional alliances, his reliance on personal chemistry over protocol and the lasting geopolitical fissures created by his “America First” mantra. Was this chaos… or strategy?
Next episode: From chaos to legacy—what happens when Trump’s “diplomatic revolution” gets a second act?
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday May 08, 2025
Thursday May 08, 2025
In this episode, we dissect one of the most consequential - and controversial - political partnerships of the 21st century: the alliance between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and U.S. President George W. Bush in the lead-up to the Iraq War. From their chummy first meeting at Camp David in 2001, through the shock of 9/11, to the high-stakes summits that paved the path to invasion, we unravel how Blair’s relentless summitry became both a weapon and a liability.
Why did Blair, leader of a middling power, gamble his legacy on aligning with Bush’s hawkish vision? How did personal rapport and diplomatic theatre mask glaring intelligence failures and geopolitical miscalculations? We explore the asymmetry of this “special relationship,” where Britain’s prime minister, armed with charm and moral fervour, struggled to steer Washington’s agenda, only to become ensnared in a war that shattered his credibility and reshaped global alliances.
Unlike superpower showdowns of the past, this is a story of unequal summitry: a follower chasing influence, a leader demanding loyalty and a cascade of decisions that ignited Middle Eastern chaos, eroded trust in institutions and left a haunting question—was this partnership about statesmanship or hubris? Join us as we probe the human drama behind closed-door negotiations, the intelligence twisted into justification and the legacy of a war that still reverberates in every summit room today.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday May 01, 2025
Thursday May 01, 2025
When history hinges on a handshake... Concluding our double episode on Reagan and Gorbachev’s high-stakes diplomatic dance, Creating History explores a series of summits in the late 1980s that defied the odds and dismantled the nuclear nightmare.
Part 1 left us in Geneva, where a handshake between the former cowboy actor and the Soviet reformer cracked open a door. Now, in Part 2, witness how Reykjavik’s near-collapse, Washington’s triumphant INF Treaty, and Moscow’s symbolic strolls through Red Square turned cautious dialogue into irreversible action. Explore the audacious proposals, white-knuckle standoffs, and startling moments of trust as the leaders sparred over “Star Wars,” slashed missile stockpiles and rewrote the rules of superpower rivalry.
Could idealism outmuscle hardline suspicion? And what lessons do these summits hold for today’s fractured world?
Creating History brings you the untold drama behind the treaties that helped end the Cold War.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Apr 24, 2025
Thursday Apr 24, 2025
In the first of a double episode charting the end of the Cold War, we go behind the scenes of the dramatic 1985 Geneva Summit, where Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev - ideological archenemies - met and glimpsed humanity in one another.
How did a single meeting ignite a chain reaction that dismantled decades of nuclear brinkmanship, tore down the Berlin Wall, and dissolved Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe - all without a shot fired? The episode unravels the paradox: Reagan, the anti-communist 'hawk', and Gorbachev, the 'reformist' Soviet, defied expectations by finding common ground in their distrust of nuclear deterrence… and their surprising personal chemistry.
Discover how whispered jokes, shared frustrations and a flicker of mutual respect between these leaders helped to thaw a frozen conflict.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Apr 17, 2025
Thursday Apr 17, 2025
Thirteen days. Three leaders. One impossible goal.
In 1978, Jimmy Carter corralled Egypt’s Anwar Sadat and Israel’s Menachem Begin at Camp David, demanding an end to 30 years of Middle East war. Tempers flared, talks collapsed, and Sadat nearly stormed out - until Carter brokered a fragile truce: Israel would return the Sinai, Egypt would recognize its enemy, and both sides ignored the Palestinian question entirely. The agreements reshaped alliances, won Nobel Prizes and lit a slow-burning fuse for future conflict.
In this episode, David and Russell tell the story of a peace made… and peace postponed.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Apr 10, 2025
Thursday Apr 10, 2025
In this episode of Creating History, we unravel the paradox of Richard Nixon’s 1972 summits in Beijing and Moscow, where his political cunning and outsider ambition inspired America’s most daring Cold War diplomacy and reshaped global power dynamics. How did such a flawed US president, often so consumed by paranoia and insecurity, broker historic détente with Mao’s China and Brezhnev’s Soviet Union?
We dissect Nixon’s legacy: a leader whose strategic brilliance thawed decades of icy relations, even as Watergate’s shadow loomed. From secret backchannel negotiations to televised handshakes with Communist adversaries, discover how Nixon’s “perpetual outsider” psyche drove him to gamble on international diplomacy.
Join us as we explore the dance of power, personality and paradox that drove Nixon’s quest for a legacy greater than his personal demons.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Apr 03, 2025
Thursday Apr 03, 2025
Step into the pressure cooker of Cold War diplomacy as we dissect the explosive 1961 Vienna Summit - a face-off between John F. Kennedy, America’s untested young president, and Nikita Khrushchev, the coarse and caustic Soviet leader hardened by years in Stalin’s shadow. These two leaders collided in a high-stakes game of brinkmanship. Kennedy sought to project strength; Khrushchev aimed to dominate. But beneath their polished façades lurked brittle egos, domestic pressures and fatal miscalculations.
Over two fraught days, their clash of personalities spiralled into a diplomatic disaster, setting the stage for the Cuban Missile Crisis and America’s plunge into Vietnam. This wasn’t just a summit - it was a tinderbox.
Why did talking nearly ignite a war? How did ego and insecurity rewrite the course of history? “Nutcracker” unpacks the perilous dance of power, revealing how the wrong words, at the wrong time, can push the world to the edge.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Mar 27, 2025
Thursday Mar 27, 2025
In this episode: we dissect the Tehran and Yalta summits between the so-called 'Big Three' of Allied leaders in World War Two, American President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Josef Stalin. At Tehran in late November 1943, the Allies hammered out their strategy for defeating Nazi Germany. At Yalta in February 1945, they attempted to lay the groundwork of a post-war world as the war entered its final months. So these were the most consequential summits of World War II, arguably of the 20th century. They resolved some key disagreements among the Allies, but they also exposed deep tensions that would go on to shape the Cold War and the entire post-war order.
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Thursday Mar 20, 2025
Thursday Mar 20, 2025
In this second episode dissecting the tense negotiations of September 1938, when Neville Chamberlain raced against time to prevent a war with Hitler's Germany over Czechoslovakia, historian David Reynolds and producer Russell Barnes unpack the dramatic backstory of the Munich Agreement. While Munich is often remembered as a capitulation to Nazi aggression, the reality was messier - a labyrinth of diplomacy, desperation, self-delusion and high-stakes brinkmanship. Discover the zigzagging drama behind the infamous pact and why its legacy remains so fiercely debated. Was it a surrender... a product of hubris ... or a strategic bid to buy time for rearmament?
From Creating History - the team behind Creating Churchill - comes a gripping new season of high-stakes diplomacy, backroom negotiations and world-altering decisions.
This is Summitry. Twelve episodes exploring pivotal meetings that shaped history.
When Hitler met Chamberlain. When Kennedy clashed with Khrushchev. When Bush and Blair stood shoulder to shoulder. When Trump had a shouting match with Zelenskyy... History isn’t just written - it’s negotiated.
Hosted by Russell Barnes and historian David Reynolds, Summitry takes you inside the rooms where power, pressure and politics collide. Each episode unpacks a defining diplomatic summit, revealing the human drama, strategic manoeuvring and lasting impacts of these encounters. Featuring expert analysis and rich historical context, this series pulls back the curtain on the meetings that changed the course of history. Because when leaders meet, the world changes…
Follow the show at @Creating_Hist on X or Instagram, and send us your comments, voice notes and questions by email to: info@clearstory.co.uk
Please rate, review and recommend our show on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us get the word out and extend our reach.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com/creating_history, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history
Creating History is hosted on Podbean, produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, digital marketing by Lee Mann, and sound engineering by Andrew Chappell. Creating History is a ClearStory production. www.clearstory.co.uk
Creating History
Send comments, voice notes and questions to info@clearstory.co.uk
Find us on X & Instagram: @Creating_Hist
Creating History is a ClearStory production.
www.clearstory.co.uk
Creating History is produced and edited by Russell Barnes, with music by Rich Farnsworth, sound engineering by Andy Chappell and digital marketing by Lee Mann.
Check out our first series Creating Churchill, also available wherever you get your podcasts: https://pod.link/1772845516
If you’d like to buy us or the team a coffee at Ko-Fi.com, we’d be very grateful. https://ko-fi.com/creating_history