# 1970s Cold War fiction **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 14, 2014, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175 "2014-12-14T02:23:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Weedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/weedy/32/301_2.png) [@Weedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weedy)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/1 "2014-12-14T02:23:57Z")
I’m looking for books, movies, poems, cartoons or anything else which were made in the 1970s, and have to do with the Cold War. It’s also OK if they are not directly about the Cold War, but are thematically linked in some way. So far I have: Apocalypse Now Day of the Jackal Gravity’s Rainbow M_A_S\*H Spy vs Spy (Mad Magazine) Telefon The Deer Hunter The Dispossessed The Gulag Archipelago The Spy Who Loved Me Three Days of the Condor Z for Zachariah There must be lots. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/2 "2014-12-14T02:53:01Z")
Coming Home ---
**Author:** ![flurb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/51bf81/32.png) [@flurb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flurb)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/3 "2014-12-14T04:43:45Z")
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/4 "2014-12-14T05:18:16Z")
The Len Deighton Game/Set/Match, Hook/Line/Sinker, Faith/Hope/Charity and Winter Bernard Sampson novels are really fun. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/5 "2014-12-14T05:22:25Z")
The first and fourth of Martin Caiden’s _Cyborg_ novels (the first of which was adapted into television’s _The Six Million Dollar Man_) have at least a partial Cold War theme, what with killing Russians and such. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/6 "2014-12-14T06:20:52Z")
Lots of John LeCarre’s novels were written in the 70s, although he has been writing for many decades. I believe the entire Karla series was published in the 70s. Also, Graham Greene’s “The Quiet American.” ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/7 "2014-12-14T06:33:13Z")
The Francis Powers TV movie with Lee Majors Also Firefox was written in 1977 ---
**Author:** ![williambaskerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f14d63/32.png) [@williambaskerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/williambaskerville)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/8 "2014-12-14T08:05:45Z")
Down To A Sunless Sea, by David Graham. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2014, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/9 "2014-12-14T08:39:04Z")
I’m going to go ahead and contribute _Charlie M_ and its various sequels about Charlie Muffin, Brian Freemantle’s ill-used British agent who simply refuses to die, for all that British Intelligence tries to dispose of him. ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2014, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/10 "2014-12-15T01:02:03Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > Also, Graham Greene’s “The Quiet American.” While clearly a quintessential Cold War novel, _The Quiet American_ was actually first published way back in 1955. Even the first film version also dates from the Fifties. ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2014, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/11 "2014-12-15T20:52:26Z")
Six Days of the Condor. The Marathon Man. ---
**Author:** ![Weedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/weedy/32/301_2.png) [@Weedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weedy)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2014, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/12 "2014-12-15T20:53:43Z")
It seems like there are a bunch of classics from the 50s and 60s, but much less from the 70s. Maybe it no longer intrigued people by then. Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/13 "2014-12-16T02:21:05Z")
[Twilight’s Last Gleaming](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twilight%27s_Last_Gleaming), 1977. Renegade general takes over missile silo, attempts to blackmail US government. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/14 "2014-12-16T02:43:05Z")
This movie, based on a true story: > **[The Defection of Simas Kudirka](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Defection_of_Simas_Kudirka)** > > The Defection of Simas Kudirka is a 1978 American made-for-television drama film based on actual events, featuring Alan Arkin as Simas Kudirka, a Lithuanian merchant seaman who attempts to defect from the Soviet Union to the United States by jumping onto a U.S. Coast Guard cutter. Among the movie's awards are two Emmys wins and three more Emmy nominations. The movie was directed by David Lowell Rich. > The movie revolves around the true events of a Lithuanian man, Simas Kudirka, who was at the ti... ---
**Author:** ![si\_blakely](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@si\_blakely](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/si_blakely)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/15 "2014-12-16T09:07:36Z")
_The Bourne Identity_ (Robert Ludlum) was published in 1980, but I think fits the bill of a 70s Cold War thriller. Some of his other novels fit the category, too, I think. Colin Forbes Frederick Forsyth (although _The Fourth Protocol_ is an 80s Cold War thriller) Craig Thomas ---
**Author:** ![MarcusF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/67e7ee/32.png) [@MarcusF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcusF)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/16 "2014-12-16T10:27:11Z")
Another series of excellent Cold War spy stories are the David Audley/Jack Butler books by Anthony Price. The first one, _The Labyrinth Makers_, was published in 1970 and the 20 odd books went right through the 70’s and 80’s with the last one in 1989 in the era of Glasnost and the end of the Cold War. On a different tack, Niven and Pournelle’s _Lucifer’s Hammer_ (recently discussed here) was published in 1977 and is very much of that time. Finally there is _The Third World War: August 1985_ by General Sir John Hackett. Written in 1978 it portrays a Warsaw Pack invasion of Western Europe. In the light of what we know now the scenario and the course of the conflict are pretty dubious but an interesting read that tells you a lot about how the NATO military commanders saw things in the late 70’s. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/17 "2014-12-16T10:45:05Z")
> [@Weedy](#): > > Spy vs Spy (Mad Magazine) How is _Spy vs. Spy_ about, or linked to, the Cold War? The two spies were completely generic. The cloak and dagger stuff they were doing could have gone on between any two rival countries, regardless of their ideologies. Maybe you were thinking of Prohias’s earlier comic, _Tovarich_, though that was more a satire of Soviet Union in general than its icy relations with the West in particular. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/18 "2014-12-16T15:09:42Z")
Do movies about “McCarthyism” count as Cold War-related? If so, there’s \*\*\*The Way We Were \*\*\*and Woody Allen’s _ **The Front** _ (actually, this was a rare movie in which Woody was just an actor, not the writer or director). ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/19 "2014-12-16T19:05:57Z")
> [@MarcusF](#): > > Written in 1978 it portrays a Warsaw Pack invasion of Western Europe. Damn those Warsaw Packs! They’re worse than Hell’s Angels! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2014, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175/20 "2014-12-16T22:23:19Z")
Donald Hamilton’s [Matt Helm](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Helm) series ran from 1960 through 1993. Published during the 1970s: #13 The Poisoners (1971) #14 The Intriguers (1972) #15 The Intimidators (1974) #16 The Terminators (1975) #17 The Retaliators (1976) #18 The Terrorizers (1977) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1970s-cold-war-fiction/707175.md?page=2)