CNN - Secrets and Spies: A Nuclear Game (2023)

CNN Original Series "Secrets & Spies: A Nuclear Game" tracks the spies operating behind the scenes in the 1980s as the Cold War brings two superpowers to the brink of nuclear war.
In the 1980s, the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. pushed the world to the brink of global disaster as each nation rushed to build up its nuclear arsenal. As that was going on, each nation felt the acute need to spy on the other.
This razor-sharp series examines the tenuousness of global geopolitics during the Cold War through the lens of two notorious double agents: Oleg Gordievsky and Aldrich Ames. While the world was on the brink of global disaster, history was being made in the shadows. As President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher maneuver on the world stage to try to resolve the Cold War, it is in fact their agents that are pulling the strings.
"There's a mole somewhere!" Gordievsky, the top KGB double agent for the British, proves invaluable by giving insight into the Soviet mindset. In the West, Aldrich is the head of the Soviet Desk for the CIA when he decides to turn traitor and work for the KGB. As the spy wars heat up in the shadows, they threaten to destabilize diplomatic efforts. The betrayals deepen, lives are lost, and some spies must embark on a daring escape.
"Secrets & Spies: A Nuclear Game" includes rare archival interviews and never-before-heard audio from double agents Gordievsky and Ames, as well as interviews with former CIA, FBI, MI6, MI5, KGB officers and former aides to Prime Minister Thatcher & President Reagan.

A BBC Studios Specialist Factual Production for CNN & BBC in Co-production with CNN

Part 1: Paranoia
Two spies, on opposing sides, turn double agents at the height of the Cold War standoff between East and West; their deception comes as the superpowers edge towards possible nuclear war.
It's summer 1982, and KGB spy Oleg Gordievsky travels from Moscow to take up a post at the Soviet embassy in London. East and west have a deep mistrust and misunderstanding of each other, and as a result, the Cold War, which has been rumbling on for almost 40 years, is heating up. The spying game and paranoia magnify the suspicion between superpowers, and an arms race threatens to bring the world to nuclear armageddon.
The first episode of the three-part series is based on rare archive material such as interviews with Gordievsky and other intelligence agents. Former advisers to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and US President Ronald Reagan as well as former officers of the KGB, MI5 and MI6 have their say, most of whom are speaking on camera for the first time. They describe the hostile climate and the mutual surveillance of East and West in the early 1980s, the atmosphere characterized by permanent tensions of probably the most dangerous phase of the Cold War.

Part 2: Traitors
Spies work behind the scenes as the superpowers enter a new era; intelligence pushes world leaders towards a more peaceful approach; but, a new danger is lurking in the shadows.
With Gordievsky's help, Britain identifies Mikhail Gorbachev as a possible new contender for Soviet leader; he could be the ticket to better relations between east and west. But fragile steps towards diplomacy are threatened by the vested interests of other spies still stuck in the old-world order.
The CIA is set on knowing who Britain's super spy is, but their head of Soviet counterintelligence, Aldrich Ames, is getting disillusioned. He turns traitor for a paltry sum, and shortly afterwards, Gordievsky is summoned back to Russia to almost certain danger.

Part 3: Escape
Spy work appears to bring East and West closer, but the web they weave is about to close in and jeopardize the spies themselves.
Battles between Cold War spies leads to danger, betrayal and high-risk stakes; as Reagan and Gorbachev take their first steps towards peace, the double agent spies begin to unravel the entire secret service networks.
It's 1985, and Mikhail Gorbachev is the new, young leader of the Soviet Union at a very tense time. While both sides have hopes of peace, they have been publicly stockpiling nuclear weapons for decades. Neither side wants to appear weak. Thatcher and Reagan hope that fresh leadership in the Kremlin will offer an opportunity for constructive dialogue.
Top double agent Oleg Gordievsky is pivotal in these negotiations, but a sudden summons back to Moscow by his KGB bosses has unnerved him - do they know he is secretly spying for Britain? When he arrives at his Moscow flat and discovers that a lock which he never turns has been used, his fears are confirmed.

Part 4: Fallout
Spycraft, betrayals, and a dramatic escape threaten fragile steps towards world peace.
Reagan and Gorbachev prepare for a global summit to discuss future peace; Oleg Gordievsky embarks on an escape plan that could derail all the diplomatic efforts. After being recalled quite suddenly to Moscow, he was exfiltrated from the USSR by MI6 in July 1985, under a plan code-named Operation PIMLICO. Escape operation was a life-and-death mission to rescue a British-Russian double agent from the KGB's clutches - a high-stakes plan so outrageous it included a Mars bar moment, a newborn baby, and plot twists that could rival any spy thriller.
Meanwhile Reagan and Gorbachev agreed that they would meet in November of 1985 in Geneva to discuss nuclear arms reduction and other issues of international diplomacy. Reagan and Gorbachev, capitalist and communist, were an unlikely pairing but their series of high profile summits have been praised for helping to end the cold war.