34 episodes listed below
Hardcore History's side door: authors, the bomb and detours.
The companion feed to Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, where Carlin talks with authors about their books, from Alex Wellerstein on Truman and Hiroshima to Zeinab Badawi on the ancient kingdom of Kush. Nuclear weapons keep resurfacing, and the detours run as far as boxing, wargaming and creativity with Rick Rubin.
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Dan Carlin's Hardcore History: Addendum is the companion feed to Carlin's main history series, home to his author conversations, solo pieces and some genuine oddities. He is candid about the limits: reading for the main show leaves little room for other books, so he describes himself as constrained in how many author interviews he can take on. When one happens, the preparation shows. With Alex Wellerstein, he quotes the book back to its author and sits with its argument that Truman may have misunderstood the targeting of Hiroshima, trying to picture the moment the reports made the truth plain. The talk lingers on the firebombing of Japanese cities, which, as the conversation notes, no reporter ever raised with Roosevelt or Truman. It then runs forward to Kennedy realizing during the Cuban Missile Crisis that he did not control every pathway to nuclear war. Carlin acknowledges that nuclear weapons are well-trodden ground here and says he makes no apologies for it. The episode list agrees, with Annie Jacobsen on how a nuclear war might unfold in 'The Handmaidens of the Apocalypse', Fred Kaplan in 'Strangelove Whisperings' and Malcolm Gladwell on Curtis LeMay and precision bombing in 'Gladwell and the Bomber Mafia'. 'Sledgehammer and Big Shot' brings the Pacific war down to one family. Henry Sledge, son of the Marine memoirist Eugene Sledge, recalls his father breaking down during the tank battle in the film Patton and describes the elder Sledge's hostility toward Nimitz over Peleliu. He calls 'With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa' a book that makes Marines fiercely proud yet is, at its core, a powerful anti-war statement. The map reaches well beyond the twentieth century. Zeinab Badawi arrives with a book spanning the whole of African history, and Carlin, by his own admission, monopolizes her on the ancient kingdom of Kush. She argues for oral tradition and Arab chronicles as sources Western historians tend to overlook, and explains why she resists calling the Kushites Nubians. Steppe nomads with Kenneth W. Harl, the Middle Ages with Dan Jones and Actium with Barry Strauss fill out the older eras. Then come the swerves. Rick Rubin on creativity, Mike Silver on whether modern boxers could compete with fighters of earlier eras, Carlin's own background in miniature wargaming, a retrospective on Bill Barrett as the voice of his podcasts, even an episode where Jeff Marek turns the tables and interviews Carlin. The solo work has its own flavor. 'So, you say you want a revolution?' repurposes older material on the late 1960s, from a wave of bombings and bomb threats to the Prague Spring and Robert F. Kennedy's run, and sets 1968 beside the present, offering social media as a rough counterpart to the role drugs played then. What comes through across all of it is an interviewer who is plainly a fan, apologizes for hijacking a guest on a pet subject, and then does it anyway.
Made for: Suits a listener drawn to the atomic age, the Pacific war and the ancient world who enjoys hearing a well-read enthusiast question authors directly about their books. It also suits someone who does not mind a conversation bending toward the interviewer's own fascinations.
What sets it apart: Rather than a general history interview show, it is tethered to one project: the questions come from someone who reads the books himself between work on the main series and admits his obsessions openly. That lets a conversation about Truman and Hiroshima share a feed with a boxing argument or a talk with Rick Rubin on creativity.
Interviews, musings and extra material from the makers of Dan Carlin's Hardcore History. If it did not fit in the HH feed it's probably here
Kush or nuclear submarines? Dan Carlin has a conversation for whichever rabbit hole claims your evening.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Marshall's recorded views sharpen the episode's look at firebombing, the atomic bomb, and official moral compromise.
This episode returns to the moral terrain around nuclear weapons by setting the atomic bomb beside the firebombing of Japanese cities at the end of the Second World War.
A thoughtful conversation about Eugene Sledge, combat memory, and the rare language veterans share.
Henry Sledge's conversation with Dan Carlin follows a son trying to make sense of his father, Eugene Sledge, whose memoir and later screen and documentary appearances made him a familiar figure in Pacific War memory.
A clear, compact look at Kush, Egypt, and the labels that can blur northern Sudan's role in the story.
Kushite Conversations gives the host's long-running interest in the kingdom of Kush a clear, contained shape. The episode starts with a guest whose new book takes on African history, then wisely narrows to Kush, Egypt, and the language later used to describe Kushite people.
A practical defense of history, moving from student loans to Jim Crow and the strain of living through change.
History is treated as something useful rather than ornamental: a way to become more adaptable when the world shifts. The point lands because it takes seriously the pressure to tie education to earning power, especially when huge student loans make that pressure hard to dismiss.
A focused, uneasy look at why nuclear submarines became the hardest-to-find arm of the nuclear triad.
The Handmaidens of the Apocalypse keeps its attention on nuclear submarines and their place in the traditional nuclear triad. It draws together Cold War dread, military rivalry, and the fear of missiles already in motion, then settles on the deeper problem of finding a…
Outnumbered units, remembered under fire.
Battle maps, war films, and patient context.
War news, tested against military reality.
Antique European history, read aloud.
Dan Carlin's Hardcore History: Addendum uses Atomic Accountability to revisit Harry Truman, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Alex Wellerstein's The Most Awful Responsibility.
Dan Carlin frames Henry Sledge's book as the missing half of Eugene Sledge's Pacific War memoir, which first became known through With the Old Breed and later documentaries and HBO's The Pacific.
Dan Carlin opens on the ancient kingdom of Kush, saying he has wanted to cover it for years, while Zainab Badawi says her book came from 20 documentary films made across more than 30 African countries.
["Dan Carlin argues that history matters because it shows how variables change outcomes, not because it hands down simple rules like the 1938 Munich appeasement analogy.", "He corrects George Santayana's famous line about remembering the past, saying its real point is memory and retentiveness rather than a slogan about repeating errors.", "The episode turns to 1968 as a mirror for the present, linking Lyndon Johnson's re-election exit, the Vietnam War, and the Tet Offensive to a growing credibility gap.", "Carlin's larger case is that the late 1960s mixed Vietnam deaths, 40,000 bombings or bomb threats, civil-rights conflict, draft resistance, and political assassinations into a period that felt close to revolution."]
Dan Carlin frames Hardcore History Addendum around nuclear weapons, referencing Destroyer of Worlds, Logical Insanity, and Annie Jacobson's Nuclear War, a Scenario.
Dan Carlin introduces a niche episode about boxing, framed through a conversation with former NFL player Russ Francis.
Dan Carlin discusses military aircraft and the role of engineers in warfare, particularly during World War II, with Elon Musk.
Dan Carlin interviews Malcolm Gladwell about his audio book, exploring cultural and societal questions related to World War II.
Dan Carlin introduces the Addendum feed and discusses the WWII naval movie Greyhound, tying it to historical context.
Dan Carlin interviews historian Max Hastings about his new book on the Vietnam War, discussing Hastings' career as a war correspondent and the book's significance.
Dan Carlin introduces a nightmarish historical event, recounting its most disturbing moments and the lasting trauma it caused.
Dan Carlin interviews historian Peter Hart about using personal accounts to enrich World War I storytelling.
Dan Carlin elaborates on his controversial opinion that the WWI German military was superior to the WWII German military, explaining why this view is counterintuitive.