I suppose WW2 was very much a hot war.
The cold war to me was something I read about in the papers or saw on TV until our little Birmingham forging company was informed by group head office that we had to install a forging plant in the USSR. We were not pleased with the prospect of having to spend weeks in a country we thought was dangerous and had no idea how to train foreign engineers.
After a few weeks with the Russian engineers at our plant they went to their embassy in London for a few days. While they were away two men walked into my office shut the door behind them and said they were from the Police Special Branch and that one of our Russians was involved in 'clandestine' operations. My first reaction was to laugh but they were serious and told me that one of the Russians had made and received phone calls in my office to someone at an address in London and what did I know about it.
We had noticed that one of the Russians was not an engineer and we jokingly assumed he was a KGB man sent to keep watch on the others. He had seemed harmless to us and the only problem we had was the number of times we had to pick him up from the Sutton Coldfield Police to get him back to his hotel at 138, Birmingham Rd. The police often called us late at night to tell us he was drunk and disorderly in Sutton Parade. I could not imagine him carrying out clandestine operations but who knows.
When the time came for my visit to the USSR my wife was very worried and I was not at all happy but I wanted to keep my job. I have tended to give the lighter side of my visit but when the time came for a second urgent visit I purposely made a mess of renewing my passport so could not go.