Arthur Snell joined the Foreign Office straight out of university and at 23-years-of-age, endured a 'baptism of fire' when he was sent to Zimbabwe as his first posting.

During a turbulent time in that country's troubled past he tells The Hipstorians how he once found himself in the same room as the violent dictator Robert Mugabe.

A fluent Arabic speaker, he would also later serve in Afghanistan, Nigeria, Yemen, the Balkans and Iraq.

The author of 'How Britain Broke the World' he is now a geopolitical consultant and host of the hit podcast Doomsday Watch.

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