During the Cold War (1948–1989), the Danube River physically connected a politically fractured Europe, flowing through capitalist, non-aligned, and Warsaw Pact states. Its ecological and hydrological realities compelled these ideologically opposed riparian nations to maintain regular dialogue on shared issues like navigation, water quality, energy production and environmental risks. Despite its potential to nuance traditional, rigid bipolar narratives of the era, the Cold War history of Danube management remains almost entirely unaddressed in current scholarship due to the hardships of multi-archival research across numerous borders. FLUIDCURT will fill the gap, delivering the first integrated, multi-archival study of the Danube’s Cold War history. By examining how the river’s natural dynamics shaped international relations, the project aims to integrate non-human actors into Cold War analysis. Moreover, it aims to bridge the historiographical divide between Eastern and Western Europe, and build a unified, pan-European historical narrative not overly influenced by Cold War dichotomies