Reagan and Gorbachev:
How the Cold War Ended
by Jack F. Matlock, Jr.
In Reagan and Gorbachev, Jack F. Matlock, Jr., gives an eyewitness account of how the Cold War ended, with humankind declared the winner. As Reagan’s principal adviser on Soviet and European affairs, and later as the U.S. ambassador to the U.S.S.R., Matlock lived history: He was the point person for Reagan’s evolving policy of conciliation toward the Soviet Union. Working from his own papers, recent interviews with major figures, and archival sources both here and abroad, Matlock offers an insider’s perspective on a diplomatic campaign far more sophisticated than previously thought, led by two men of surpassing vision.
“Engrossing …authoritative…a detailed and reliable narrative that future historians will be able to draw on to illuminate on the most dramatic periods in modern history.” Los Angeles Times Book Review
Matlock details how, from the start of his term, Reagan privately pursued improved U.S.—U.S.S.R. relations, while rebuilding America’s military and fighting will in order to confront the Soviet Union while providing bargaining chips. When Gorbachev assumed leadership, however, Reagan and his advisers found a potential partner in the enterprise of peace. At first the two leaders sparred, agreeing on little. Gradually a form of trust emerged, with Gorbachev taking politically risky steps that bore long-term benefits, like the agreement to abolish intermediate-range nuclear missiles and the U.S.S.R.’s significant unilateral troop reductions in 1988.
“Absorbing…The author excels in his descriptions of U.S. policy making, infighting and all, and also in giving the Soviet side of events, basedin part on interviews with Gorbachev and other Kremlin officials.” Business Week
Through his recollections and unparalleled access to the best and latest sources, Matlock describes Reagan’s and Gorbachev’s initial views of each other. We learn how the two prepared for their meetings; we discover that Reagan occasionally wrote to Gorbachev in his own hand, both to personalize the correspondence and to prevent nit-picking by hard-liners in his administration. We also see how the two men were pushed closer together by the unlikeliest characters (Senator Ted Kennedy and François Mitterrand among them) and by the two leaders’ remarkable foreign ministers, George Shultz and Eduard Shevardnadze.
“[Matlock’s] account of Reagan’s achievement as the nation’s diplomat in chief is a public service as well as a contribution to the historical record….It is also corrective, since it debunks much of the hype and spin. … The truth is a better tribute to Reagan than the myth.” Strobe Talbott, The New York Times Book Review
The end of the Cold War is a key event in modern history, one that demanded bold individuals and decisive action. Both epic and intimate, Reagan and Gorbachev will be the standard reference, a work that is critical to our understanding of the present and the past.
Translations
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 Latvian edition |
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Questions Welcome
Questions and comments are welcome from registered participants who have read the book. (I don’t have time to explain again something I have explained in the book.)
Jack. I’m surprised no one has commented on this book yet. Allow me to be the first. I’d like to read that book someday, shame there aren’t any audio formats of your books. Your jerney in the diplomatic field has inspired me to work in international relations my self someday. I admire you as well as other US and Soviet/Russian foreign officials, from Kissinger, Dobrynin, to the Georgian who was Gorbachev’s Secretary of State who’s name I can’t spell. Did you ever have any trouble working with US officials at all during your time as a diplomat?
I am not sure what you mean by “trouble.” We sometimes had differences of opinion in the administration, but that is usually the case in policy making. Big mistakes can be made when there is too much uniformity of thinking. I describe some of the differences in Reagan and Gorbachev . For example, my advice regarding our response to Nick Daniloff’s arrest was different from the policy the State Department followed. So, yes, there were differences, but I would not describe policy disputes as “trouble” unless they become become personal. Debating policy before decisions are made is part of the job, but everyone should be prepared to carry out the president’s decision once it is made.
Jack, do you agree with me when I believe Gorbachev and Medvedev have much in common? ex-lawyers now in politics, and the youngist leaders in office at their peaks of power. Gorbachev was only 54 when he became Soviet leader, and Dmitry Anatolyivich is 44 now.
I’m not sure there is that much similarity. Yes, they are both younger than their predecessors and both were trained in the law, but their style of governance is quite different since the government of the systems they ruled are quite different. Gorbachev rose in the ranks of the Communist Party to become its boss, and used that power to change the system. Medvedev has much less power. He clearly shares it with former president, and current prime minister, Vladimir Putin, and neither is able to exercise the sort of authority the general secretary of the Communist Party could when Gorbachev occupied that office.
So far as his rhetoric is concerned, Medvedev talks about reform more than Putin and repeatedly criticises corruption and the like. But then very little is done. Maybe this is a sign of the limits on his power; it also could be a sign that he is not serious.
Bottom line: Gorbachev did infinitely more to change the system he inherited than Medvedev has done, but the systems are quite different. Many of the freedoms Gorbachev established (such as the freedom to travel and freedom of speech) are still in place. So Russia is not in a need to reform to the same degree the Soviet Union was when Gorbachev came to power in 1985.
Jack. I’m curious. When did you first meet Mikhail Gorbachev, and what were your impressions of him then? Also, did you ever meet Anatoly Dobrinin when you were US ambassador in the Soviet Union?
I first met Gorbachev in 1985, shortly after he became General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (the most powerful Soviet leader). He struck me as vigorous, smart, and quite self-assured. At the time, he still felt that the Communist Party could lead reform in the Soviet Union. He changed his mind later when he ran into opposition to the reforms he considered necessary.
Of course I knew Dobrynin very well. We dealt with him for many years in Washington, where I was at various times director of Soviet Union affairs in the State Department and later special assistant to the president for national security. After I became ambassador I dealt with Dobrynin in Moscow when he returned from Washington to head the Communist Party’s International Affairs Department.
His memoirs are well worth reading, and you will find comments about him in my books.
Jack. I’ve read Dobrynin’s memoirs, very impressive. The guy served as Soviet ambassador to six US Presidents. Anatoly Fyodorivich was one of the best diplomats the Soviet Union had. Shame to hear he past away a few months ago.
Yes, he was a very effective diplomat from the Soviet point of view. But it was a mistake for Kissinger and Nixon to use him as a sole “channel” to the Soviet government. He did not always understand U.S. policies and sometimes (wittingly or unwittingly) misrepresented them to his government. Also, his English was not as good as he thought and he didn’t always get the full meaning of a message if no interpreter was present–and usually there was none.
Which of the two men, Reagan or Gorbachev, do you feel began ending the Cold War?
Reagan’s policy, set forth in his January 1984 speech, established a viable framework of negotiating an end to the Cold War. But other Soviet leaders would not have accepted it. It took both Reagan and Gorbachev to make it work.