That evening, Gorbachev went on television to announce he was leaving his post. He began his December 25 resignation speech by noting that he had stood “firmly…for the preservation of the union state, the unity of the country. Events went a different way. The policy prevailed of dismembering this country and disuniting the state, with which I cannot agree.” He lamented the “breakup” of Soviet “statehood” and “the loss” of, curiously, “a great country.” He also noted, rightly, that his “foremost achievement” was the political and spiritual freedom he brought to Soviet society, and highlighted the “historic significance” of eliminating the totalitarian system and creating a democratic society. He cited two principal reasons for the failure of the Soviet state: the Communist-command economy generally and the “terrible burden of the arms race.”26 The Reagan arms race was indeed devastating.
By resigning as head of the USSR that Christmas Day, Gorbachev also resigned the USSR and provided the time of death of the Communist empire. His peaceful departure reflected the fact that he had no other option, but it was also a sign of his gentleness and unique nature. He was that rarest of Soviet leaders: he walked out of office willingly rather than being carried out horizontally. As Ronald Reagan had frequently emphasized, Gorbachev was a decent man, certainly not a monster like his predecessors.
The symbolism of Gorbachev’s resignation on that special day was rich: The Bolshevik dictatorship, born October 26, 1917, which declared war on Christians and other believers, was ended on the day the world celebrates the birth of Christ. From California, Reagan the Crusader must have relished the spiritual significance of the moment.
THE SDI FACTOR
Soon after Communism’s fall, it became clear that while many of Reagan’s initiatives had contributed to its unraveling, one stood out above them alclass="underline" SDI. It was a point that a number of high-level Soviet officials have verified since the end of the Cold War. Gorbachev Foreign Minister Alexander Bessmertnykh said flatly that programs like SDI “accelerated the decline of the Soviet Union.”27 Ukrainian Alexander Donskiy, a Red Army veteran who served in the prestigious Strategic Rocket Forces division, says that he and many of those who served with him thought that SDI “was possible,” that it could work, and that it “helped destroy the Soviet Union. The economic cost killed us.”28 Vladimir Lukhim, a high-ranking Soviet official, said: “It’s clear that SDI accelerated our catastrophe by at least five years.”29 That is quite a claim to make in regard to a single research program.
Genrikh Trofimenko, head of the Institute for U.S.A. and Canada Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, says that with SDI Reagan merely reacted to a race the Soviets had started, and that Reagan “took up the gauntlet” thrown by Soviet leaders:
So what did President Reagan do, being aware of all this? He said: “If you are that eager to compete, let us then go the whole hog; let’s do whatever one likes best. The United States will continue competition not in offensive ballistic missiles, where you, Soviets, are on par with us. We will move into a realm of strategic missile defense, where we—Americans—have a little bit of something that you, probably, still do not have.” And the whole business of competition, as you know, is to keep ahead. He actually says to Moscow: “You thought you’ve caught up with us in strategic gadgetry and that it is the end of the road. You are wrong—the road is endless. The United States is not defeated. So, let’s have another go at it.”30
Trofimenko says that Reagan responded to the challenge by one-upping the Soviets, with the intent of prompting the USSR to spend itself into oblivion. The USSR, says Trofimenko, did just that. Thus, he asserts, “it was Ronald Reagan who won the Cold War and brought it to an end. That is why the system’s collapse is a clear and definite victory for the West—for President Ronald Reagan, in particular, who raised the cost of potential victory for Moscow so high that it collapsed from the strain.”31
Of course, this was Reagan’s intention. Trofimenko said that SDI “was the most effective single act to bring [Gorbachev] to his senses—to the understanding that he could not win….[H]e had to cry ‘uncle’ and to vie for a peaceful interlude.” It is interesting that Trofimenko used the phrase “cry uncle”—exactly the words Reagan had once written in his diary.32 Trofimenko maintains that “ninety-nine percent of all Russians believe that Reagan won the Cold War because of [his] insistence on SDI.”33
Outside the USSR, there is widespread agreement on SDI’s impact, including from liberals like Strobe Talbott and the toughest Reagan biographers.34 Edmund Morris insists: “And as we all know, the Strategic Defense Initiative was what brought about the final capitulation of the Soviet Union.”35 Agrees Lou Cannon: “SDI turned out to be very useful in getting the Soviets to the bargaining table. Reagan was right.”36 Even Secretary of State George Shultz, who once deemed SDI a form of insanity, later called it “the propellant that would lead the Soviets to agree to deep reductions” in missiles. SDI “in fact proved to be the ultimate bargaining chip,” Shultz writes in his memoirs. “And we played it for all it was worth.”37
Shultz’s words would have thrilled SDI progenitor Edward Teller. When I interviewed Teller as he laid on his deathbed, he kept bringing up the summit meeting in Reykjavik. He understood that SDI prompted Gorbachev’s dramatic offers at Reykjavik, and that Reykjavik was crucial to ending the Cold War. He returned to the point again and again. “I believed then and I believe now that Reagan made a great contribution to stopping Communism in Russia,” said Teller. The Soviets “could not match” the U.S. missile-defense effort; the pursuit of SDI contributed to the Soviet demise. “Without Reagan,” contended Teller in July 2003, “there would be Communism now.”38 This was a sentiment that Margaret Thatcher reiterated when she maintained that SDI turned out to be the single most important decision of Reagan’s presidency.39
Alas, despite the passions of liberals like Ted Kennedy, decisions like the pursuit of SDI and the deployment of INFs made the world a vastly better place—by ultimately cutting, not increasing, nuclear weapons and the risk of war. Eminent Cold War historian John Lewis Gaddis commends the impact of both SDI and the INFs on Soviet behavior and in eventually defusing the Cold War.40 Even liberal Cold War scholar Raymond Garthoff grudgingly concedes that the Reagan military buildup and pursuit of SDI posed a military challenge that the Soviet Union was economically and technologically hard pressed to meet. He concedes that Gorbachev understood that the Soviet Union could not afford to match or overmatch the United States.41
MUTUAL PRAISE: REAGAN AND GORBACHEV
By the start of 1992, even the most recalcitrant Cold Warrior could no longer deny the obvious: the Cold War was over, as one of the two nations in the long battle no longer existed. Now, a second struggle commenced as historians and journalists sought to credit either Reagan or Gorbachev with the Cold War’s demise.
While those partial to Reagan often fault Gorbachev’s role, it is important to recall that Reagan himself repeatedly said that Gorbachev was a “different kind of leader.” He came to view Gorbachev in an endearing way; indeed, as a “friend.”42 He said from the start that Gorbachev “has faith in” and “believes in” Communism and was “totally dedicated to their system.”43 Yet, he learned that Gorbachev was committed to reform and a better world. He nonetheless always insisted on a “trust but verify” relationship—translated into a Russian phrase he repeated so often to Gorbachev that it annoyed the general secretary: dovorey no provorey. Reagan captured Gorbachev quite well when he later summed up in his memoirs: “Whatever his reasons, Gorbachev had the intelligence to admit Communism was not working, the courage to battle for change, and, ultimately, the wisdom to introduce the beginnings of democracy, individual freedom, and free enterprise.”44