next, author and historian simon miles participates in a discussion of his book "engaging the evil empire: washington, moscow, and the beginning of the -- together with changes in soviet diplomatic strategy helped diffuse tensions between the superpowers in the 1980's. this online event was cohosted by the national history center and the wilson, and they provided the video. >> i'm delighted to introduce and moderate today's panel, which will begin the conversation about engaging the people empire --"engaging the evil empire: washington, moscow, and the beginning of the end of a conversation to which we invite all of you, in about 30 to 40 minutes. again, feel free to use the race hand function -- raise hand function. rweekly@historians.org.

start raising your hands if you have a question. it will give us a sense of how many questions are out there. we would like to accommodate as many of you as possible. first up, dr. simon miles, the author of the book. he is assistant professor in the stanford school of public policy at duke university -- sanford school of public policy at duke university. he has published research into diplomatic history, diplomacy, and statecraft. he is the author of the book we will be talking about today, "engaging the evil empire." he heard -- holds a phd. he will talk about his book. we will introduce our distinguished commentators afterwards. simon, to you. simon: thank you so much. it's a real pleasure to be here.

especially here as so much of the historical scholarship that really got me excited about history, that is probably the reason i am a historian, and i will leave it up to the audience to said -- to decide if that's for better or worse. all the work that was being done by those who went before me, it's a real treat to be here with you, especially with mary and elizabeth giving some comments, to which i look forward. this book started for me as a puzzle. this book started for me as a real puzzle. hand, i was very familiar with the kind of cold war story of, i guess we could say, the death of detentes.

afghanistan, the iran hostage crisis, events in latin america spelled, in- they -- end, for many people, on the other hand, i knew very well the story of reagan and gorbachev. reagan had taken to calling him gorby. strolling across what square -- red square. the seeming transformation of the cold war from conflict to cooperation. so much so that i would say that the late 1980's period has become one of the textbook cases of old rivals putting their differences aside. end of the cold war itself is something which strikes me with -- by its rapidity and its unexpectedness.

it is there and then it is gone. howpecially wondered then did we get there. how did we get the end of the cold war story? how do we get there in a way which seems like such a swing, from the end of detente, from the end of u.s.-soviet to collaboration, cooperation between the two superpowers? and in particular, how do we get there during a period during which the story, the conventional story goes the superpowers are not even talking to one another? you have on the one hand reagan, who was maybe too ideologically focused to even talk to the soviets. on the other hand, you have soviet leaders who epitomize the jared tucker c charge -- the jared tucker c -- the

gerontocracy. i went looking for that. i went looking for an uslanation that could tell something more than just the sort of second cold war image of implacable hostility, but that could maybe show us what accounts for this transformation and also maybe prefigure some of the momentous shift that we associate with the process of ending the cold war. i went looking in the archives, the soviet archives, in moscow, the american archives in simi valley and washington, d.c., and out -- the archives of a lot of their allies. one of the elements i'm really proud of about this book is its

incorporation of a variety of perspectives on the cold war and a variety of materials. let me run down the three big things that i found and that i think, in the q&a, we will probably flesh some of these out in greater detail. key to first that the understanding both the speed and the scope of the changes of the late-19 80's lies at the beginning of that decade -- late 1980's lies at the beginning of that decade. balance --two perceived shifts. one perceived as favoring the russians, another the united states. and also a war of words supplemented by back channel dialogue, to one of over summitse in the famous between reagan and gorbachev.

in writing this book, i found these two shifts that explain trends, which are locked-in in the first half of the 1980's and which have such an influence on the latter half of the decade. second, whereas many argued ronald reagan was either kind of a flip-flopper on strategy toward the soviet union -- some people famously argued that reagan had none. some have gone so far to say reagan was too much of a simpleton to have one in the first place. the united states actually implemented a pretty consistent approach to the soviet union, a dual track grand strategy, if you will, which shaped both of those aforementioned processes. wo elements thereof are basically carried and stick -- carrot and stick. there's a lot of back channel negotiating going on between east and west. a lot of deals are being done very quietly, about, for example, human rights issues.

the second element, the stick, is the famous piece through strikes -- peace through strikes. the ideological and political offensive of trying to bring american allies on board with the united states. on the third point, and this is really important to me because of the nature of the book, moscow actually had strategies of its own. the soviet union isn't just being acted upon, but rather it's a pretty active participant in the cold war at this time. even under mikhail gorbachev. not soo present these much as an interregnum, but as a fairly consistent application of tenet in the soviet approach to policy, which is to reduce tensions, reduce cold

war tensions in order to create breathing space for moscow, in order to actually complete -- compete more effectively against the united states. you tosay again, thank everyone in the audience for coming. thank you to everyone for organizing this. i'm really looking forward to talking about this book. >> great. thanks, simon. as mentioned, we have two distinguished, wonderful commentators with us today to start the conversation, elizabeth c. charles and mary sarotte. dr. charles is a historian in the office of the historian at the u.s. state department, researching and compiling the formulations of the united states series. she completed the reagan administration formulations ,olumes on the soviet union

, andto 85 and 1985 to 86 the intermediate nuclear range forces treaty. she is now working on the george w. bush records on the collapse of the state -- soviet union. she has an m.a. in russian history from boston college. she currently serves as president of the society for the history in the federal government. as curriculums and training committee with the national council on public history. sarotte is the inaugural holder of the kravis distinguished professorship of

historical studies at johns hopkins university. most recently, she was the dean's professor of history at university of southern california, usc. she's also a research associate at harvard university. phd in history at yale university. she is the author and editor of the five books, including "the collapse." the struggled to create post-cold war europe." both were selected as "financial times'" books of the year, among other distinctions and awards. following graduate school, mary served as a white house fellow and joined the faculty of the university of cambridge, where she reserved -- received tenure. she is a former humble scholar scholar.ldt

mary, who haswith to park a little early today go and teach -- to part a little early today to go and teach. we will have questions for simon, who will have a chance to immediately respond to the questions. mary, the zoom room is yours. great to have you with us today. mary: excellent. it's an honor and pleasure to acknowledge the work of a brilliant young scholar doing amazing work on the reagan era, which we all really want to understand better, because it is hugely important. i was just casting my eye over the names of people in the audience, and it's a real testimony to your work and its importance. the names of the people who are here, i see just a few who david up, nate jones,

holloway, james mann, william ill, samuel wells -- a very impressive collection of colleagues, editors, participants in events. but the real testimony -- it's a real testimony to your work. it's great to be here today. i recommend you buy the book. you can do it while i'm talking. amazon.diebooks.com or whatever you want. you don't even have to pretend to listen to me because i can't see anybody. i was told to give you a few thoughts, to make sure we get time for the audience. i won't go into any great detail. i blurbed the book. i'm particularly interested to learn about the beginning of the 1980's, because the 1980's are a

janus-faced decade. we start the war with the potential for nuclear conflict and we end with the peaceful collapse of the berlin wall. the first half of the 1980's is very different from the second half. because of the extreme difficulty of working as a scholar at the reagan library, in my view, the first half of the decade is underresearched compared to the second half. i've worked with excellent archivists at the george h.w. bush library, who have bent over backwards to help me with the requests i've been filing since the beginning -- end of the last century. everyone who works in that area knows that there is a large amount of documents out in the public domain. i'm pleased to hear elizabeth charles is working on bringing even more out. whereas the reagan library, not for lack of trying by the staff, eight is muchhe w

more on its function as a museum and as a platform for events than for research. it is fiendishly difficult to work there. it's a credit assignment that he's been able to start getting things -- credit to simon that he's been able to start getting things out. we have good scholarship now on bush. bunch ofy got a documents declassified from the clinton presidential library, most notably transcripts of conversations between clinton and yeltsin. i'm finishing a book manuscript are need expansion -- manuscript on nato expansion. it's great to have simon's book. wonderful to see documentation of this dual track approach, this idea that there was no reagan reversal, because obviously that's a persistent theme, that there was some this complete about-face by president reagan between the first and second term. i will be interested to hear more about that. i was particularly interested to

read where you wrote there was no reagan reversal because i know ambassador matlock, and he has consistently said that, and it's good to see it. i have only the highest regard for ambassador matlock, and it's good to see it confirmed independently by scholars. it's important that the history of these events be written, not just by participants, but also by historians. ahn gaddis has written, participant in events doesn't necessarily have the best you, because your perceptions extend no farther than your own senses. you are down on the ground level, surrounded by people. you obviously know exactly what's going on, but you don't have perspective. it's useful to have a historian's perspective as well. john gaddis has written it is a from a distant hide. you lose detail, but the

perspective is much greater. so, i just have one area i want to zero in on, because it's of interest to me in my current writing on nato expansion in the 1990's. at one point in the book, simon, you talk about page 49 -- about the kremlinways hoped to use the debate over enter immediate range -- intermediate range nuclear forces to -- to play on this tension. of course, the conventional line in germany was a relatively thin line for the soviets to punch through. you wanted those weapons to protect against the soviet union. the tension between the u.s. and nato position that those forces were necessary versus the popularity repulsion at them -- revulsion at

them. this comes up later once the wall comes down, as a why to try to put the brakes on german reunification. down, it isll comes suggested to gorbachev, how about we propose some kind of referendum where we say the germans could have their unification, if they give up the nuclear weapons on their soil, particularly the short-range ones. by then, the inf treaty had come into effect. he thought either the west and helmut kohl would simply not have this referendum at all, which would be a public relations coup for moscow, because moscow could say we are on the side of paying attention to public attention in the west -- public opinion in the west. or there was a chance that moscow's favored side would win. the shorter the range, the debtor the germans. the germans,der why do we want them anyway. i really can't stress this.

the landscape of the 1980's switches in the middle of the decade. early 80's is different from the late-19380's and early-1990's. 2020, butoctober 1, only on twitter. we may have to get that specific. 1980's are not quite that bad, but it is such a rich decade, it's a meaningful difference to work on the early verses the late. -- versus the late. it's great to have some company on the early-1980's. thank you, simon, for writing this book. >> do you want to respond? simon: maybe i will pick up on your point about the quantity of information, right? me's so true that, as ti progresses, the quantity of material that requires declassification grows

logarithmically. once we get into the world of that, i really feel for those whose job it is to do the public's work and to get, that information out including -- to get that information out, including, of course, elizabeth and her colleagues. you mentioned some of the challenges. part of the solution to that was dogged use of mdr requests, to the extent that i could and to the extent that those came in time. i spent five years getting my phd, and that wasn't enough time for a great many of those requests to be completed. and i'm still waiting on some of those, and it's been a couple years since i finished. part of my approach with this book was to try to find backdoors. and, of course, that was

applicable to the russian case, where some of the eastern bloc nations, especially east germany and czechoslovakia and ukraine, provide a real wealth of scholars, material for scholars, who want that eastern bloc perspective, but who may be can't get it in russia. i have to stress that the russian archives right now are extraordinarily open. the amount of material you can get now in moscow is pretty spectacular in terms of things which had been open for only a brief amount of time in the 1990's, were closed down in the years, and-yeltsin have now been opened back up. i certainly made use of some of that in this book. i'm working in those materials now for another project. led me was,at

indeed -- i want to talk about the reversal and then i want to talk about imf, which i think is the other thing mary has charged me with. the reagan reversal story makes a lot of sense, right? because if we focus, as a lot of that he works which put forward this argument -- the key works which put forward this argument did, if we focus on the public elements of this, that's absolutely what you see. you get evil empire speech, mid-1983. late-1982, you have the westminster speech. communism, history. there's a lot of harsh rhetoric. changen it really does quickly. deal with thef reagan reversal thesis is by saying, ok, what else is going on here, what else is actually

happening under the hood, if you will, of american policy. the picture, to me, becomes a lot more complicated. on the one hand, some of the catalysts that have been put forward as having catalyzed this reversal looked different to me using international archival sources. the alleged near miss of nuclear war, for example. also a lot of internal political bureaucratic policy elements. also, what is actually happening. decide, fort just example, in january, 1984, that he wanted to talk to the soviets . he decided that back in the mid-1970's. the same time he was for political reasons lambasting gerald ford for doing it and then lambasting jimmy carter for doing it, he was also saying

publicly that we need to find a way to talk with them and make progress on matters of mutual interest. reagan starts singing this tune in the 1970's. in the 1980's, he starts implementing it quite quickly. in the book, i highlight an episode in berlin where the reagan administration maintains a very sustained back channel dialogue between the u.s. federalor to the republic of germany, west germany, and the soviet ambassador to east germany, to the german democratic republic. the former, reagan's appointee, shows up. he says ronald reagan sent me here to use this as a forum for discussion, for conversation, to try to keep the cold war under control, to keep it cold. reversal, butly a

a shift in emphasis. it's a shift in emphasis from more of the buildup, and it's important to stress here, whatever reagan's land is asian -- reagan's lionization, in 1982, he is not american optimism personified. he is the opposite. he is so pessimistic. the soviets had us beat in strategic arms come people on his team were saying. they've had us beat forever in conventional forces in europe. we are in big trouble here folks. -- here, folks. stagflation, the demoralization of the american public, etc. as the u.s. situation improves, reagan is far more confident and his advisors are more confident. ambassador matlock, who we are privileged to count as a colleague here at duke, but also

george schulz, who pushed this agenda forward of doing more overt, as opposed to covert engagement. that's how i think about it. to me, this is also, if i can say as someone who not only teaches history, but teaches strategy, this is good strategy. good strategy is responsive to changing realities, whether that's at home or abroad. good strategy is interactive, in a sense. what reagan calls quiet diplomacy -- it bears fruit and he keeps doing it. your question about imf and nato, i think, such an because it one, shows how much more is going on in this period than just the superpowers. that is a civil society question, too. early-19cially in the

80's, is an extremely fraught 1980's, is early- an extremely fraught subject. some of the greatest protests are over the imf issue, especially in germany, which is twog to be the home of ballistic missiles. there's questions about whether italy, belgium, the netherlands, will even accept the deployment of nato nuclear weapons on their territory, at that military installation there. this is a whole universe of peace organizations, not only in western europe. there's also a robust east german peace movement. indeed, in western europe, funded in part by the soviet union or by the east germans.

often, the east germans were the conduit for the cash and for the various forms of support, but not made up of communist sympathizers. made up of people who were really worried about inviting nuclear attack on their homes with the presence of these weapons. that's not a uniquely european phenomenon. look at the midwest. the minutemen. that.rs and things like they have great concerns about living next to a giant bull's-eye, so to speak. the soviets see this as a really useful opportunity. that's why they are putting a lot of money and effort into trying to drive a wedge. they can call into question whether or not the military element of the nato alliance, a military alliance, is actually

viable. this strikes a lot of people in the kremlin as a really valuable opportunity to try and call into question some of the ancient, the old cold war issues. will the united states really trade new york preparest? or chicago for -- trade new york for paris? using nato -- imf to break nato is appealing to the soviets. it is cheap in the grand scheme of the ways you can test nato's viability. in november of 1983, there is a big setback for the soviets, as they see it, but it is also a disappointment to a lot of people around eastern europe. around western europe as well. take for example the u.s. in 1983,of grenada

invading a commonwealth country with no notice to the u.k. margaret thatcher starts saying, wait a minute, you are putting nuclear weapons on my territory and if you will do that without giving us a heads up, what are you going to do with those awfully powerful tools? this is a key part of that story. thank you for those questions and for your generous comments. less bring into the conversation. >> thank you. i am pleased to be here and to discuss this amazing book. i know simon has been working on this project for a long time and i cannot talk enough about the , all of archival research the archives you went through, makes this book shine and shows

us what you can do, looking at inhives and digging around places that you may not think you are going to find something allows you to get the nuances of these stories on the superpowers during this period. i do need to start with my arelaimer, these views mine, not of the u.s. government, and my comments are going to be based solely on declassified and publicly available materials. ,ow that that is out of the way like simon, i have worked with these characters and documents and in these archives for far too long and lived with these people and their decision-making and how they work is fascinating , but simon has done us a great service by filling an enormous gap in this literature.

this book starts with gorbachev 1991, howoes to gorbachev's reforms impacted what happened in 1991. as simon shows us with this book , in this period, the current of these events where there. i know well from my work in the whoce with my colleague completed the other reagan volumes, we see the documentation of reagan reaching out, talking to the soviets, trying to open this dialogue, but it is behind the scenes, it is not public. you get rhetoric empire, how the soviet system did not work and would not function.

this is all in public. the behind-the-scenes that shine through in simon's book. , it is in the title, engaging. that was throughout this entire narrative. behind-the-scenes, we see the secretary of state talking to the soviet ambassador. insee ambassador hartman moscow engaging with his soviet counterpart when possible. we see schultz meeting on the , anyes of u.n. meetings other international meetings. they are trying to find a way to communicate, trying to open this dialogue. -- ie of simon's footnotes found it entertaining to put a reminderootnote --

to bush that neither superpower should allow strong rhetoric for domestic consumption to influence international relations. that encapsulates what this book is about. ,n public, we may say things but behind-the-scenes, we are trying to figure out a way to make this relationship more fruitful at engaging with each other. why this is happening is what is important and where simon shines through with his analysis. he explains to us that the soviet union needed the breathing space. analysis of how they were behind-the-scenes running things. i would love for you to talk more about that.

it is how these leaders were making decisions to engage, to give the breathing space they needed, because they recognized that reagan and the u.s. were economically on better footing, so to get where the soviet union needed to be to improve its economic situation, they were going to have to cooperate with the u.s. on, thiset gorbachev changes dramatically and gorbachev is more well-positioned to make this happen. i think simon's book does is put this in a global context. it tells the story of the u.s. and soviets and how they were trying to engage but also talks about the allies on each side, how leaders were meeting with u.s. officials, how u.s. officials were meeting with people and east germany, people were meeting in london, people were trying to talk. i thought it was interesting and i wish we had more of that but i

believe that was an issue of space and try not to write too long a book. i think you do an excellent job of leaving in the dramatic events and issues, especially , the imftumultuous missiles being deployed. side toin it for either keep talking? you dove into that and that is where this book provides an excellent analysis. this has not been studied enough until now. my two questions i will start with, if you mentioned that within each government, the soviet and u.s. governments, there are factions who do not want to engage of the soviets and do not want the soviet leadership to engage with the u.s. this comes out in the book.

i am wondering if you could flesh that out and talk about these sections and how reagan is liketo push down people michalski and weinberger and make them realize that he is serious about talking to the soviets, and the same thing from the soviet side. i think we need to know more about the soviet strategy, what they are trying to do. i think more discussion of that would be interesting. policieshink, what laid the foundation for gorbachev that maybe we under appreciated, that we are not thinking enough about, and did you have one or two ideas that they started that gorbachev was able to deal with? i have more questions but i will stop there for now and just say

that i enjoyed reading this book . usefootnotes and archival is incredible and thank you for writing it, and i will look forward to a discussion with all of these amazing participants. christian: simon? simon: thanks so much. with an eye on the clock, i'm going to not get as full an answer as i could to those excellent questions. let me make the following brief remarks. i too wish that there had been more on the allies in here and in order to scratch that itch, i'm writing an international history of the warsaw pact, but that will be a little bit of time coming, but i'm looking forward to using some of the material that was on the cutting room floor for this project to leastthat project, or at

part of it. issue, this is such an important element, because not only at the time in a lot of government, except for those parts which were intensely butsed on kremlinology, also in the popular perceptions of the soviet union then and now, it is a monolith. even the phrase evil empir emperorthere being an who runs the show. what i found for this period and for so many other people who have done work on the soviet union before me and after me find that it is more complicated than that. can probably answer both your questions by talking

kgbt -- people within the but also within the central committee's international department who had a strong all was not well. byre is a wonderful memoir the head of the analytical section of the kgb who talks , and notections , butprofile defections young kgb officers probably on their first postings who have gone through the ideological vetting, get to the west, then , this is for me. information that a

lot of other people in the leadership are not seeing. this tells me something about where we are. the answer i will give to the policy is the fostering of his coterie -- they called themselves the freethinkers. the creation of an environment in which they could come closer to speaking truth to power than anyone could elsewhere in the soviet union. who is the most famous? gorbachev. with aes into office keen understanding of the full the soviet union's problems, that is why i argue he is willing to go further than anyone else was.

others understand this. i am glad you mentioned the inclusion. one of my mentors as a graduate student always described me as america's preeminent poroshenko revisionist and i don't know he meant it as a come lament. -- a compliment. -- i a lot of interesting would not say policy innovations , because a lot of what he is doing is going back to the playbook, but he is aware of the ways, heand in some turned to older solutions. there is a power struggle going on around him and some of these efforts are confounded. the fact that his kidneys don't confounds some of these efforts. in the united states, george schultz is such a key figure

because he is a skilled political operator, but he can also deliver results. when makowski and weinberger are trying to stymie these efforts, not only can schultz go around in the bureaucratic labeling, but he comes back with a win, he consistently, and that is very meaningful in terms of shaping american policy. so i see those as the key elements here. and shoko does introduce certain economic policies which figure .n some ways given his kgb background, he is more reticent about touching it. gorbachev is an innovator in that regard.

he opens an establishment, a president -- precedent. andropo could say, we need to change this, this is not working , without undermining the system. gorbachev takes that and ones with it and does damage to the system. that is an observation. that is a key element also of that. but thank you for your generous comments and for those questions. christian: thanks so much. we are quickly getting to the q&a session and i do want to give the audience a chance to chime in. i know, mary, you have to run. is there anything on your mind that you would like to ask

simon? otherwise, i will see if elizabeth has another question. i know you have to run. anything urgent? mary: i only wanted to say -- by the way, the photo behind me is the reagan ranch, which i pulled up in honor of professor miles' visit. i would like to encourage everyone to vote. am i allowed to do that? [laughter] christian: is there an election coming up? mary: simon, you have an amazing crowd. i know you have not been able to scroll through the attendees like i have. i think we should go to the audience as soon as possible because there is depth of expertise out there. christian: thanks, mary. elizabeth, i will try to weave you in later in the conversation.

simon, if you could be a little more concise, that would allow us to accommodate more questions. we have focused on making side.able the soviet i would love for you to talk -- you mentioned the u.s. side, the difficulties there. i think it is important for you the russian and other documentation and to what extent it goes beyond what has already been uncovered and published in recent years, especially for the gorbachev period, where we are seeing a lot new work coming out. secondly, if you could talk more

sides, especially the gorbachev factor. the competition, which strikes some people as reductionist interpretation of what gorbachev was about and a qualitative world. withhat the this soviet leader. if you could respond to that, because i think that is one of the major arguments in the book, at least indirectly, that you make. simon: happily, christian. i will try to do so briefly, though you make that hard by asking me to talk about all the wonderful archival materials

under those hospices. let me do my best to answer both in a brief manner. there was an enormous amount of material in russia that i have. the mentioned some of slowness of declassification at the reagan library. there is a lot of material you sideet from the russian from the russian state archive of contemporary history in moscow where the american side is still classified. beumbly submit no one should happy about that status quo. in my interactions with folks in the u.s. government, it is a point i like to make and eyesight the specific episodes -- i cite the specific episodes. my approach was to basically build on a network understanding of how alliances work.

even if you accepted the most top-down interpretations of what the warsaw pact was, and i don't and i try to argue against a lot of that in this book -- in order to tell someone what to do, you still need to tell them what to do. you need to explain what they are supposed to say, supposed to do, supposed to think. that leaves a paper trail. to theves us access thinking in moscow, even if only as distilled and packaged for the consumption of their allies. sometimes, it gives us access to students -- stories that have not been told before. i mentioned the berlin back channel. i have never seen explicit american documents about this. i have seen some materials from papers which, if you know about it, makes more sense in that context, but i have never seen

the american side of this, nor have i seen the russian original side. i came across a purely by all of this in the east german archives translated from russian into german. that is the promise, to me, of this approach to research. as you said, an approach which is so deeply connected to the work that the wilson center and international history project have been doing. for abachev, i could talk long time about this, so let me just make the point -- this might sound cryptic but i don't mean it to be. 1989 is ahev of different gorbachev than the gorbachev of 1985. for better or worse, i think for withr, this book ends gorbachev of needing 85.

-- of 1985. there are evolutions in his thinking. thosed argue that some of have been skillfully packaged in pure,st as being liberal-minded policy shifts, but at the time were very much driven by needs. in particular, the needs for anything approaching a if it was win, even just the successful conclusion of the summit, because things were going poorly at home. almostbachev of 1985 immediately after coming into power excoriates the united states for caring about human rights. i talk about that in the fifth chapter. it jumps off the page. his real -- it jumps off the original pages, i would not say that about my own. key --l frustration with

with hypocrisy about human rights is different from the gorbachev of 1989. that is where i'm going to leave it. thank you. the not a specialist in 1980's, so take this question as an outsider's engagement with your engagement with the subject. correctly, the impression that one gets quite clearly, or at least i got clearly, is that the first half of the decade successfully laid the foundations for american success in the second half of the decade and there is -- a way in which you

portray quite positively the reagan administrations approach -- reagan administration's approach of dealing with the soviets. then there is a paragraph that you have in the introduction about what you don't cover in ,he book and you say that thinking holistically about reagan's foreign policy, moving past the partisan rhetoric, the failings cannot be ignored no matter the success. on there are failings american policy in central america. , thethe contras sandinistas, the human vice violations inside el salvador -- human rights violations in el salvador. could you bring those back into the picture? reagan is pursuing his grand strategy in the first half of the 1980's, he is beginning to

lay waste to central america. if he could bring that into the picture and how does that temper -- if you had twice the number of pages, how would that factor in? simon: it is a critical question and of course, you did not mention this, but there is a conversation to be had on domestic policy as well. i think a lot of this story, holistically, as you rightly say, have to do with ronald reagan's leadership style, or as we can term it, lack thereof. manager.s a bad in can regularly read internal memos, everyone walking out of a meeting believing they had been given the green light to do whatever they want to do by the president.

areh, if you know what they talking about, is impossible because it is predicated on the other when not being allowed to go forward, so people are taking a live license, then we see, for example, the iran-contra scandal, taking a lot of liberties, to put it extremely, extremely mildly. reagan was very focused on the u.s.-soviet question. part of the reason i feel i can get away with this focus is that it mirrors the present and this is the policy issue, the foreign policy issue in particular, which has his fingerprints the most on. is beyond a tragic and itf american policy was allowed to become that by the vicious cycle of a degree of indifference on the part of

reagan, but an overall ideological tenor which he sets which says that fighting communism is a good thing. aides in regional or functional roles say, i want to fight communism and i'm going to do that in latin america because that is my purview. then there is the element of the thinking in athe lot of american government circles at the time, and this is not unique to the reagan administration, that there is more room for maneuver because latin america, the united states ' backyard, the feeling that what is acceptable there -- things are acceptable they are which might not be acceptable elsewhere. in a bigger book, this might feel like a less positive book about the reagan administration

because those failings are serious and they absolutely matter, which is why i try to acknowledge them in the introduction. i am a believer in responsibility in the fact that the person whose name is on the shop bears responsibility, but when it comes to where reagan is involved, on a lot of issues that are not u.s.-soviet relations, he takes a backseat. one of the challenges of writing this book, you look through national security council minutes and the president is almost absent sometimes. it is in other, smaller meetings, the meeting after the meeting, etc., where he makes his views known, and latin just -- this does not excuse anything, but it is one of the cases where you see some of this playing out with

disastrous consequences. thank you for that question. that is an important element. christian: let's go to audience questions. first, i would like to call on an ambassador. please unmute yourself. that was a thought-provoking discussion. i want to make some brief --nts, firstly about [inaudible] the second point, the whole sticksof carrots and

goes back bill before reagan. reagan.back well before thirdly, i think it goes to the question which was mentioned at the beginning, i think that inception the americans had the 1980's was matched among the russians. enough --t [inaudible] the question of how the players perceive the situation as well as what the situation actually

is. [indiscernible] after another saying, this is not working. a lot of people gave sophisticated input trying to deal with the problem of that. so when gorbachev arrived, he was arriving well prepared. [indiscernible] a very stimulating discussion. christian: thanks very much.

simon, would you like to respond to that? --not simon: the point is well taken about this. reagan is not the first person to implement such an approach. your reference is spot on. book, youread the will find the reagan spin on the russianh and on perception, which you rightly raised, is so critical to all of cold war history. christian: let me call next on bill young. hill.t on william please unmute yourself. can you hear me? christian: yes. >> thanks very much for a

fascinating presentation. book, i lookad the forward to going through it. i witnessed a number of the things that you described and analyzed in it from a junior position to be sure. i have one short comment and one question. that thesure non-changing aspects of the background are fully appreciated in more popular histories of the soviet union, in particular before he moved over to the kgb as head of the international department of the central committee, where he has assembled a cast of analysts, many of whom appear later as or -- ass of dislike

architects. youst wonder to what extent dealt with that aspect. i am wondering to what extent personnelhanges in had influence on the direction and development of u.s. policy towards the soviet union. schultz get george until a couple years into the administration. with a chief out national security advisor on and later moved to matlock, quite different and different experiences in dealing with the

soviets. i wonder to what extent that does that. thank you. let me answer as briefly as i can. kgb background, absolutely critical. i ranked that as one of the most important things he does, bringing this coterie around him , which is the kernel of the in 1985 and onwards. and ik that is critical do also agree with you that he is the specter of the kgb. i think it can be overplayed in terms of what is policy views

are. he is the loudest voice against intervention in poland in the 1980's, vice his policies towards prague and hungary. personnel is key and i can talk for a long time about this so i will simply say, the arrival of people like george schultz and matlock who are in step with how reagan thought about the cold war, how he thought about the soviet union is vital in enabling the president and others around him to execute on this strategy successfully. i give a lot of credit to matlock, to george schultz, also to george h w bush, who is a duringvoice in this camp the tough battles, including richard price, who is not totally opposed to this but does not want to go as far as reagan

himself. so thank you for those two points. christian: thank you. if numbers of the audience could introduce themselves briefly by name and affiliation, if you like, that would be helpful. >> my audio is working. thank you for letting me ask a question and thank you for the presentation. i have not read the book yet but i will. i took part in some of the demonstrations you talked about. why did the reagan people choose the back channel diplomacy while using this extreme rhetoric? the arms buildup was another part of that policy, which we saw as dangerous. we, so many in europe and the

u.s., would not want to support the reagan administration and were skeptical of what it wanted to do. through some other things you said, did reagan have this big strategy, that a blueprint to end the cold war? it sounded like you were talking about this, something like a grand strategy. thank you. christian: thank you. question about the grand strategy. someone who teaches a course on grand strategy, i should add a question mark to the title. why choose the quiet diplomacy and overt on diplomatic statements? answer is thesic reagan administration did not feel in the early 1980's that they were in a position that they could turn that diplomacy into success. there is a strong feeling that they don't want to talk for

talking's sake, that they are going to do something big, like a summit, that there needs to be actual results. point,lt that at this they would not be able to get the result that they wanted out of them. the is why they focus on and-raising rhetoric military approach, but that also gives leverage. the investments in things like accurate nuclear missiles, we can see how that benefits the u.s. bargaining position later on in the imf treaty. reagan did not have a blueprint to end the cold war because he did not think it was going to end in his lifetime. at the beginning of his administration, there is a consensus that the soviet union would probably be around for another 60 years.

there was no sense that reagan witnessg to be alive to the end of the soviet union. of course, he was wrong on that. as ar than seeing this blueprint to end the cold war, i would say it was a blueprint to reduce cold war tensions on american terms. american comparative advantage vis-a-vis the strategy -- reducing the levels of nuclear armaments. i described reagan's strong personal views, nuclear abolitionism if you will, which is something he very much wanted to realize.

it is not so much a blueprint to end the cold war or when the war,war, -- win the cold but it is a mindset of how to deal with the challenge posed by the soviet union in ways that favor american interests. thank you for those questions. john.ian: next, we go to i think i am unmuted now. i am trying to figure this out. namepronunciation of nine -- of my name was very good. i am a university professor at the university at chicago and i wanted to ask, what role did the solidarity trade union in the 1980's, what influence did that have on

soviet thinking? christian: thank you. simon: solidarity is a critical element of this history, of course. on one hand, it certainly is to the soviets about the real problems that they have, not only in their own country, but in the warsaw pact about increasing dissatisfaction with the status quo. gorbachev really does not view the warsaw pact leaders fondly at all. at one of their funerals, he brings them together and says, you are basically on your own. we are not going to be intervening. but i would say that the key issue is that it shows the , the many soviet leaders, especially in the

military, look back on the soviet nonintervention at the , thet of people nonintervention in polish affairs is the deathknell. it opens up the range of possibilities for action by a lot of leaders. no one really is willing to go as far as 1989 so quickly, but .t is pivotal degree of can see a the emboldened mint -- based on soviet nonaction. christian: we will go next to james. please unmute yourself. >> there we go.

yes, thank you for the presentation. i wanted to focus on the last year of the administration. you spoke about the evolution of it much as iu see did in my one book on the subject. personnel.ocus on in that last year of the administration by the accounts seniorral people, the officials for the administration are getting together to make decisions without reagan. , he was pastte was the point of being in the system to prevent something from happening. ways, he might be vastly more detached, and on the other hand, you have a vigorous debate

that leads to the paws of the next administration, a vigorous debate on is gorbachev just another soviet leader or does he represent something different? schultz is the plan advocate. do youstion is, how much find that reagan is himself participating in that debate or stealing that debate, or is he leaving it to others? christian: thank you. find a very active reagan on this issue. the of this goes back to comments i made in response to eric's point about the bigger picture and there are a lot of allowshere reagan bureaucrats -- not bureaucrats, they are political appointees -- to exercise initiative with disastrous consequences. so i don't see it as that simple and i would say that the soviet

union issue was to reagan, at this point in particular, when there is a summit on the horizon, the key issue. on the nature of the soviet union, this is one, he is doing what matlock called soviet union 101. he is doing lengthy seminars with discussion papers talking about not just the nature of the new leader but the nature of the soviet union. on the nature of the new leader, reagan writes a memo with his in octobers on this of 1985, he dictates a memo with his thoughts on the matter, in which, again, we see the evolution from 1985 to 1989. they can is saying, the soviets would not have let this guy be in charge if they thought he was going to give away the farm, so

skilledy, he is a political operator within the soviet context and he is cause,ed to the soviet perhaps reagan says the communist cause. so reagan is on the record on this debate and at this point, he is saying, gorbachev, there are some things that make him look more appealing, also things that make them more dangerous. this is a guy who can do pr, who is sort of glamorous but also engaging and personable, which you cannot -- so this isy dangerous. what makes him new makes him a better advocate for his ideology. reagan is very involved in this.

in thistively engaged question, he is producing policy documents on this issue. his views change, though. over the course of the 1980's, his views change on gorbachev. at this early time, he is in the thick of it. christian: i want to give elizabeth a chance. questionsng in two that came to us through the email. ,ne is from philip brown interesting that the archives are open these days, given the example of paul whelan, american president in russia. , a question by brad

morris, how do you evaluate the significance of reagan's attempt to impose sanctions on the western allies regarding the pipeline with the soviets? also, was reagan abandoning this plan? simon: let me answer the first question with a no. unaware of any of bute issues, i have nothing nice things to say about the archivists and other folks at the moscow archives. that being said, i do take care to comply with all the visa rules, etc. fascinating issue, kind of apropos of mary's earlier question about imf because this is a key source of tension where on one hand, you have this -- perhaps as a

canadian -- this typical american actor territoriality -- extra territoriality on the dealings of other countries, which turns around and bites the reagan administration. in particular, margaret thatcher, who is generally perceived as reagan closest ally, she is probably his harshest critic on the siberian pipeline issue. that is another key obstacle to challenge to nato cohesion. for thenot portend well imf issue. on one hand, it is seen as american overreach and to many people, american arrogance, and on the other hand, because the united states can't get its allies on board, and this is frustrating to the reagan , but reagan in

particular backed down to a certain extent on this issue in order to preserve the stability and solidity of the alliance and not subject it to a less necessary stress test than deploying cruise missiles. anystian: elizabeth, follow-up questions, short questions, since we have a number of questions collating? elizabeth: i don't, i'm going to let you keep going with the audience, but i'm apologizing to .imon the documentation in these two volumes will marry well with everything simon has written about and provide more context. look for them soon on the internet. christian: thank you.

question by email. how accurate was the early 1980's cia estimate on the fragility of russia's economy in pushing reagan's economic warfare? did it empower those who believed a resolution of the cold war was possible as opposed to those who thought the ussr would continue for much longer? simon: the issue of the soviet bookmics performance is a in and of itself. one thing i was struck by, especially in the early 1980's, was the sense that capitalism was in crisis, right? that does not mean that people were looking to the soviet union , the soviet model, but there is a great op-ed in the new york 1979 which is called,

japan, return the favor and occupy us. is a lot a publications at this time, including, if you can get your hands on one of the original versions of paul kennedy's book, the cover art tells the story of the united states on the decline and japan coming up behind it. not communism, socialism, but a more significant role for the government in managing the economy was seen by many people as a strength, not as a weakness or liability. a lot of thecolors interpretations of people like they interpret, how they orient themselves through cia estimates, which are story hand telling a bad about the soviet economy, but on

the other hand, ronald reagan is saying, we are in the worst economic disaster this country has seen since the great depression. look back on the late 1980's and think that that is the economic climate, but early 1980's, you are talking about a recession, barely gotten out of stagflation, the memory of panic at the pump is a fresh one, and that is when policymakers read these memos saying things are bad in the soviet union, many are saying camacho, but we think they can recover from that in a way out of recovery -- our economy might not be able to, and things are not so great here. christian: thank you. i want to see if we can get three more questions real quick in one after another and then give simon a final chance to respond before eric will wrap up today's event.

please unmute yourself. brief question. >> hi, everybody. i commented -- thank you for the presentation. it is very much in quincy and with the views that i have about this issue. i have not seen the book yet but i will. i am happy there is a book based .n more documents on other thing is a comment -- [indiscernible]

i perceive the comment as you gorbachev spoke about nonintervention. i don't agree with that if that is your point because my position is different. the summer of 1988 when the soviets gave up the idea of intervention. then the question is about the fbi. ?hat was the role of fbi has been documented for a long time now, how gorbachev was begging reagan to give up on the idea of fbi and reagan said no. appreciate it.

please unmute yourself. a brief question. the book so i want to ask you to talk more about the relationship between reagan's strategy and reagan's doctrine. thank you. christian: thanks. please unmute yourself. george schultz in his memoir said that the day pershing to

arrived in germany was the equivalent of d-day for the reagan administration. one of reagan's iconic moments was what he said in berlin, mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall. this was arguably not a message anmr. gorbachev so much as effort to influence many other audiences, so i would like any comments you would have on the public diplomacy effort during the 1980's to make the imf issue compatible for resolution, given the fact that european governments had assigned on, more or less, to this decision 1979, but they had domestic opposition.

double a public diplomacy on the imf issue. christian: thank you very much. simon,past our time, so a quick response, you probably don't have time to respond to each question individually, and hopefully the conversation continues afterwards. onon: let me briefly say, gorbachev about the eastern block being on their own, i don't think that they necessarily take seriously, the leadership of the warsaw pact countries, but i think gorbachev means it seriously. even get your hands on a copy of the book, you can see the reference to the russian archives where i get this information from. on the economy, it is critical. it is critical because early in

the reagan term, he needs to focus on the economy. that is the big issue. it is not foreign policy. this is something that makes a lot of eastern block policymakers welcome his election, which is a counterintuitive aspect of what we know happens later, but many people in the check slovakian ministry say, he is going to focus on the economy, he is not going to nail us on human rights like jimmy carter. and thatritical economic strength and the recovery emboldens the ship from covert to overt diplomacy, which i talked about earlier. especially public diplomacy, when it comes to imf, it is undeniable that there were not good at it. ,hey sent out william buckley whose job it is to bring everybody on board, and he comes back and he is not persuaded

that he has succeeded. that is not william buckley the conservative pundit, this is a state official. the public diplomacy is not very successful. quietme by a lot of diplomacy especially with u.s. and nato allies, a critical aspect. things to you,y simon, elizabeth, eddie mary. over to eric for final words. thanks to you as well as those posing questions on the audience. announcer: you are watching american history tv all weekend every weekend on c-span3. announcer: on the presidency gwendolyn bought shaw provides an overview of the gallery's