i would also mentioned george shultz, the foreign ministers. neither of them could have done it without that sort of support but the fact is that the united states needed someone with the confidence of the right wing to make a deal with the soviet union if any was going to be made that was going to be politically defensible. not that there was no democrat. they couldn't have thought this was a dumb idea. most of them probably did and i will save for the democrats they supported us every way as we were going toward the soviet union. >> so much on deployment. remember the nuclear freeze moment? >> i am talking about when we got the treaty. and then i would also say in the case of the soviets none of gorbachev's successes would have been capable of doing what he did to change policy to understand the degree to which predecessors' policies were not in the interests of the soviet union. that took gorbachev and it also took the very improbable soviet leader who would risk his own position in order to try to do what machiavelli said is impossible, to

he knew what he was doing and george shultz and he worked very closely on this. sdi was the reason there could not be more agreement columnists, approach the united states in spring of 1987 to say it has to be global, nothing else. with respect to short-range missiles, which had not really been part of the discussion. we had not come not come a day at sun. they would agree to zero short-range missiles, which is an incredible announcement from the soviet side produced a 00 prospect in the spring of 1987. >> thank you very much. wonderful presentation. jack matlock, were you in moscow during this whole time? >> disappeared from 85 to 87? >> now, i was in washington and in reykjavÍk in geneva. >> working very much on the reagan stuff. >> trying to figure out what the russians were up to. >> from your point of view as a russian expert, what was going on in the russian mind as all this is taking place? was the importance of the gorbachev as the soviet union? >> there are a number of very important questions out there. i think we understand in retrospect is usually muc

from bud mcfarland, who was one of his foreign-policy advisers. >> guest: in the foreword that george shultz wrote. c-span: yeah. he--this is a quote from bud mcfarland: "he knows so little and accomplishes so much." what's the--what's the origin of that s--that statement? >> guest: secretary shultz wrote the foreword to--to this book, and--and--and that was wonderful for us, because he was by reagan's side for six and a half years and for one of the most important events of the 20th century: the beginning of the end of the cold war. and so, shultz wrote that himself and--from a meeting--they came out of a white house meeting with reagan, and--and i guess mcfarland was shaking his head and--or was just surprised at how much reagan accomplishes. i think this book explains why they're so much surprise, the fact that reagan was associated with big outcomes, like the end of the cold war. reagan wrote privately and he never talked about it. he thought and he read privately and he didn't try to expose it. he never told people that he'd done all of this work before the presidency. and if you look a

george shultz as secretary of state -- had been suggested for approximately a month.e came from the state department, ma someone who was well versed in economics in business. he wasn't somebody that paid attention to strategic nuclear balance. and he, i got a call. paul was coming and have lunch, when i come to lunch on the seventh floor. and i went to the lunch, and paul then briefed secretary schultz on his informal chat with a russian ambassador on their proposed arms control. which would have led to lower levels of deployment. not a zero option to lower levels of deployment. but would not have involved persian to missile battle. that was absolutely zeroed out. the big problem, when i listen to this is the secret of our success, getting the missiles in. the fact that our ambassador had gone off -- without telling any of them, and giving them a sense of ownership, it was very dangerous to the reason he didn't go off the road was the russians stupidly turned down that deal. they could have stopped deployment in our tracks. finally, just one other quick anecdote. we d

george shultz and understood as few others can -- since.george shultz and understood -- even if he could not have predicted the place of the treasury department occupies in america's national security architecture. god they will work to advance our national security interests -- today we work to a dance our national security interests by systematically undermine the financial strength of those who threaten our national security. while my colleagues in the treasury department are hard at work preparing our economy, laying the foundation for sustained and balanced growth and job creation here at home and working to create an mitigate financial instability abroad, we are focused on leveraging the unique powers and status that comes from being firmly rooted in the united states department of the treasury to combat illicit finance and promote financial integrity. all in the service of key u.s. foreign-policy and national- security objectives. no other finance ministry in the world houses and operation quite like tfi, one that uses policy making,

has a hero of mine, and also of course walter cronkite who is a hero in a lot of other ways and george shultz, like to say, the former secretary of state for ronald reagan, no-man's liberal but you get those folks together to agree on anything and it's pretty impressive. >> you also have another book out and this is another new one? what is this one? >> it is a handbook of solutions to america's problems and there really are resolutions to these problems. and honestly i wrote this without having any intentions or thoughts of being involved in another political campaign. but it talks about health care, education, the policy of capital punishment, which regardless of your philosophy isn't working. getting into responsible criminal-justice issues and rehabilitation, that sort of thing. i even recommended going on the metric system which is certainly something else and you said i'm running for vice president with governor gary johnson. it's amazing because she from a totally different perspective has come out to pretty much the same analysis that i have on all these important issues like educatio