so maggie thatcher was very important to her. she was kind enough to come on our show on msnbc and share her reflections. i did thank her afterwards, and you know, i used to send her flowers and commemorate anniversaries and birthdays. because she was always so kind. and i did receive a beautiful letter from her when i had my cancer experience almost five years ago. and she had been one of the first ladies, you know, not as muchf of a breakthrough as betty ford, so memorably and courageously back in the day, with breast cancer, but nancy reagan had her own experience. and then we also of course shared that moment when ronald reagan had his cancer surgery, and the doctors at nih, we were all out there for a live news conference, and the doctor the head of nih and the cancer institute at nih says the president has cancer. that almost got him fired because nancy reagan and ronald reagan insisted the president no longer had cancer because they had surgery removed the tumors. so there was that side of her, who, you know, she protected

nancy along with maggie thatcher changed history by encouraging the president to negotiate with what he had called the evil empire, the soviet union and mikhail gorbachev. another critical moment, reagan's come back after the iran contra scandal. >> different times in his presidency where he'd gone astray or gotten too near to the edge of the cliff, she pulled him back from the edge of the cliff. >> in the mid '90s, when he revealed he'd been diagnosed with alzheimer's disease, nancy made it her new cause. she became the living symbol of the reagan legacy. >> nancy, let me say thank you for all you do. thank you for your love. and thank you for just being you. [ applause ] >> nancy reagan will be buried the date for the funeral hasn't been announced yet. prior to the funeral, there will be an opportunity for the public to pay their respects. >> reaction is pouring in from here and around the world. president obama and the first lady released a statement about the former first lady's life and legacy, saying in part, we remain grateful for nancy reagan's life, thankful for her guidance

acknowledging the scourge of aids after their friend rock hudson was afflicted.cy reagan, along with maggie thatcher, changed history by encouraging the president to negotiate w had called the evil empire. the soviet union. and its new leader mikhail gorbachev. >> my problem for thefirst few years was they kept dying. >> reporter: their first summit over the objections of the powerful defense secretary caspar er. >> he knew he could do a deal with gorbachev. he just needed to be allowed to do it. and she ran that interference for him. >> reporter: another critical moment. reagan's comeback after the iran-contra scandal. >> different times in his presidency when he'd gone astray or edge of the cliff she pulled him back from the edge of the cliff. >> reporter: tributes today not only from the obamas but from form yes former presidents and first ladies. reagan's vice president george bush and barbara bush writing "nancy reagan was totally devoted to president reagan and we take comfort that they will be reunited once more." jimmy carter and rosalind, who lost the white house to ronald reagan, writing,

his only ally was maggie thatcher, leader in france, socialist, other leaders, pierre trudeau, father of justin trudeau, who is coming for a state visit to washington, the new leader in canada, frustrated with the reagan policies in 1982 and 1983. a summit in 1983 which went very badly in williamsburg, virginia, where reagan hosted the g-7 summit and it was all about missile deployments in europe. and the controversy over whether or not there should be nuclear weapons and there whether or not zero option of anti-nuclear weapons. but the first effort of reagan and gorbachev to start drawing down weapons that began to make europe a safer place, america a safer place and led to better communication and all of the changes we saw in then the soviet union and the eastern bloc. so a major transformation on foreign policies. in other ways she and her husband were more rigid. they had to be dragged into recognizing that in the philippines, fer hand in marco, dictator and his wife, who they got along with very well, were not the future and they had to think about democracy there and it was rich

>> well, my last communication was a public one because i called her when maggie thatcher died. they shared such a love and respect for each other. margaret thatcher was the first to take ronald reagan seriously and she was his partner throughout the very ta'u muchous years when he was isolated from the other foreign leaders in their perspective toward east-west relations and also econom economics. she was very important to her and was kind enough to come on our show on msnbc and share her reflections. i thanked her afterward. i would send her flowers and commemorate anniversary and birthdays because she was always so kind and i did receive a beautiful letter from her when i had my cancer experience almost five years ago. and she had been one of the first ladies, you know, not as much of a breakthrough as betty forward so memorably and courageously back in the day with breast cancer, but nancy reagan had her own experience. and then we also, of course, shared that moment when ronald reagan had his cancer surgery and the doctors at nih were all out for a live news conference and t

. >> how important husband her relationship -- his and her relationship i should say with maggie thatcher? >> well, it was very important. president reagan and prime minister thatcher spoke for each other in international meetings. he oftentimes let margaret thatcher speak for the two of them and then on occasions of course he would speak for the two of them as a leader of the alliance. but he and margaret thatcher were soulmates and they were very, very close to eesm other and close personal friends. >> she was criticized by some for being overprotective. in looking back now and learning how close he came to dying after the assassination attempt in 1981, that really was an outgrowth of the fear that she felt every day that something would happen to him after that, wasn't it? >> well, that's correct. she was fearful of that and i was with her at the hospital during those -- right after the shooting, and she was very, very understandably shaken up. she spent some time in the chapel there praying, and of course president reagan came a lot closer to death than we knew at the time. but it was

to say reagan was isolated among his western allies other than maggie thatcher and his own party whichas divided by this. so all of the future relationships and the fall of the wall and the opening up of the eastern block, that all proceeded from the 1985 gorbachev reagan summit and i don't think that would have happened if she had not been first lady. >> about her relationship with her husband, she was beyond close and protective as a spouse, as first lady but then came the day john hinkley emptied a revolver outside the hilton, the president became closer to death than any of us knew at the time. it took years later to understand how dicy his survival was. from then on she, it seems to me, was in a different role as caregiver. first of all, it was an every day affair never leaving the hospital. it was vital that she be there and then that kind of followed through the rest of his presidency talking about veil of alzheimer's and ending with his death in '04. >> you know, i have been thinking a lot about at assabou i struggled about whether or not he should be released because i knew wh

and the first time with maggie thatcher and all of the leaders, it was that moment he made a privatechancellor cole of germany said we lost a lot of soldiers. would you come to germany? that's the commitment to go to bitburg. when it was advanced by the white house advance team, it was the snows of winter and they did not see the gravestones. they did not see there were ss soldiers buried there as well with the regular german soldiers. so that became hugely consequential and damaging to the early don reagan chief of staff second term white house, but president reagan, even nancy reagan pleaded with them, do not go. the holocaust survivor. and said i made a promise to another head of state and that's when they added a visit to auschwitz to commemorate the holocaust victims as well. so many memories, but peggy newnan and the speech in normandy and after we lost the challenger, that horrible day. he spoke about the loss of our astronauts, including, of course, the civilian, the teacher from new hampshire. you know, brian, this first lady was also, as i was talking to a native, mcbride,