Duncan Currie: 1989 and All That
[Duncan Currie is deputy managing editor of National Review Online.]
In retrospect, the ending of the Cold War may seem inevitable. Of course the Berlin Wall eventually came down. Of course the long-subjugated peoples of Central and Eastern Europe eventually threw off the shackles of totalitarianism. Of course the chronically dysfunctional Soviet economy eventually plunged into a terminal crisis. Communism depended on lies and terror to survive; it produced miserably poor living standards; and it clashed with the most basic elements of human nature — so of course it was destined to collapse.
Well, not exactly. Communism was always doomed to fail in its stated mission; but the precise timing, circumstances, and nature of its implosion were hardly preordained. “At the beginning of 1989,” notes the eminent Cold War historian John Lewis Gaddis, “the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe seemed as solid as it had been for the past four and a half decades.” (Or almost as solid: Poland had been rocked by a series of massive labor strikes in 1988, but instead of jailing Lech Walesa and the other leaders of the Solidarity trade union, the Communist government was negotiating with them.) Only later did we discover that “the Soviet Union, its empire, its ideology — and therefore the Cold War itself — was a sandpile ready to slide.” The unraveling of Communism was among the most remarkable geopolitical developments the world has ever seen. Twenty years after the Berlin Wall fell, we are still grappling with the significance of what transpired in November 1989.
The end of the Cold War “may well be one of the most misunderstood episodes in all of American history,” wrote the late intellectual historian John Patrick Diggins. Both liberals and conservatives are guilty of promoting overly simplistic narratives about the role played by Ronald Reagan. The latter tend to emphasize Reagan’s first-term hawkishness and tough rhetoric but neglect his crucial second-term diplomacy; the former, meanwhile, have long resisted giving the 40th president his due, though that is slowly changing.
Indeed, a growing number of non-conservative analysts have come to appreciate Reagan’s vital importance. In his 2007 book, Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, and the Making of History, Diggins lauded Reagan as “one of the three great liberators in American history,” along with Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. One might have expected conservatives to welcome such an assessment — except that Diggins rejected the standard conservative narrative of how the Cold War ended. In his view, Reagan brought the superpower conflict to a close “by creating what Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher insisted was the ‘essential trust’ that would be necessary to allow the peaceful exit of the Soviet Union from history.”
Earlier this year, veteran journalist James Mann published The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, another thoughtful effort to counter Reagan mythology and explain the Gipper’s true Cold War legacy. As Mann notes, those who credit the Reagan administration with exhausting the Soviet economy generally point to a host of U.S. actions that strained Moscow’s finances, such as cranking up defense spending, proceeding with the Strategic Defense Initiative, collaborating with the Saudis to reduce global oil prices, limiting Soviet access to high-tech exports, and secretly aiding anti-Communist movements in Poland (Solidarity) and Afghanistan (the mujahedeen). While Mann dismisses the idea that Reagan’s policies caused the Soviet Union to collapse, he acknowledges that some of these policies — particularly covert support for the Afghan mujahedeen — did indeed weaken it.
Popular memories of President Reagan as a hawkish Cold Warrior stem chiefly from his first-term record: predicting that Communism was headed for “the ash heap of history,” rebuffing calls for a nuclear freeze, branding the Soviet Union an “evil empire,” invading Grenada, installing Pershing and cruise missiles in Western Europe. Mann’s book focuses heavily on the period from 1986 to 1988, when Reagan and Soviet boss Mikhail Gorbachev pursued sweeping arms-control negotiations. During those years, prominent Republicans of diverse ideological stripes expressed concern that Reagan had misread Gorbachev and gone perilously soft on the Soviet leader. These critics included Jesse Helms, Dan Quayle, Henry Kissinger, and Richard Nixon. Their anxieties were shared by leading conservative journalists and intellectuals.
Reagan’s appraisal of Gorbachev turned out to be the correct one: Gorbachev really was different from previous Soviet rulers, and he really was committed to transforming Soviet foreign policy. Reagan provided Gorbachev with the “time, latitude, and prestige” he needed to implement his reforms, says Mann. Absent Reagan’s deft diplomacy, Gorbachev might not have had adequate support in Moscow to make such momentous policy changes. Reagan gave Gorbachev “the breathing room he required.” In the end, Gorbachev established a partially liberalized Communist system that was unsustainable. As Mann puts it, “Gorbachev unintentionally destroyed the Soviet system. Reagan gave him the help he needed to do it.”
We should not overstate or misunderstand Gorbachev’s role in the liberation of Central and Eastern Europe. His chief contribution was refusing to suppress the indigenous revolts with violent force. As the unrest stirred, in 1989 and 1990, Gorbachev chose to avoid a replay of Hungary ’56 or Prague ’68. The momentum for liberalization came from the European reformers and activists, who were emboldened by Reagan’s and Thatcher’s democratic evangelism. But Gorbachev made the critical choice not to resuscitate the Brezhnev Doctrine, the longstanding policy that said Moscow would not allow Soviet-bloc countries to leave its sphere of influence.
In his 2005 book, The Cold War, Gaddis points out that the Brezhnev Doctrine had effectively died in 1981, when the Soviets chose not to intervene militarily in Poland. KGB chairman, Politburo member, and future general secretary Yuri Andropov told colleagues that even if the Solidarity movement gained control of Poland, the Kremlin would not dispatch troops. “I think we have reached a unanimous view here on this matter,” said chief Kremlin ideologist Mikhail Suslov, “and there can be no consideration at all of introducing troops.” As Gaddis writes, “Had these conclusions become known at the time, the unraveling of Soviet authority that took place in 1989 might well have occurred eight years earlier.”
Gaddis deems Reagan “one of [America’s] sharpest grand strategists ever.” Mann says he “played a crucial role” in ending the Cold War. Yet Mann remains dubious of the notion that Reagan sought intentionally to bankrupt the Soviet Union, emphasizing that “there is no consensus among Reagan administration officials that such a strategy was ever the driving force behind the American policy.” George Shultz, who served as secretary of state from 1982 to 1989, was asked in a 2000 PBS interview whether Reagan’s military buildup “effectively broke the back of the Russian economy,” and whether this was a “deliberate” U.S. policy objective. “I don’t think it was,” Shultz replied. “The policy was for us to be strong so that no one could contest our allies and us. That was the essence of the matter. And the other side had to respond.” In Shultz’s view, “the most important moment” came when the U.S. and its NATO partners deployed intermediate-range missiles in Western Europe to counter the Soviet Union’s own weaponry.
What if Reagan had decided not to install the missiles? (Their installation spurred massive protests in both the U.S. and Europe, not to mention bitter opposition from the Kremlin.) How would that have affected Soviet policy? What if, a few years later, Reagan had backed away from arms-control talks with Gorbachev? Speaking of Gorbachev, what if he had been deposed by hardliners in, say, 1987? What if those hardliners had sought to revive the Brezhnev Doctrine? What if, alternatively, Gorbachev had embraced the strategy being followed by the Communist Chinese rulers and combined Leninist political controls with capitalist economic reforms? What if Moscow’s European satellites had followed suit?
As for the Berlin Wall, what if Hungary had not removed its barbed-wire fence along the Austrian border (thereby attracting East Germans hoping to emigrate)? What if East German security forces had opened fire on the tens of thousands of demonstrators who gathered in Leipzig one month before the Wall fell? What if famed German conductor Kurt Masur had not joined those demonstrators and helped prevent a violent crackdown? What if a clumsy East German Politburo member had not accidentally given his countrymen the green light to descend on the Wall and seek passage into West Berlin during a fateful November 9 press conference?
To pose these questions is to realize that the Cold War’s end game was not inevitable...
Read entire article at National Review
In retrospect, the ending of the Cold War may seem inevitable. Of course the Berlin Wall eventually came down. Of course the long-subjugated peoples of Central and Eastern Europe eventually threw off the shackles of totalitarianism. Of course the chronically dysfunctional Soviet economy eventually plunged into a terminal crisis. Communism depended on lies and terror to survive; it produced miserably poor living standards; and it clashed with the most basic elements of human nature — so of course it was destined to collapse.
Well, not exactly. Communism was always doomed to fail in its stated mission; but the precise timing, circumstances, and nature of its implosion were hardly preordained. “At the beginning of 1989,” notes the eminent Cold War historian John Lewis Gaddis, “the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe seemed as solid as it had been for the past four and a half decades.” (Or almost as solid: Poland had been rocked by a series of massive labor strikes in 1988, but instead of jailing Lech Walesa and the other leaders of the Solidarity trade union, the Communist government was negotiating with them.) Only later did we discover that “the Soviet Union, its empire, its ideology — and therefore the Cold War itself — was a sandpile ready to slide.” The unraveling of Communism was among the most remarkable geopolitical developments the world has ever seen. Twenty years after the Berlin Wall fell, we are still grappling with the significance of what transpired in November 1989.
The end of the Cold War “may well be one of the most misunderstood episodes in all of American history,” wrote the late intellectual historian John Patrick Diggins. Both liberals and conservatives are guilty of promoting overly simplistic narratives about the role played by Ronald Reagan. The latter tend to emphasize Reagan’s first-term hawkishness and tough rhetoric but neglect his crucial second-term diplomacy; the former, meanwhile, have long resisted giving the 40th president his due, though that is slowly changing.
Indeed, a growing number of non-conservative analysts have come to appreciate Reagan’s vital importance. In his 2007 book, Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, and the Making of History, Diggins lauded Reagan as “one of the three great liberators in American history,” along with Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. One might have expected conservatives to welcome such an assessment — except that Diggins rejected the standard conservative narrative of how the Cold War ended. In his view, Reagan brought the superpower conflict to a close “by creating what Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher insisted was the ‘essential trust’ that would be necessary to allow the peaceful exit of the Soviet Union from history.”
Earlier this year, veteran journalist James Mann published The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, another thoughtful effort to counter Reagan mythology and explain the Gipper’s true Cold War legacy. As Mann notes, those who credit the Reagan administration with exhausting the Soviet economy generally point to a host of U.S. actions that strained Moscow’s finances, such as cranking up defense spending, proceeding with the Strategic Defense Initiative, collaborating with the Saudis to reduce global oil prices, limiting Soviet access to high-tech exports, and secretly aiding anti-Communist movements in Poland (Solidarity) and Afghanistan (the mujahedeen). While Mann dismisses the idea that Reagan’s policies caused the Soviet Union to collapse, he acknowledges that some of these policies — particularly covert support for the Afghan mujahedeen — did indeed weaken it.
Popular memories of President Reagan as a hawkish Cold Warrior stem chiefly from his first-term record: predicting that Communism was headed for “the ash heap of history,” rebuffing calls for a nuclear freeze, branding the Soviet Union an “evil empire,” invading Grenada, installing Pershing and cruise missiles in Western Europe. Mann’s book focuses heavily on the period from 1986 to 1988, when Reagan and Soviet boss Mikhail Gorbachev pursued sweeping arms-control negotiations. During those years, prominent Republicans of diverse ideological stripes expressed concern that Reagan had misread Gorbachev and gone perilously soft on the Soviet leader. These critics included Jesse Helms, Dan Quayle, Henry Kissinger, and Richard Nixon. Their anxieties were shared by leading conservative journalists and intellectuals.
Reagan’s appraisal of Gorbachev turned out to be the correct one: Gorbachev really was different from previous Soviet rulers, and he really was committed to transforming Soviet foreign policy. Reagan provided Gorbachev with the “time, latitude, and prestige” he needed to implement his reforms, says Mann. Absent Reagan’s deft diplomacy, Gorbachev might not have had adequate support in Moscow to make such momentous policy changes. Reagan gave Gorbachev “the breathing room he required.” In the end, Gorbachev established a partially liberalized Communist system that was unsustainable. As Mann puts it, “Gorbachev unintentionally destroyed the Soviet system. Reagan gave him the help he needed to do it.”
We should not overstate or misunderstand Gorbachev’s role in the liberation of Central and Eastern Europe. His chief contribution was refusing to suppress the indigenous revolts with violent force. As the unrest stirred, in 1989 and 1990, Gorbachev chose to avoid a replay of Hungary ’56 or Prague ’68. The momentum for liberalization came from the European reformers and activists, who were emboldened by Reagan’s and Thatcher’s democratic evangelism. But Gorbachev made the critical choice not to resuscitate the Brezhnev Doctrine, the longstanding policy that said Moscow would not allow Soviet-bloc countries to leave its sphere of influence.
In his 2005 book, The Cold War, Gaddis points out that the Brezhnev Doctrine had effectively died in 1981, when the Soviets chose not to intervene militarily in Poland. KGB chairman, Politburo member, and future general secretary Yuri Andropov told colleagues that even if the Solidarity movement gained control of Poland, the Kremlin would not dispatch troops. “I think we have reached a unanimous view here on this matter,” said chief Kremlin ideologist Mikhail Suslov, “and there can be no consideration at all of introducing troops.” As Gaddis writes, “Had these conclusions become known at the time, the unraveling of Soviet authority that took place in 1989 might well have occurred eight years earlier.”
Gaddis deems Reagan “one of [America’s] sharpest grand strategists ever.” Mann says he “played a crucial role” in ending the Cold War. Yet Mann remains dubious of the notion that Reagan sought intentionally to bankrupt the Soviet Union, emphasizing that “there is no consensus among Reagan administration officials that such a strategy was ever the driving force behind the American policy.” George Shultz, who served as secretary of state from 1982 to 1989, was asked in a 2000 PBS interview whether Reagan’s military buildup “effectively broke the back of the Russian economy,” and whether this was a “deliberate” U.S. policy objective. “I don’t think it was,” Shultz replied. “The policy was for us to be strong so that no one could contest our allies and us. That was the essence of the matter. And the other side had to respond.” In Shultz’s view, “the most important moment” came when the U.S. and its NATO partners deployed intermediate-range missiles in Western Europe to counter the Soviet Union’s own weaponry.
What if Reagan had decided not to install the missiles? (Their installation spurred massive protests in both the U.S. and Europe, not to mention bitter opposition from the Kremlin.) How would that have affected Soviet policy? What if, a few years later, Reagan had backed away from arms-control talks with Gorbachev? Speaking of Gorbachev, what if he had been deposed by hardliners in, say, 1987? What if those hardliners had sought to revive the Brezhnev Doctrine? What if, alternatively, Gorbachev had embraced the strategy being followed by the Communist Chinese rulers and combined Leninist political controls with capitalist economic reforms? What if Moscow’s European satellites had followed suit?
As for the Berlin Wall, what if Hungary had not removed its barbed-wire fence along the Austrian border (thereby attracting East Germans hoping to emigrate)? What if East German security forces had opened fire on the tens of thousands of demonstrators who gathered in Leipzig one month before the Wall fell? What if famed German conductor Kurt Masur had not joined those demonstrators and helped prevent a violent crackdown? What if a clumsy East German Politburo member had not accidentally given his countrymen the green light to descend on the Wall and seek passage into West Berlin during a fateful November 9 press conference?
To pose these questions is to realize that the Cold War’s end game was not inevitable...