Tag: mikhail gorbachev

Revealed – The Gorbachev File by the NSA – TOP SECRET

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(L to R) Vice President George H. W. Bush, President Ronald Reagan and President Mikhail Gorbachev during the Governor’s Island summit, December 1988. (Credit: Ronald Reagan Presidential Library)

Marking the 85thbirthday of former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, the National Security Archive at George Washington University (www.nsarchive.org) today posted a series of previously classified British and American documents containing Western assessments of Gorbachev starting before he took office in March 1985, and continuing through the end of the Soviet Union in 1991.

The documents show that conservative British politicians were ahead of the curve predicting great things for rising Soviet star Gorbachev in 1984 and 1985, but the CIA soon caught on, describing the new Soviet leader only three months into his tenure as “the new broom,” while Ronald Reagan greeted Gorbachev’s ascension with an immediate invitation for a summit. The documents posted today include positive early assessments by Margaret Thatcher and MP John Browne, CIA intelligence reports that bookend Gorbachev’s tenure from 1985 to 1991, the first letters exchanged by Reagan and Gorbachev, the American versions of key conversations with Gorbachev at the Geneva, Reykjavik and Malta summits, German chancellor Helmut Kohl’s credit to Gorbachev in 1989 for the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War, and the U.S. transcript of the G-7 summit in 1990 that turned down Gorbachev’s request for financial aid.

The Archive gathered the Gorbachev documentation for two books, the Link-Kuehl-Award-winning “Masterpieces of History”: The Peaceful End of the Cold War in Europe 1989 (Central European University Press, 2010), and the forthcoming Last Superpower Summits: Gorbachev, Reagan and Bush (CEU Press, 2016). The sources include the Margaret Thatcher Foundation, the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library, and Freedom of Information and Mandatory Declassification Review requests to the CIA and the State Department.

Leading today’s Gorbachev briefing book is British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s “discovery” of Gorbachev in December 1984 during his trip to Britain as head of a Soviet parliamentary delegation. In contrast to his elderly and infirm predecessors who slowly read dry notes prepared for them, Gorbachev launched into animated free discussion and left an indelible impression on Lady Thatcher. The Prime Minister, charmed by the Soviet leader, quickly shared her impressions with her closest ally and friend, Ronald Reagan. She commented famously, “I like Mr. Gorbachev. We can do business together.”


Alexander Yakovlev, Mikhail Gorbachev, Eduard Shevardnadze walking in the Kremlin, 1989 (personal archive of Anatoly Chernyaev)

Soon after Gorbachev became the Soviet General Secretary, a Conservative member of the British parliament, John Browne, who observed Gorbachev during his visit to Britain and then followed information on Gorbachev’s every early step, compared him to “Kennedy in the Kremlin” in terms of his charisma. By June 1985, the CIA told senior U.S. officials in a classified assessment that Gorbachev was “the new broom” that was attempting to clean up the years of debris that accumulated in the Soviet Union during the era of stagnation.

But Reagan had to see for himself. For four years before Gorbachev, as the American president complained in his diary, he had been trying to meet with a Soviet leader face to face, but “they keep dying on me.” In his first letter to Gorbachev, which Vice President George H.W. Bush carried to Moscow for the funeral of Gorbachev’s predecessor, Reagan invited Gorbachev to meet. Gorbachev and Reagan became pen-pals who wrote long letters – sometimes personally dictated, even handwritten – explaining their positions on arms control, strategic defenses, and the need for nuclear abolition.

Their first meeting took place in Geneva in November 1985, where in an informal atmosphere of “fireside chats” they began realizing that the other was not a warmonger but a human being with a very similar dream—to rid the world of nuclear weapons. That dream came very close to a breakthrough during Gorbachev and Reagan’s summit in Reykjavik; but Reagan’s stubborn insistence on SDI and Gorbachev’s stubborn unwillingness to take Reagan at his word on technology sharing prevented them from reaching their common goal.

Through a series of unprecedented superpower summits, Gorbachev made Reagan and Bush understand that the Soviet leader was serious about transforming his country not to threaten others, but to help its own citizens live fuller and happier lives, and to be fully integrated into the “family of nations.” Gorbachev also learned from his foreign counterparts, establishing a kind of peer group with France’s Mitterrand, Germany’s Kohl, Britain’s Thatcher, and Spain’s Gonzalez, which developed his reformist positions further and further. By the time George H.W. Bush as president finally met Gorbachev in Malta, the Soviet Union was having free elections, freedom of speech was blossoming, velvet revolutions had brought reformers to power in Eastern Europe, and the Berlin Wall had fallen to cheers of citizens but severe anxieties in other world capitals.

German Chancellor Helmut Kohl wrote in his letter to Bush at the end of November 1989: “Regarding the reform process in Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, the CSSR [Czechoslovakia], and not least the GDR [East Germany], we have General Secretary Gorbachev’s policies to thank. His perestroika has let loose, made easier, or accelerated these reforms. He pushed governments unwilling to make reforms toward openness and toward acceptance of the people’s wishes; and he accepted developments that in some instances far surpassed the Soviet Union’s own standards.”

In 1989, the dream of what Gorbachev called “the common European home” was in the air and Gorbachev was the most popular politician in the world. When he was faced with discontent and opposition in his country, he refused to use force, like his Chinese neighbors did at Tiananmen Square. And yet, the West consistently applied harsher standards to Gorbachev’s Soviet Union than to China, resulting in feet dragging on financial aid, credits, and trade. As Francois Mitterrand pointed out during the G-7 summit in Houston in 1990: “the argument put forth for helping China is just the reverse when we are dealing with the USSR. We are too timid […] regarding aid to the USSR. […].”

What Gorbachev started in March 1985 made his country and the world better. In cooperation with Reagan and Bush, he ended the Cold War, pulled Soviet troops out of Afghanistan, helped resolve local conflicts around the globe, and gave Russia the hope and the opportunity to develop as a normal democratic country. As with many great reformers, he did not achieve everything he was striving for – he certainly never intended for the Soviet Union to collapse – but his glasnost, his non-violence, and his “new thinking” for an interdependent world created a legacy that few statesmen or women can match. Happy birthday, Mikhail Sergeyevich!

READ THE DOCUMENTS

Document-01
Memorandum of Conversation between Mikhail Gorbachev and Margaret Thatcher. December 16, 1984, Chequers.
1984-12-16
This face-to-face encounter between British Prime Minister and the leader of a Soviet parliamentary delegation produced a conversation that both Thatcher and Gorbachev would refer to many times in the future. Gorbachev engaged Thatcher on all the issues that she raised, did not duck hard questions, but did not appear combative. He spoke about the low point then evident in East-West relations and the need to stop the arms race before it was too late. He especially expressed himself strongly against the Strategic Defense Initiative promoted by the Reagan administration. Soon after this conversation Thatcher flew to Washington to share her enthusiastic assessment with Gorbachev with Reagan and encourage him to engage the Soviet leader in trying to lower the East-West tensions. She told her friend and ally what she had told the BBC, “I like Mr. Gorbachev. We can do business together” – and described him to Reagan as an “unusual Russian…. [m]uch less constrained, more charming,” and not defensive in the usual Soviet way about human rights.
Document-02
Letter from Reagan to Gorbachev. March 11, 1985
1985-03-11
Vice President George H.W. Bush hand delivered this first letter from President Reagan to the new leader of the Soviet Union, after the state funeral for Konstantin Chernenko in March 1985 (“you die, I fly” as Bush memorably remarked about his job as the ceremonial U.S. mourner for world leaders). The letter contains two especially noteworthy passages, one inviting Mikhail Gorbachev to come to Washington for a summit, and the second expressing Reagan’s hope that arms control negotiations “provide us with a genuine chance to make progress toward our common ultimate goal of eliminating nuclear weapons.” Reagan is reaching for a pen-pal, just as he did as early as 1981, when he hand-wrote a heartfelt letter during his recovery from an assassination attempt, to then-General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev suggesting face-to-face meetings and referring to the existential danger of nuclear weapons – only to get a formalistic reply. Subsequent letters between Reagan and the whole series of Soviet leaders (“they keep dying on me,” Reagan complained) contain extensive language on many of the themes – such as the ultimate threat of nuclear annihilation – that would come up over and over again when Reagan finally found a partner on the Soviet side in Gorbachev. Even Chernenko had received a hand-written add-on by Reagan appreciating Soviet losses in World War II and crediting Moscow with a consequent aversion to war.
Document-03
Gorbachev Letter to Reagan, March 24, 1985
1985-03-24
This lengthy first letter from the new Soviet General Secretary to the U.S. President displays Gorbachev’s characteristic verbal style with an emphasis on persuasion. The Soviet leader eagerly takes on the new mode of communication proposed by Reagan in his March 11 letter, and plunges into a voluminous and wide-ranging correspondence between the two leaders – often quite formal and stiff, occasionally very personal and expressive, and always designed for effect, such as when Reagan would laboriously copy out by hand his official texts. Here Gorbachev emphasizes the need to improve relations between the two countries on the basis of peaceful competition and respect for each other’s economic and social choices. He notes the responsibility of the two superpowers for world peace, and their common interest “not to let things come to the outbreak of nuclear war, which would inevitably have catastrophic consequences for both sides.” Underscoring the importance of building trust, the Soviet leader accepts Reagan’s invitation in the March 11 letter to visit at the highest level and proposes that such a visit should “not necessarily be concluded by signing some major documents.” Rather, “it should be a meeting to search for mutual understanding.”
Document-04
Reagan Letter to Gorbachev. April 30, 1985
1985-04-30
Perhaps as a reflection of the internal debates in Washington (and even in Reagan’s own head), it would take more than a month for the administration to produce a detailed response to Gorbachev’s March 24 letter. The first two pages rehash the issues around the tragic killing of American Major Arthur Nicholson by a Soviet guard, before moving to the sore subject of Afghanistan. Reagan vows, “I am prepared to work with you to move the region toward peace, if you desire”; at the same time, U.S. and Saudi aid to the mujahedin fighting the Soviets was rapidly expanding. Reagan objects to Gorbachev’s unilateral April 7 announcement of a moratorium on deployment of intermediate-range missiles in Europe, since the Soviet deployment was largely complete while NATO’s was still underway. The heart of the letter addresses Gorbachev’s objections to SDI, and Reagan mentions that he was struck by Gorbachev’s characterization of SDI as having “an offensive purpose for an attack on the Soviet Union. I can assure you that you are profoundly mistaken on this point.” Interestingly, the Reagan letter tries to reassure Gorbachev by citing the necessity of “some years of further research” and “further years” before deployment (Reagan could not have suspected decades rather than years). This back-and-forth on SDI would be a constant in the two leaders’ correspondence and conversations at the summits to come, but the consistency of Reagan’s position on this (in contrast to that of Pentagon advocates of “space dominance”), not only to Gorbachev but to Thatcher and to his own staff, suggests some room for Gorbachev to take up the President on his assurances – which never happened.
Document-05
“Mr. Gorbachev-a Kennedy in the Kremlin?” By John Browne (Member of Parliament from Winchester, England). Impressions of the Man, His Style and his Likely Impact Upon East West Relations. May 20, 1985.
1985-05-20
British MP John Browne, member of the Conservative party, was part of the Receiving Committee for Gorbachev’s visit to London in December 1984 and spend considerable time with him during his trips (including to the Lenin museum). This long essay, sent to President Reagan, and summarized for him by his National Security Adviser, describes Gorbachev as an unusual Soviet politician-“intelligent, alert and inquisitive.” Browne notes “that Gorbachev’s charisma was so striking that, if permitted by the Communist Party system, Mr. and Mrs. Gorbachev could well become the Soviet equivalent of the Jack and Jacqueline Kennedy team.” On the basis of his observations in 1984 and after Gorbachev was elected General Secretary, Browne concludes that politicians of Western democracies are likely to face an increasingly sophisticated political challenge from Mr. Gorbachev both at home and abroad.
Document-06
Letter from Gorbachev to Reagan. June 10, 1985
1985-06-10
In this long and wide-ranging response to Reagan’s letter of April 30, the Soviet leader makes a real push for improvement of relations on numerous issues. The date June 10 is significant because on this day in Washington Reagan finally took the action (deactivating a Poseidon submarine) necessary to keep the U.S. in compliance with the unratified (but observed by both sides) SALT II treaty. Here Gorbachev raises the issue of equality and reciprocity in U.S.-Soviet relations, noting that it is the Soviet Union that is “surrounded by American military bases stuffed also by nuclear weapons, rather than the U.S. – by Soviet bases.” He suggests that all previous important treaties between the United States and the Soviet Union were possible on the assumption of parity, and that Reagan’s recent focus on SDI threatens to destabilize the strategic balance – yet again demonstrating Gorbachev’s deep apprehension about Reagan’s position on strategic defenses. The Soviet leader believes that the development of ABM systems would lead to a radical destabilization of the situation and the militarization of space. At the heart of the Soviet visceral rejection of SDI is the image of “attack space weapons capable of performing purely offensive missions.” Gorbachev proposes energizing negotiations on conventional weapons in Europe, chemical weapons, the nuclear test ban, and regional issues, especially Afghanistan. He calls for a moratorium on nuclear tests “as soon as possible” – the Soviets would end up doing this unilaterally, never understanding that the issue is a non-starter in Reagan’s eyes. Here, the Soviet leader also welcomes horizontal exchanges between government ministers and even members of legislatures. However, Gorbachev’s position on human rights remains quite rigid-“we do not intend and will not conduct any negotiations relating to human rights in the Soviet Union.” That would change.
Document-07
Dinner Hosted by the Gorbachevs in Geneva. November 19, 1985.
1985-11-19
In their first face-to-face meeting at Geneva, which both of them anticipated eagerly, Reagan and Gorbachev both spoke about the mistrust and suspicions of the past and of the need to begin a new stage in U.S.-Soviet relations. Gorbachev described his view of the international situation to Reagan, stressing the need to end the arms race. Reagan expressed his concern with Soviet activity in the third world–helping the socialist revolutions in the developing countries. They both spoke about their aversion to nuclear weapons. During this first dinner of the Geneva summit, Gorbachev used a quote from the Bible that there was a time to throw stones and a time to gather stones which have been cast in the past to indicate that now the President and he should move to resolve their practical disagreements in the last day of meetings remaining. In response, Reagan remarked that “if the people of the world were to find out that there was some alien life form that was going to attack the Earth approaching on Halley’s Comet, then that knowledge would unite all peoples of the world.” The aliens had landed, in Reagan’s view, in the form of nuclear weapons; and Gorbachev would remember this phrase, quoting it directly in his famous “new thinking” speech at the 27th Party Congress in February 1986.
Document-08
Last Session of the Reykjavik Summit. October 12, 1986.
1986-10-12
The last session at Reykjavik is the one that inspires Gorbachev’s comment in his memoirs about “Shakespearean passions.” The transcript shows lots of confusion between just proposals on reducing ballistic missiles versus those reducing all nuclear weapons, but finally Reagan says, as he always wanted, nuclear abolition. “We can do that. Let’s eliminate them,” says Gorbachev, and Secretary of State George Shultz reinforces, “Let’s do it.” But then they circle back around to SDI and the ABM Treaty issue, and Gorbachev insists on the word “laboratory” as in testing confined there, and Reagan, already hostile to the ABM Treaty, keeps seeing that as giving up SDI. Gorbachev says he cannot go back to Moscow to say he let testing go on outside the lab, which could lead to a functioning system in the future. The transcript shows Reagan asking Gorbachev for agreement as a personal favor, and Gorbachev saying well if that was about agriculture, maybe, but this is fundamental national security. Finally at around 6:30 p.m. Reagan closes his briefing book and stands up. The American and the Russian transcripts differ on the last words, the Russian version has more detail [see the forthcoming book, Last Superpower Summits], but the sense is the same. Their faces reflect the disappointment, Gorbachev had helped Reagan to say nyet, but Gorbachev probably lost more from the failure.
Document-09
Letter to Reagan from Thatcher About Her Meetings with Gorbachev in Moscow. April 1, 1987
1987-04-01
Again, Margaret Thatcher informs her ally Reagan about her conversations with Gorbachev. The cover note from National Security Advisor Carlucci (prepared by NSC staffer Fritz Ermarth) states that “she has been greatly impressed by Gorbachev personally.” Thatcher describes Gorbachev as “fully in charge,” “determined to press ahead with his internal reform,” and “talk[ing] about his aims with almost messianic fervor.” She believes in the seriousness of his reformist thinking and wants to support him. However, they differ on one most crucial issue, which actually unites Gorbachev and Reagan-nuclear abolition. Thatcher writes, “[h]is aim is patently the denuclearization of Europe. I left him with no doubt that I would never accept that.”
Document-10
Letter to Bush from Chancellor Helmut Kohl. November 28, 1989.
1989-11-28
This remarkable letter arrives at the White House at the very moment when Kohl is presenting his “10 points” speech to the Bundestag about future German unification, much to the surprise of the White House, the Kremlin, and even Kohl’s own coalition partners in Germany (such as his foreign minister). Here, just weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the German leader encourages Bush to engage with Gorbachev across the board and to contribute to peaceful change in Europe. Kohl points that Gorbachev “wants to continue his policies resolutely, consistently and dynamically, but is meeting internal resistance and is dependent on external support.” He hopes Bush’s upcoming meeting with Gorbachev in Malta will “give strong stimulus to the arms control negotiations.” Kohl also reminds Bush that “regarding the reform process in Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, the CSSR [Czechoslovakia], and not least the GDR [East Germany], we have General Secretary Gorbachev’s policies to thank. His perestroika has let loose, made easier, or accelerated these reforms. He pushed governments unwilling to make reforms toward openness and toward acceptance of the people’s wishes; and he accepted developments that in some instances far surpassed the Soviet Union’s own standards.”
Document-11
Malta First Expanded Bilateral with George Bush. December 2, 1989.
1989-12-02
Being rocked by the waves on the Soviet ship Maxim Gorky, President Bush greets his Russian counterpart for the first time as President. A lot has changed in the world since they last saw each other on Governor’s Island in December 1988-elections had been held in the Soviet Union and in Poland, where a non-communist government came to power, and the Iron Curtain fell together with the Berlin Wall. After Bush’s initial presentation from notes, Gorbachev remarks almost bemusedly that now he sees the American administration has made up its mind (finally) what to do, and that includes “specific steps” or at least “plans for such steps” to support perestroika, not to doubt it. Gorbachev compliments Bush for not sharing the old Cold War thinking that “The only thing the U.S. needs to do is to keep its baskets ready to gather the fruit” from the changes in Eastern Europe and the USSR. Bush responds, “I have been called cautious or timid. I am cautious, but not timid. But I have conducted myself in ways not to complicate your life. That’s why I have not jumped up and down on the Berlin Wall.” Gorbachev says, “Yes, we have seen that, and appreciate that.” The Soviet leader goes on to welcome Bush’s economic and trade points as a “signal of a new U.S. policy” that U.S. business was waiting for. Gorbachev responds positively to each of Bush’s overtures on arms control, chemical weapons, conventional forces, next summits and so forth, but pushes back on Bush’s Cuba and Central America obsessions.
Document-12
First Main Plenary of the G-7 Summit in Houston. July 10, 1990.
1990-07-10
The bulk of discussion at this first session of the summit of the industrialized nations is devoted to the issue of how the club of the rich countries should react to the events unfolding in the Soviet Union and how much aid and investment could be directed to the support of perestroika. The summit is taking place at the time when Gorbachev is engaged in an increasingly desperate search for scenarios for radical economic reform, and fast political democratization, but he needs external financial support and integration into global financial institutions in order to succeed – or even to survive, as the events of August 1991 would show. Just before this 1990 G-7, Gorbachev wrote in a letter to George Bush that he needs “long-term credit assistance, attraction of foreign capital, transfer of managerial experience and personnel training” to create a competitive economy. Yet, the U.S. president throws only a bone or two, like “step up the pace of our negotiations with the Soviets on the Tsarist and Kerensky debts [!] to the U.S. government” (instead of forgiving or at least restructuring the debt), and “expand our existing technical cooperation.” Bush concludes his speech by stating flatly “It is impossible for the U.S. to loan money to the USSR at this time. I know, however, that others won’t agree.” The leaders who do not agree are Helmut Kohl (in the middle of providing billions of deutschmarks to the USSR to lubricate German unification) and Francois Mitterrand. The latter decries the double standards being applied to the Soviet Union and China, even after the Tiananmen massacre. Mitterrand criticizes the proposed political declaration of the G-7 as “timid” and “hesitant,” imposing “harsh political conditions as a preliminary to extending aid.” He believes the EC countries are in favor of contributing aid to the USSR but that other members, like the U.S. and Japan, have effectively vetoed such assistance.
Document-13
CIA Memorandum, The Gorbachev Succession. April 1991.
1991-04-00
On April 10, 1991, the National Security Council staff asked the CIA for an analysis of the Gorbachev succession, who the main actors would be, and the likely scenarios. The assessment opens quite drastically: “The Gorbachev era is effectively over.” The scenarios offered have an eerie resemblance to the actual coup that would come in August 1991. This might be the most prescient of all the CIA analyses of the perestroika years. The report finds that Gorbachev is likely to be replaced either by the reformers or the hard-liners, with the latter being more likely. The authors point out that “there is no love between Gorbachev and his current allies and they could well move to try to dump him.” They then list possible conspirators for such a move– Vice President Yanaev, KGB Chief Kryuchkov, and Defense Minister Yazov, among others, all of whom whom participate in the August coup. The report predicts that the “traditionalists” are likely to find a “legal veneer” for removing Gorbachev: “most likely they would present Gorbachev with an ultimatum to comply or face arrest or death.” If he agreed, Yanaev would step in as president, the conspirators would declare a state of emergency and install “some kind of a National Salvation Committee.” However, the memo concludes that “time is working against the traditionalists.” This turned out to be both prescient and correct – the August coup followed the process outlined in this document and the plot foundered because the security forces themselves were fractured and the democratic movements were gaining strength. But indeed, the coup, the resurgence of Boris Yeltsin as leader of the Russian republic, and the secession of Russia from the Soviet Union during the fall of 1991 did mark the end of the Gorbachev era.

 

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TOP-SECRET: Alexander Yakovlev and the Roots of the Soviet Reforms

Alexander Yakovlev and the
Roots of the Soviet Reforms

Washington D.C. August 20, 2011 – Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev, who died in Moscow last week at the age of 81, was probably the best known “architect of perestroika.” Soviet ambassador to Canada, then member of the Politburo and Mikhail Gorbachev’s closest adviser, he could rightfully be called the “Father of Glasnost.”

Alexander Yakovlev rose through the Communist Party ranks to become one of the most vocal critics of the Stalinist past and a passionate advocate of democratization in the second half of the 1980s. He was one of the people history will credit for his role in helping to end the Cold War.

Yakovlev was born in a peasant family in the Yaroslavl oblast, fought in World War II, and was badly wounded in 1943. In the same year he joined the Communist Party and became a professional “apparatchik.” In 1972, during the Brezhnev years, after publishing an article in Literaturnaya Gazeta (on a dispute within the Writers’ Union) that was considered “unpatriotic,” he was sent to Canada as ambassador. In 1983, he was allowed to return to Moscow to assume the position of director of the prestigious Institute of World Economy and International Relations, which soon became a bastion of reformist intellectuals and one of the springboards of perestroika.

Soon after becoming general secretary in 1985, Gorbachev quickly recognized Yakovlev’s potential and promoted him to head the Central Committee’s Propaganda Department. In 1986, Yakovlev became secretary of the Central Committee in charge of ideology and in 1987 a full member of the Politburo. His role in promoting freedom of the press, political openness and democratization has been widely noted by observers of the Soviet political process of the late 1980s.

Recently released documents from the Yakovlev Collection of the State Archive of the Russian Federation (GARF) show the unprecedented scope of issues on which Alexander Yakovlev exerted influence within Soviet decision-making circles under Gorbachev. Although we usually associate Yakovlev with glasnost and democratization, it becomes clear from the record that he was also a key reformer when it came to arms control (“untying” the Soviet “package” position on nuclear arms control negotiations), and the Soviet economy. The documents also show that Yakovlev’s position was quite developed and consistent very early on, when the rest of the Soviet reformers, including Gorbachev himself, were not yet willing to look beyond the existing one-party system.

The following selection of materials are part of a much larger collection of documents from the former Soviet bloc available for research at the National Security Archive.

Documents
Note: The following documents are in PDF format.
You will need to download and install the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to view.Document 1: Alexander Yakovlev. On Reagan. Memorandum prepared on request from M.S. Gorbachev and handed to him on March 12, 1985

In this memorandum, which Gorbachev requested and Yakovlev prepared the day after Gorbachev’s election as general secretary, Yakovlev analyzed President Ronald Reagan’s positions on a variety of issues. The analysis is notable for its non-ideological tone, suggesting that meeting with the U.S. president was in the Soviet Union’s national interest, and that Reagan’s positions were far from clear-cut, indicating some potential for improving U.S.-Soviet relations.

Document 2: Memorandum to Mikhail Gorbachev, “The Imperative of Political Development,” December 25, 1985

In this memorandum to Gorbachev, Yakovlev outlines his view of the needed transformation of the political system of the Soviet Union. Yakovlev writes in his memoir that he prepared this document in several drafts earlier in the year but hesitated to present it to Gorbachev because he believed his own official standing at the time was still too junior. Yakovlev’s approach here is thoroughly based on a perceived need for democratization, starting with intra-party democratization. The memo suggests introducing several truly ground-breaking reforms, including genuine multi-candidate elections, free discussion of political positions, a division of power between the legislative and executive branches, independence of the judicial branch, and real guarantees of human rights and freedoms.

Document 3: Memorandum for Gorbachev, “To the Analysis of the Fact of the Visit of Prominent American Political Leaders to the USSR (Kissinger, Vance, Kirkpatrick, Brown, and others), circa December 1986

In this memorandum, devoted to U.S.-Soviet relations and the issues of arms control, Yakovlev proposes a radical breakthrough in Soviet foreign policy. Until now, the Soviet negotiating position on nuclear arms control was based on a ” package ” approach-tying together progress on strategic nuclear weapons, intermediate-range weapons and forward-based systems in Europe, and the issue of anti-ballistic missile defense. Gorbachev’s insistence on the package approach and Reagan’s commitment to SDI made a breakthrough at the U.S.-Soviet summit in Reykjavik impossible. Here, Yakovlev proposes ” untying ” the package and signing separate agreements on each of its elements, arguing that this would be in the Soviet interest. Gorbachev agreed to ” untie the package ” as early as March 1987.

Document 4: Text of Presentation at the CC CPSU Politburo Session, September 28, 1987

This presentation to the Politburo comes after the January and June Plenums of the Central Committee, which outlined comprehensive programs of reform of the political (January) and economic (June) system, and after Yakovlev himself was promoted to the full Politburo membership (in charge of ideology). This is the first time he unveils his views on democratization–which he considered at the time to be the most important task of perestroika–to the Politburo.

Document 5: Notes for Presentation at the Politburo session, December 27, 1988

These notes represent a summary of Yakovlev’s thinking about the most important developments of 1988. His presentation follows Gorbachev’s seminal speech at the United Nations on December 7. The notes reflect his first disappointments with the slow pace of perestroika, bureacratic intertia, and the general apathy of the population. Yakovlev argues for more systematic implementation of the principles and reforms of the ” new thinking ” and gives special emphasis to the U.N. speech, which he calls a ” watershed .”

Document 6: Anatoly Chernyaev, Personal Memorandum to Mikhail Gorbachev, November 11, 1989

In this personal handwritten memorandum, Gorbachev’s foreign policy adviser, Anatoly Chernyaev, expresses his discomfort with the way Gorbachev treated Yakovlev at a recent party Plenum. The memo reflects a recent rift between Gorbachev and Yakovlev, which was precipitated by a disinformation campaign initiated by KGB Chairman Vladimir Kryuchkov. Chernayev defends Yakovlev, emphasizing his intellectual potential and his importance for continuing perestroika’s reforms.


TOP-SECRET: The Diary of Anatoly Chernyaev Former Top Soviet Adviser’s Journal Chronicles Final Years of the Cold War

Washington, DC, August 13th, 2011 – Today the National Security Archive is publishing the first installment of the diary of one of the key behind-the-scenes figures of the Gorbachev era – Anatoly Sergeevich Chernyaev. This document is being published in English here for the first time.

It is hard to overestimate the uniqueness and importance of this diary for our understanding of the end of the Cold War – and specifically for the peaceful withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan and Eastern Europe, and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The document allows the reader a rare opportunity to become a fly on the wall during the heady discussions of early perestroika, and to witness such fascinating phenomena as how the dying ideology of Soviet-style communism held sway over the hearts and minds of Soviet society.

In 2004, Anatoly Chernyaev donated the originals of his diaries from 1972 to 1991 to the National Security Archive in order to ensure full and permanent public access to his notes – beyond the reach of the political uncertainties of contemporary Russia. The Archive is planning to publish the complete English translation of the diaries in regular installments.

This first installment covers the year 1985, which saw the election of Mikhail Gorbachev to the post of General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and the beginning of the changes that were evident first in the “style,” and then in the practice of Soviet domestic and foreign policy. The diary gives a detailed account of Gorbachev’s election and of the political struggle associated with it. The author is observing the changes in 1985 from his position as a senior analyst in the International Department of the Central Committee (CC), where Chernyaev was in charge of relations with West European Communist parties.

The author documents all the major developments of 1985 – beginning from the first revelations about the sad state of the Soviet economy and the extent of such societal problems as alcoholism, to anguished discussions about the war in Afghanistan, to the first summit with President Ronald Reagan in Geneva. Throughout the year, the most noticeable change is the process of radical “cleansing” of the party – the great turnover of personnel designed to replace the old dogmatic Brezhnevite elite. The diary sheds light on how, gradually but persistently, Gorbachev built his reform coalition, making such fateful decisions as appointing Eduard Shevardnadze to the post of Foreign Minister, and bringing Boris Yeltsin to Moscow.

The pages of the diary provide a gallery of living portraits of all the influential figures in the highest echelons of the Soviet elite who in 1985 were engaged in a struggle for political survival under the new leadership. Chernyaev observes his colleagues in the Central Committee trying to reconcile their ingrained ideology with the new “Gorbachev style,” or “Gorbachev thinking.” He himself, as is clear from his notes, remained committed to the Leninist romanticism of communist ideology and argued for going back to Lenin in an effort to purify and reform the Soviet society.

One line of Chernyaev’s narrative follows developments in the influential International Department of the CC CPSU as its staff tried to find answers about the future of the international communist movement as the Soviet Union itself began to change. Gorbachev at that time chose to renounce Moscow’s Big Brother role with regard to socialist countries and non-ruling Communist parties, both in terms of dictating to them but also bankrolling them. Chernyaev presents us with an intimate portrait of one of the most influential figures in the Soviet leadership – the head of the International Department, Boris N. Ponomarev.

The diary gives a detailed account about one of the most important (and long poorly-understood) dynamics of foreign policy making in the Soviet Union – the interaction between the Central Committee and the Foreign Ministry in every step of the preparation of major events and decisions. From its pages, one can see the tremendous role of experts and consultants – the free-thinking intellectuals of the Soviet elite – in forming policy priorities for the leadership. The International Department was a major oasis of enlightened thinking in the Soviet nomenklatura; it provided Gorbachev with people on whom he could rely for new ideas and honest estimates of the situation after coming to power – beginning with Anatoly Chernyaev, whom Gorbachev chose as his foreign policy adviser in March 1986. One can confidently say that every bold foreign policy initiative advanced by Gorbachev in the years 1986-1991 bears Chernyaev’s mark on it. Thus, the diary gives insights into the thought processes of one of most influential new thinkers in Moscow.

Anatoly Sergeevich Chernyaev was born on May 25, 1921 in Moscow. He fought in World War II beginning in 1941. After the war, he returned to his studies at Moscow State University in the Department of History, which he completed in 1948. From 1950-1958, he taught contemporary history at Moscow State University. From 1958-1961, Chernyaev worked in Prague on the editorial board of the theoretical journal Problems of Peace and Socialism, joining the International Department in 1961. In 1986, he became foreign policy adviser to the General Secretary, and later to the first and the last President of the USSR. A prolific writer, Chernyaev has published five monographs in addition to numerous articles in Soviet, Russian, European and U.S. journals.

The National Security Archive takes great pleasure in wishing a happy birthday to Anatoly Sergeevich, who for years has been our partner in the mission to fight government secrecy through glasnost. Anatoly Sergeevich turns 85 today.

The Chernyaev Diary was translated by Anna Melyakova and edited by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.

Reagan, Gorbachev and Bush at Governor’s Island

governor's island

Washington DC, August 2nd 2011 – Previously secret Soviet documentation shows that Mikhail Gorbachev was prepared for rapid arms control progress leading towards nuclear abolition at the time of his last official meeting with President Reagan, at Governor’s Island, New York in December 1988; but President-elect George H. W. Bush, who also attended the meeting, said “he would need a little time to review the issues” and lost at least a year of dramatic arms reductions that were possible had there been a more forthcoming U.S. position.

The new documentation posted today by the National Security Archive at George Washington University (www.nsarchive.org) includes highest-level memos from Gorbachev advisors leading up to Gorbachev’s famous speech at the United Nations during the New York visit, notes of Politburo discussions before and after the speech and the Reagan-Bush meeting, CIA estimates before and after the speech showing how surprised American officials had been and how reluctant the new Bush administration was to meet Gorbachev even half-way, and the declassified U.S. transcript of the private meeting between Reagan, Bush and Gorbachev on December 7.

The Governor’s Island Summit, December 1988

The last official meeting between President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev – after four spectacular summits that commanded worldwide attention at Geneva 1985, Reykjavik 1986, Washington 1987 and Moscow 1988 – took place on an island in New York harbor on December 7, 1988 during the Soviet leader’s trip to deliver his now-famous United Nations speech announcing unilateral arms cuts and – to many observers – the ideological end of the Cold War.

Adding particular interest to this abbreviated summit was the participation of then-President-elect George H.W. Bush, who was at that moment constructing a national security team of aides who were distinctly more skeptical of Gorbachev’s motives than President Reagan or his top officials were.  In fact, the transition from the Reagan to the Bush administrations at the end of 1988 and beginning of 1989 might be described as a transition from doves to hawks.  (One of the leading hawks was Bush’s deputy national security adviser Robert Gates, now serving as Secretary of Defense for President George W. Bush and President-elect Barack Obama.)

According to evidence from the Soviet side – much of it published here for the first time anywhere – Gorbachev explicitly prepared the U.N. speech as a means to speed up arms reductions, engage the new American leader, and end the Cold War.   After the successful signing of the INF Treaty at the Washington summit in 1987 eliminated that entire class of nuclear weapons, the Soviet leadership was prepared for a very quick progress on the strategic offensive weapons treaty START.  Building on the personal understanding and chemistry between President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev, the Soviets were counting on signing the treaty with Reagan, before the U.S. presidential election of 1988.

Having made substantial concessions on verification and shorter-range missiles for the INF Treaty, Gorbachev was signaling Reagan throughout the spring of 1988 trying to push for faster progress on START.  But Reagan’s conventionally-minded advisers – particularly Frank Carlucci at the Defense Department and Colin Powell at the White House – undercut Secretary of State George Shultz with their go-slow approach, even though Shultz saw the opportunities for radical arms reductions.  Opposition from the U.S. Navy over submarine-launched cruise missiles also stalled progress, even though the withdrawal of such missiles was manifestly in the U.S. national security interest. (Note 1) Then result was that the Americans were not ready to agree on START in time for the Moscow summit in May-June 1988.  Even after the summit, Gorbachev still kept hope alive for signing the treaty; but there was no progress, at least in part because then Vice-President Bush – in the middle of a presidential campaign where securing the conservative base of the Republican Party was key to his strategy – was not eager to move any arms control forward. (Note 2)

During the summer of 1988, gradually, the documents show that the Soviet leadership realized that the treaty would have to wait until the new administration came to power in Washington, and therefore, the most important priority for Soviet foreign policy now was not to lose the momentum and to hit the ground running with the new administration.  Georgy Arbatov in his June 1988 memo to Gorbachev [Document 1] emphasized the importance of being prepared for the new administration – not slowing down the pace of negotiations, keeping the initiative, and building a base of support in Europe – thus keeping the pressure for comprehensive cuts in conventional arms, including elimination of asymmetries and reductions of Soviet forces by 500,000.  However, in the summer of 1988, the Soviet side still saw this plan as part of mutual reductions in Europe.

In the summer of 1988, the groundbreaking Soviet XIX Party Conference discussed the main ideas that later became part of the Gorbachev U.N. address and adopted them as guidelines for Soviet foreign policy.  But even that significant ideological shift did not produce any response in the United States preoccupied with the electoral campaign.  In the fall of 1988, however, after various Soviet initiatives did not result in U.S. engagement, the Soviets felt the need to radicalize their approach if they were to achieve quick progress with the new administration.  Former ambassador to Washington and now key Central Committee official Anatoly Dobrynin in his September memorandum to Gorbachev [Document 3] suggested that the General Secretary should meet with the President-elect as early as possible, preferably during his visit to New York for the session of the U.N. General Assembly.  Dobrynin suggested that if Gorbachev delivered an address at the U.N., it would be helpful in his relations with the new administration and would have positive impact on the American public opinion.

Late October 1988 brought a major break with past Soviet positions, when Gorbachev decided to offer deep reductions in Soviet forces in Europe as a unilateral initiative, and to deliver a major address at the United Nations.  Gorbachev conceptualized this speech as an “anti-Fulton, Fulton in reverse” in its significance – comparing it with the historic Winston Churchill “Iron Curtain” speech of 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, at the beginning of the Cold War.  Gorbachev wanted his speech to signify the end of the Cold War, offering deep Soviet reductions in conventional weapons as proof of his policy.  These reductions would address the most important Western concern about the threat of war in Europe, where the Soviets enjoyed significant conventional superiority.  This move, in Gorbachev’s mind, would build trust and open the way for a very fast progress with the new American administration.  His meeting with President-elect Bush and President Reagan would take place immediately after the U.N. speech.

However, the documents show that Gorbachev and his advisers had first to convince their own military of the wisdom of making such unilateral unbalanced reductions, including the problem of what to do with the personnel being withdrawn from Europe [Document 5].  Gorbachev seemed well aware of the potential opposition to his initiative both in the Politburo and in the Armed Forces – a very sensitive issue to handle.  The decision making on the U.N. speech involved a very narrow circle of advisers, and the full scope of numbers was never discussed at the Politburo or published, partly because as Gorbachev stated in an unprecedented direct way on November 3, “If we publish how the matters stand, that we spend over twice as much as the US on military needs, if we let the scope of our expenses be known, all our new thinking and our new foreign policy will go to hell.  Not one country in the world spends as much per capita on weapons as we do, except perhaps the developing nations that we are swamping with weapons and getting nothing in return” [Document 4].

Gorbachev’s U.N. speech on December 7 explicitly endorsed the “common interests of mankind” (no longer the class struggle) as the basis of Soviet foreign policy and, significantly for Eastern Europe, declared “the compelling necessity of the principle of freedom of choice” as “a universal principle to which there should be no exceptions.”  Gorbachev particularly surprised CIA and NATO officials with his announcement of unilateral cuts in Soviet forces totaling 500,000 soldiers, and the withdrawal from Eastern Europe of thousands of tanks and tens of thousands of troops.

Reaction in the West ranged from disbelief to astonishment.  The New York Times editorialized, “Perhaps not since Woodrow Wilson presented his Fourteen Points in 1918 or since Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill promulgated the Atlantic Charter in 1941 has a world figure demonstrated the vision Mikhail Gorbachev displayed yesterday at the United Nations.” (Note 3)  U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan called this speech “the most astounding statement of surrender in the history of ideological struggle,” while retired Gen. Andrew Goodpaster, a former NATO commander and top aide to President Eisenhower, described Gorbachev’s announcement of unilateral troop cuts as “the most significant step since NATO was founded.” (Note 4)

Little of this world-shaking impact was evident in the highest-level U.S. government reaction.  At the Governors Island meeting, for example, President Reagan remarked only that “he had had a brief report on it, and it all sounded good to him”; while Vice-President and President-elect Bush remarked that he “would like to build on what President Reagan had done” but “he would need a little time to review the issues….”  Bush described the “theory” behind his “new team” as “to revitalize things by putting in new people.”

But the new Bush advisers were more than skeptical of Gorbachev.  In subsequent memoirs, national security adviser Brent Scowcroft dismissed the U.N. speech when he described his staunch opposition to any early summit with Gorbachev in 1989:  “Unless there were substantive accomplishments, such as in arms control, the Soviets would be able to capitalize on the one outcome left – the good feelings generated by the meeting.  They would use the resulting euphoria to undermine Western resolve, and a sense of complacency would encourage some to believe the United States could relax its vigilance.  The Soviets in general and Gorbachev in particular were masters at creating these enervating atmospheres.  Gorbachev’s UN speech had established, with a largely rhetorical flourish, a heady atmosphere of optimism.  He could exploit an early meeting with a new president as evidence to declare the Cold War over without providing substantive actions from a ‘new’ Soviet Union.  Under the circumstances which prevailed [in 1989], I believed an early summit would only abet the current Soviet propaganda campaign.” (Note 5)

Ironies abound in this statement.  The Soviet evidence shows that substantive accomplishments in arms control were very much on the table and available at the very beginning of the Bush administration.  These included the START agreement for 50% reductions in strategic arms that the Bush administration would not actually sign until 1991, or the withdrawn deployments of tactical nuclear weapons that President Bush did not order until the fall of 1991, to immediate reciprocation by Gorbachev.  The U.S. ambassador to Moscow, Jack Matlock, titled his chapter on this initial period of the Bush administration, “Washington Fumbles”; while Gorbachev’s advisor Anatoly Chernyaev is even harsher with his chapter title, “The Lost Year.” (Note 6)

Chernyaev subsequently wrote:  “Much has been written about the impression that Gorbachev made on the world in his UN speech.  But we also have to consider the impact on him of the world’s response to his speech…. Having received such broad recognition and support, having been ‘certified’ a world class leader of great authority, he could be faster and surer in shaking off the fetters of the past in all aspects of foreign policy.” (Note 7) Regrettably, exactly those “fetters of the past” continued to restrain the highest levels of the George H.W. Bush administration from meeting Gorbachev half-way, and arguably prevented dramatic reductions in nuclear weapons, fissile materials, and conventional armaments, to the detriment of international security today.

Read the Documents

Document 1:  Arbatov memorandum to Gorbachev, June 1988

This memorandum to the General Secretary from the influential advisor to Soviet leaders and director of the U.S. and Canada Institute of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, Georgy Arbatov, provides an after-action assessment of the Moscow summit and the state of U.S.-Soviet relations.  Arbatov points to the significance of the summit as being a “discovery” of the Soviet Union by America and the West and the breaking of the enemy image.  He outlines the broad arms control agenda that remains, but cautions Gorbachev that during the last stages of the electoral campaign in the United States it would not be realistic to expect any serious progress.  Arbatov clearly believes the Reagan administration has spent its potential to make any serious steps on strategic or conventional weapons.  In one part of the memorandum, he carefully suggests that it might be time for the Soviet Union to undertake some unilateral initiative on conventional weapons in Europe, like significant reductions in tanks, which would impress European public opinion and make quick progress with the new U.S. administration more likely.

[Source: Archive of the Gorbachev Foundation. Fond 2.
Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.]

Document 2:  Dobrynin Memorandum to Gorbachev on U.S.-Soviet relations. September 18, 1988

Here, the former Soviet Ambassador to the United States and future head of the International Commission of the Central Committee Anatoly Dobrynin advises Gorbachev on the next moves toward the United States.  Dobrynin explains perceptively the dynamics of the presidential campaign in the U.S. and suggests that Gorbachev should try to meet with the president-elect as early as possible, before he is inaugurated, in order to preserve the continuity and momentum in U.S.-Soviet relations.  The best time and location for such a meeting would be in New York especially if Gorbachev was making an address to the General Assembly of the United Nations.  The address then could provide a major stimulus for a new start in U.S.-Soviet relations.

[Source: Archive of the Gorbachev Foundation. Fond 2.
Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.]

Document 3: Gorbachev’s Conference with Advisers on Drafting the U.N. Speech, October 31, 1988

In this document Gorbachev thinks aloud in the presence of a narrow circle of foreign policy experts, in effect brainstorming with them on the content of his upcoming speech to the U.N. General Assembly.  In addition to Foreign Minister Shevardnadze and Gorbachev’s foreign policy assistant Chernyaev, the circle also includes Alexander Yakovlev as head of the International Commission, former ambassador to the U.S. Anatoly Dobrynin as head of the Central Committee’s International Department, and Dobrynin’s deputy, Valentin Falin.  The major thrust of Gorbachev’s initiative, as he envisions it, is about disarmament and the gradual withdrawal of Soviet troops from Eastern Europe. But the spirit is less pragmatic than messianic. The Soviet leader visualizes himself as a world figure who will not only assuage the security fears of Western countries, but will outline an entirely new cooperative global order.  When Gorbachev says, “In general this speech should be an anti-Fulton – Fulton in reverse,” he means to undo the Cold War that was declared most dramatically in the “Iron Curtain” speech delivered by Winston Churchill in Fulton, Missouri, in March 1946.

[Source: Archive of the Gorbachev Foundation. Fond 2.
Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.]

Document 4: Chernyaev Diary, November 3, 1988

In this diary entry, Chernyaev records a “historic” conversation at the Politburo, after the formal agenda items.  This is the first time Gorbachev presents his decision to announce deep unilateral cuts in his UN speech to the full Politburo.  Chernyaev notes that Gorbachev is “clearly nervous,” because he is aware of the radical nature of the steps he is going to undertake, and because of the presence of Defense Minister Dmitry Yazov in the room, who would have to approve the cuts.  The General Secretary makes an unprecedented push for cutting Soviet military expenses and publishing the numbers as a matter of building trust.  He tries to impress the Politburo with the unreasonably high Soviet military expenses and the need to withdraw from Eastern Europe.  Gorbachev has  to walk a fine line—making the conservatives feel that they are part of the decision making process, and yet leaving them out of decisions on actual scope of the cuts—therefore he never mentions the actual numbers.  Only at the end of his intervention does Gorbachev mention that the cuts will be unilateral—a huge break with the past Soviet position, which demanded reciprocal cuts in conventional weapons in Europe.
Chernyaev predicts this is “an event that may well take the second place of importance after the April of 1985” – referring to the party plenum when the policy of perestroika was formally announced.

[Source:  Anatoly Chernayev Diary Manuscript, donated to the National Security Archive
Translated by Anna Melyakova for the National Security Archive]

Document 5: Chernyaev Memorandum to Gorbachev on the Armed Forces, November 10, 1988

Here, Gorbachev’s foreign policy adviser and confidant Anatoly Chernyaev provides suggestions to Gorbachev in anticipation of the opposition among the military to the deep unilateral cuts that would be announced in Gorbachev’s U.N. speech.  Chernyaev suggests that the initiatives should be presented in such a way that would co-opt the military as much as possible even though they were not involved in the real decision making leading to the U.N. initiative.  In addition, Chernyaev suggests taking preliminary measures to accommodate the large numbers of officers who would have to be retired before their turn, and moved to temporary housing.  The advice would never be fully followed, which indeed would lead to strong frustration and rising opposition among the military, culminated in the August 1991 coup against Gorbachev.

[Source: Archive of the Gorbachev Foundation. Fond 2.
Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.]

Document 6: Director of Central Intelligence, Special National Intelligence Estimate 11-16-88, “Soviet Policy During the Next Phase of Arms Control in Europe,” November 1988 (Key Judgments only)

This Top Secret SNIE, produced just two weeks before Gorbachev’s speech at the U.N., demonstrates how much the Soviet leader took the US government by surprise with the unilateral cuts in Soviet ground forces (by 500,000 out of a total force of 5 million)) and the withdrawals from Eastern Europe (50,000 troops, 10,000 tanks, 8,500 artillery systems, and 800 combat aircraft).  The intelligence community consensus reflected here posits that the Soviets “prefer to negotiate with NATO to achieve mutual reductions of conventional forces” because “it makes more sense to trade force reductions, thereby retaining a balance in the correlation of forces.”  The SNIE goes on to suggest that “the Warsaw Pact probably realizes that negotiating an agreement with NATO that is acceptable to the Soviets could take years – and might not even be possible” – a judgment that would become obsolete within days, yet would live on into the new Bush administration as the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, Robert Gates, would move to the White House as deputy national security advisor.  Just in case, however, the authors of the SNIE mention that “for political effect, the Soviets may also take unilateral initiatives” such as withdrawing some troops from Hungary.  But they completely misjudge the troops cuts, claiming that the “Soviets may attempt to portray force restructuring as a unilateral force reduction” but really this is “intended primarily to make units more effective for prolonged conventional combat operations against NATO.”

[Source: released by CIA for 1999 conference at George H. W. Bush Center for Presidential Studies, Texas A & M University, published in Benjamin B. Fischer, ed., At Cold War’s End (CIA Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1999)]

Document 7: U. S. Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence, Soviet Task Force, Wednesday, December 7, 1988
(Testimony of Doug MacEachin, Director, Office of Soviet Analysis, CIA; Bob Blackwell, National Intelligence Officer for the Soviet Union, CIA; and Paul Erickson, Deputy Director, Office of Soviet Analysis, CIA)

This remarkable closed-door testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee by the top three CIA analysts of the Soviet Union occurs at the precise moment that Gorbachev is speaking to the United Nations on December 7, 1988.  MacEachin opens his testimony by saying “in about 15 minutes or so we may find out if one of my analytical judgments is going to turn out to be correct,” referring to his prediction that Gorbachev will have to cut the proportion of Soviet resources that go to the military.  At the same time, MacEachin disparages the “plausible but totally unfounded story of very large cuts.”  (page 3)  Later (page 32) he says that “Blackwell just went down the hall to watch some” of the U.N. speech on television, and (page 36) he mentions the “news bulletin” of the 500,000 troop cut, calling the discussion “analysis on the fly.”

Most striking is the way this testimony illustrates the rifts within the U.S. government between Gorbachev skeptics like Robert Gates and the new national security advisor Brent Scowcroft on one side, and the career analysts like MacEachin on the other.  MacEachin remarks (page 37) that “if Gorbachev is successful he will cause major social displacement in the United States” because “[t]here are not many homes for old wizards of Armageddon, and it is kind of like old case officers trying to find employment.”  And MacEachin offers a true confession in the extraordinary passage on page 38, which demonstrates how prior assumptions about Soviet behavior, rather than actual intelligence data points, actually drove intelligence findings:

“Now, we spend megadollars studying political instability in various places around the world, but we never really looked at the Soviet Union as a political entity in which there were factors building which could lead to the kind of – at least the initiation of political transformation that we seem to see.  It does not exist to my knowledge.  Moreover, had it existed inside the government, we never would have been able to publish it anyway, quite frankly.  And had we done so, people would have been calling for my head.  And I wouldn’t have published it.  In all honesty, had we said a week ago that Gorbachev might come to the UN and offer a unilateral cut of 500,000 in the military, we would have been told we were crazy.  We had a difficult enough time getting air space for the prospect of some unilateral cuts of 50 to 60,000.”

[Source: published by the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee in 1992 in the three-volume record of the 1991 confirmation hearings on Robert Gates to be Director of Central Intelligence]

Document 8: Memorandum of Conversation, “The President’s Private Meeting With Gorbachev,” December 7, 1988, 1:05 – 1:30 p.m., Commandant’s residence, Governors Island, New York

This poignant transcript of the last official meeting between President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev shows the two leaders practically avoiding any substantive discussion of the momentous changes in Soviet policy Gorbachev had just announced at the U.N.  Instead, they wax nostalgic for their series of summits dating back to Geneva 1985, and Reagan presents the Soviet leader with an inscribed photograph of that meeting.  Gorbachev is clearly eager to move forward with the President-elect, who demurs that “he would need a little time to review the issues” (even after eight years at Reagan’s right hand?) but “wished to build on what President Reagan had accomplished, working with Gorbachev.”  Ironically, Bush says “he had no intention of stalling things.  He naturally wanted to formulate prudent national security policies, but he intended to go forward.”  Yet, the transition to new hard-line advisers and the Bush White House determination to commission a months-long review of national security policy actually would stall forward progress on arms reductions and even any engagement with Gorbachev.  The two men would not meet again for an entire year (until the Malta summit in December 1989), and by that time, the world would have changed around them, the Berlin Wall would be gone, German unification would be the absorbing controversy, and Gorbachev would be losing the ability on his side to deliver more of what he announced at the U.N. that very day.

[Source: released by the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, National Security Archive FOIA request]

Document 9: Yakovlev-Matlock Conversation December 26, 1988

In this conversation, requested by the U.S. ambassador to Moscow Jack Matlock, the Ambassador assures Politburo member and head of the International Commission Alexander Yakovlev that there would be continuity in U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union under the new President George H. W. Bush.  Matlock praises the new President’s seriousness and professionalism, compares him favorably to Reagan in terms of his experience in foreign policy, including being personally involved in developing the policy line toward the Soviet Union.  At the same time, however, Matlock states bluntly that the United States would not be ready with its approaches on strategic arms negotiations by February 15 (the deadline for Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan), and that the new President needed time for an in-depth study and analysis of these issues.  Yakovlev emphasizes especially that the Soviet leadership is hoping for “enhanced continuity” and resolution on arms control issues and regional conflicts and that Gorbachev’s goal in his meetings in New York was precisely to prevent a long pause in U.S.-Soviet relations after the new administration comes to power.  Yakovlev also expresses his frustration with the U.S. position on the settlement in Afghanistan: “the United States so far has not shown any desire to actually encourage the Afghan settlement.”

[Source:  State Archive of the Russian Federation, Fond 100063, opis 2, delo 148
Translated by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive]

Document 10: Politburo Session December 27-28, 1988

This is one of very few official records of Soviet Politburo proceedings that are available publicly.  This December meeting is the first after Gorbachev’s return from the United States, having cut short his travels in order to deal with the results of the disastrous earthquake in Armenia.  Gorbachev devotes much time to summaries of the increasingly grave forecasts for his perestroika program by foreign analysts, but then dismisses their seriousness.  Part of the context for Gorbachev’s lengthy monologues and Shevardnadze’s proposals for a “businesslike” withdrawal of Soviet troops from Eastern Europe is the growing bewilderment of certain military and KGB leaders who were not fully informed in advance about the scale and tempo of Gorbachev’s announced unilateral arms cuts.  Still, there is no trace of real opposition to Gorbachev’s course.  The Soviet party leader has learned a lesson from the military’s lack of reaction to the previous discussions of “sufficiency,” and he is now ramming change down their throats. Ever obedient, Defense Minister Yazov states, “everyone reacted with understanding,” even after Shevardnadze aggressively attacks the military for retrograde thinking, for directly contradicting the U.N. speech, and for proposing only “admissible” openness rather than true glasnost.  Ironically, when Shevardnadze and Ligachev suggest announcing the size of Soviet reductions “publicly,” Gorbachev objects: if the Soviet people and party learn how huge the Soviet defense expenditures really are, it will undermine the propaganda effect of his U.N. speech.  In yet another call for strategy vis-a-vis Eastern Europe, a conservative Politburo member, Vitaly Vorotnikov, says, “I consider the situation in a number of socialist countries to be so complicated that we should clarify our thinking in one document or another.”  No such integrated strategy ever appeared.

[Source: RGANI. Published in the Russian historical magazine Istochnik, Issue 5-6, 1993.  Translated by Vladislav Zubok for the National Security Archive]

Document 11: Director of Central Intelligence, National Intelligence Estimate 11-4-89, “Soviet Policy Toward the West: The Gorbachev Challenge,” April 1989 (Key Judgments only)

The remarkable section headlined “Disagreements” provides a striking contrast to President Reagan’s comment in the Governor’s Island summit that “we were all on Gorbachev’s side concerning the reforms he was trying to make in the Soviet system.”  Here, in a summary of the thinking of President Bush’s own top advisers Scowcroft and Gates, the estimate says “Some analysts see current policy changes as largely tactical, driven by the need for breathing space from the competition…. They judge that there is a serious risk of Moscow returning to traditionally combative behavior when the hoped for gains in economic performance are achieved.”  In contrast, “Other analysts believe Gorbachev’s policies reflect a fundamental re-thinking of national interests and ideology as well as more tactical considerations…” and amount to “historic shifts in the Soviet definition of national interest” and “lasting shifts in Soviet behavior.”  The evidence now available from the Soviet side, including the documents included in this posting and the others in the National Security Archive’s series on the U.S.-Soviet summits, demonstrates that the latter analysts were precisely correct; yet they did not have nearly the influence on U.S. policy after the 1986 Reykjavik summit, or especially in the first year of the George H.W. Bush administration, that the hard-liners did who were so wrong because of their presumptions about the Soviet Union.  These disagreements within the U.S. side and the suspicions of top policymakers in Washington would create a kind of paralysis in the process of arms reductions after Governors Island, leaving worldwide persistence of nuclear weapons and fissile material in particular at far higher levels than the U.S. and the Soviet Union could have achieved if a more accurate U.S. view of Gorbachev’s reforms had carried the day.

[Source: released by CIA for 1999 conference at George H. W. Bush Center for Presidential Studies, Texas A & M University; published in Benjamin B. Fischer, ed., At Cold War’s End (CIA Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1999)]

Notes

1. For the inside story on the Navy’s shortsighted refusal of on-site verification for SLCMs, see Jack F. Matlock, Jr., Reagan and Gorbachev (New York: Random House, 2004), pp. 277-279.

2. See Jack F. Matlock Jr., Reagan and Gorbachev, p. 306.

3. The New York Times, 8 December 1988, p. 34.

4. For the Moynihan, Goodpaster and other international reaction, see Thomas Blanton, “When did the Cold War End?” Cold War International History Project Bulletin 10 (March 1998), p.184.

5. George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), p. 46.

6. Jack F. Matlock, Jr., Autopsy on an Empire (New York: Random House, 1995), p. 177; Anatoly Chernyaev, My Six Years With Gorbachev, p. 201.

7. Anatoly Chernyaev, My Six Years With Gorbachev (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2000), p. 203.

Afghanistan and the Soviet Withdrawal 1989 20 Years Later

Alexander Lyakhovsky

Washington D.C., July 31st 2011 – Twenty years ago today, the commander of the Soviet Limited Contingent in Afghanistan Boris Gromov crossed the Termez Bridge out of Afghanistan, thus marking the end of the Soviet war which lasted almost ten years and cost tens of thousands of Soviet and Afghan lives.

As a tribute and memorial to the late Russian historian, General Alexander Antonovich Lyakhovsky, the National Security Archive today posted on the Web (www.nsarchive.org) a series of previously secret Soviet documents including Politburo and diary notes published here in English for the first time.  The documents suggest that the Soviet decision to withdraw occurred as early as 1985, but the process of implementing that decision was excruciatingly slow, in part because the Soviet-backed Afghan regime was never able to achieve the necessary domestic support and legitimacy – a key problem even today for the current U.S. and NATO-supported government in Kabul.

The Soviet documents show that ending the war in Afghanistan, which Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev called “the bleeding wound,” was among his highest priorities from the moment he assumed power in 1985 – a point he made clear to then-Afghan Communist leader Babrak Karmal in their first conversation on March 14, 1985.  Already in 1985, according to the documents, the Soviet Politburo was discussing ways of disengaging from Afghanistan, and actually reached the decision in principle on October 17, 1985.

But the road from Gorbachev’s decision to the actual withdrawal was long and painful.  The documents show the Soviet leaders did not come up with an actual timetable until the fall of 1987.  Gorbachev made the public announcement on February 8, 1988, and the first troops started coming out in May 1988, with complete withdrawal on February 15, 1989.  Gorbachev himself, in his recent book (Mikhail Gorbachev, Ponyat’ perestroiku … Pochemu eto vazhno seichas. (Moscow: Alpina Books 2006)), cites at least two factors to explain why it took the reformers so long to withdraw the troops.  According to Gorbachev, the Cold War frame held back the Soviet leaders from making more timely and rational moves, because of fear of the international perception that any such withdrawal would be a humiliating retreat.  In addition to saving face, the Soviet leaders kept trying against all odds to ensure the existence of a stable and friendly Afghanistan with some semblance of a national reconciliation process in place before they left.

The documents detail the Soviet leadership’s preoccupation that, before withdrawal of troops could be carried out, the Afghan internal situation had to be stabilized and a new government should be able to rely on its domestic power base and a trained and equipped army able to deal with the mujahadeen opposition.  The Soviets sought to secure the Afghan borders through some kind of compromise with the two other most important outside players—Pakistan, through which weapons and aid reached the opposition, and the United States, provider of the bulk of that aid.  In the process of Geneva negotiations on Afghanistan, which were initiated by the United Nations in 1982, the United States, in the view of the Soviet reformers, was dragging its feet, unwilling to stop arms supplies to the rebels and hoping and planning for the fall of the pro-Soviet Najibullah regime after the Soviet withdrawal.

Internally, the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan did everything possible to prevent or slow down the Soviet withdrawal, putting pressure on the Soviet military and government representatives to expand military operations against the rebels.

Persistent pleading on the part of Najibullah government as late as January 1989 created an uncharacteristic split in the Soviet leadership, with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze suggesting that the withdrawal should be slowed down or some forces should remain to help protect the regime, while the military leadership argued strongly in favor of a complete and decisive withdrawal.

According to the American record, Shevardnadze had already informed Secretary of State George Shultz as early as September 1987 of the specific timetable for withdrawal.  But many senior officials did not believe the Soviet assurances; in fact, deputy CIA director Robert Gates famously bet a State Department diplomat on New Year’s Eve 1987 that Gorbachev would make no withdrawal announcement until after the end of the Reagan administration.  Gates believed the Chinese saying about the Soviet appetite for territory: “What the bear has eaten, he never spits out” – and only in his memoirs did he admit he was making “an intelligence forecast based on fortune cookie wisdom.”  (Robert Gates, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider’s Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War (New York:  Simon&Shuster, 1996, pp. 430-431).  Of course, Gates’ hardline views on Gorbachev would take over U.S. policy as the George H.W. Bush administration came into office in January 1989.

By this time, however, the Soviet leaders well realized that the goal of building socialism in Afghanistan was illusory; and at the same time the goal of securing the southern borders of the Soviet Union seemed to be still within reach with the policy of national reconciliation of the Najibullah government.  So the troops came out completely by February 15, 1989.  Soon after the Soviet withdrawal, however, both superpowers seemed to lose interest in what had been so recently the hottest spot of the Cold War.

Najibullah would outlast Gorbachev’s tenure in the Kremlin, but not by much:  Within three years Najibullah would be removed from power and brutally murdered, and Afghanistan would plunge into the darkness of civil war and the coming to power of the Taliban.  Twenty years later, the other superpower and its Cold War alliance are fighting a war in Afghanistan against forces of darkness that were born among the fundamentalist parts of mujahadeen resistance to the Soviet occupation.  In such a context, the language and the dilemmas in these 20-year-old documents still provide some resonance today.

This posting is also a tribute to and a commemoration of one of our long-standing partners in the pursuit of opening secrets and writing the new truly international history of the Cold War.   General Alexander Lyakhovsky passed away from a heart attack while standing on a Moscow Metro platform on February 3, 2009, less than two weeks before the 20th anniversary of the end of the war in which he served as an officer, and which he studied for many years as a scholar.  He is survived by his wife Tatyana and their children Vladimir and Galina.

The National Security Archive mourns the passing of our dear friend and partner, Alexander Antonovich.  It is fitting and proper that here we express our deepest appreciation for his remarkable knowledge, his scholarly and personal integrity, and his generosity both in expertise and the documents that he always shared with us, while he educated us and the world.  His memory lives on in all of us who ever read his work, heard him speak, or best of all, listened to him sing the sad songs of the Afghan war.

— Svetlana Savranskaya, director of Russia programs, Thomas Blanton, executive director, National Security Archive, and Malcolm Byrne, Deputy Director, National Security Archive.

Documents:

Document 1. Memorandum of Mikhail Gorbachev’s Conversation with Babrak Karmal, March 14, 1985

In his first conversation with the leader of Afghanistan, who was installed by the Soviet troops in December of 1979, Gorbachev underscored two main points: first that “the Soviet troops cannot stay in Afghanistan forever,” and second, that the Afghan revolution was presently in its “national-democratic” stage, whereas its socialist stage was only “a course of the future.” He also encouraged the Afghan leader to expand the base of the regime to unite all the “progressive forces.” In no uncertain terms, Karmal was told that the Soviet troops would be leaving soon and that his government would have to rely on its own forces.

Document 2.  Anatoly Chernyaev Diary, April 4, 1985

Chernyaev reflects on the “torrent of letters” about Afghanistan received recently by the Central Committee and the Pravda newspaper.  They reflect the growing dissatisfaction of the population with the drawn-out war and the consensus that the troops should be withdrawn.

Document 3 Anatoly Chernyaev Diary, October 17, 1985.

At the Politburo session of October 17, 1985, General Secretary Gorbachev proposed to make a final decision on Afghanistan and quoted from citizens’ letters regarding the dissatisfaction in the country with the Soviet actions in Afghanistan.  He also described his meeting with Babrak Karmal during which Gorbachev told the Afghan leader: “we will help you, but with arms only, not troops.”Chernyaev noted Gorbachev’s negative reaction to the assessment of the situation given by Defense Minister Marshal Sergey Sokolov.

Document 4.  Politburo Session, June 26, 1986.

The Politburo discusses the first results of Najibullah’s policy of national reconciliation.  Gorbachev emphasizes that the decision to withdraw the troops is firm, but that the United States seems to be a problem as far as the national reconciliation is concerned.  He proposes early withdrawals of portions of troops to give the process a boost, and proposes to “pull the USA and Pakistan by their tail” to encourage them to participate in it more actively.

Document 5 Politburo Session, November 13, 1986.

The first detailed Politburo discussion of the process and difficulties of the withdrawal of the Soviet troops from Afghanistan, which included the testimony of Marshal Sergei Akhromeev.

Document 6 Politburo Session, January 21, 1987

The Politburo discusses the results of Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze and Head of the Central Committee International Department Anatoly Dobrynin’s trip to Afghanistan.  Shevardnadze’s report is very blunt and pessimistic about the war and the internal situation.  The main concern of the Politburo is how to end the war but save face and ensure a friendly and neutral Afghanistan.

Document 7 Politburo Session, February 23, 1987

Gorbachev talks about the need to withdraw while engaging the United States and Pakistan in negotiations on the final settlement.  He is willing to meet with the Pakistani leader Zia ul Khaq, and maybe even offer him some payoff.  The Soviet leader also shows concern about the Soviet reputation among non-aligned countries and national liberation movements.

Document 8 Politburo Session, February 26, 1987

In his remarks to the Politburo, General Secretary returns to the issue of the need to withdraw Soviet troops from Afghanistan several times.  He emphasizes the need to withdraw the troops, and at the same time struggles with the explanation for the withdrawal, noting that “we not going to open up the discussion about who is to blame now.”  Gromyko admits that it was a mistake to introduce the troops, but notes that it was done after 11 requests from the Afghan government.

Document 9  Colonel Tsagolov Letter to USSR Minister of Defense Dmitry Yazov on the Situation in Afghanistan, August 13, 1987

Criticism of the Soviet policy of national reconciliation in Afghanistan and analysis of general failures of the Soviet military mission there are presented in Colonel Tsagolov’s letter to USSR Defense Minister Dmitry Yazov of August 13, 1987.  This letter represents the first open criticism of the Afghan war from within the military establishment.  Colonel Tsagolov paid for his attempt to make his criticism public in his interview with Soviet influential progressive magazine “Ogonek” by his career—he was expelled from the Army in 1988.

Document 10  CC CPSU Letter on Afghanistan, May 10, 1988

On May 10, 1988, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the USSR issued a “closed” (internal use) letter to all Communist Party members of the Soviet Union on the issue of withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan.  The letter presents the Central Committee analysis of events in Afghanistan and Soviet actions in that country, the problems and the difficulties the Soviet troops had to face in carrying out their mission.  In particular, the letter stated that important historic and ethnic factors were overlooked when the decisions on Afghanistan were made in the Soviet Union. The letter analyzes Soviet interests in Afghanistan and the reasons for the withdrawal of troops.

Document 11 Politburo Session January 24, 1989

This Politburo session deals with the issue of the completion of the withdrawal and the post-war Soviet role in Afghanistan, as well as possible future development of the situation there.  The discussion shows the split among the Soviet leadership with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze arguing for leaving some personnel behind to help protect the Najibullah regime or delaying the full withdrawal.

Document 12 Excerpt from Alexander Lyakhovsky and Vyacheslav Nekrasov, Grazhdanin, Politik, Voin: Pamyati Shakha Masuda (Citizen, Politician, Fighter: In Memory of Shah Masoud), (Moscow, 2007), pp. 202-205

Document 13  Excerpt from Statement of the Soviet Military Command in Afghanistan on the Withdrawal of Soviet Troops, February 14, 1989

On April 7, 1988, USSR Defense Minister signed an order on withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan.  In February 1989, the Defense Ministry prepared a statement of the Soviet Military Command in Afghanistan on the issue of withdrawal of troops, which was delivered to the Head of the UN Mission in Afghanistan on February 14, 1989—the day when the last Soviet soldier left Afghanistan.  The statement gave an overview of Soviet-Afghan relations before 1979, Soviet interpretation of the reasons for providing internationalist assistance to Afghanistan, and sending troops there after the repeated requests of the Afghan government.  It criticized the U.S. role in arming the opposition in disregard of the Geneva agreements, and thus destabilizing the situation in the country.  In an important acknowledgement that the Vietnam metaphor was used to analyze Soviet actions in Afghanistan, they military explicitly referred to “unfair and absurd” comparisons between the American actions in Vietnam and the presence of Soviet troops in Afghanistan.

Document 14. Official Chronology of the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan with quotes from documents from the Archive of the Gorbachev Foundation, Moscow.

Books By Alexander Lyakhovsky
Grazhdanin,Politik,Voin, Plamya Afgana and Zacharovannye svobodoj

 

TOP-SECRET: The Diary of Anatoly Chernyaev 1989

Washington, DC, July 31st – The National Security Archive publishes its fourth installment of the diary of Anatoly Chernyaev, the man who was behind some of the most momentous transformations in Soviet foreign policy at the end of the 1980s in his role as Mikhail Gorbachev’s main foreign policy aide.  In addition to his contributions to perestroika and new thinking, Anatoly Sergeevich was and remains a paragon of openness and transparency, providing his diaries and notes to historians who are trying to understand the end of the Cold War.  This section of the diary, covering 1989—the year of miracles—is published here in English for the first time.

After the “turning point year,” 1988, the Soviet reformers around Gorbachev expected fast progress on all fronts—domestically in implementation of the results of the XIX party conference and further democratization of the Soviet system, and internationally following the groundbreaking UN speech of December 1988, especially in the sphere of nuclear arms control and in integrating the Soviet Union into Europe.  However, those hopes were not realized, and the year brought quite unexpected challenges and outcomes.  By the end of the year, no new arms control agreements would be signed, but the Berlin Wall would fall, nationalist movements would start threatening the unity of the Soviet Union, and popular revolutions would sweepEastern Europewhile the Soviets stuck to their pledge not to use force.  By the end of 1989,Europewas transformed and the Cold War had ended.  Anatoly Chernyaev documented all those changes meticulously and reflected on their meaning in real time.

For Chernyaev, the year began with an argument over the final withdrawal of Soviet forces fromAfghanistan.  Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze tried to delay the full withdrawal of troops and to send an additional brigade to help the Afghan leader Najibullah repel attacks of Pakistani-supported mujahaddin and stabilize his government.  Chernyaev and Alexander Yakovlev actively opposed that course of action on the grounds that it would cost hundreds of lives of Soviet soldiers and undermine Soviet trustworthiness in the eyes of international partners.  The troops were withdrawn on schedule by February 15, 1989.

Domestically, the most important event was the first contested election to the Congress of People’s Deputies on March 26, 1989.  Chernyaev himself was elected as a Deputy, but expressed unease about being among the 100 candidates on the “guaranteed” party list.  His reflections on the electoral campaign and the results of the elections show his sincere belief that the Soviet system could be transformed by deepening the democratization and his concerns over the limitations and resistance by the conservative elements within the party.  The electoral campaign takes place at the time when the economic situation deteriorates quite significantly, leading to unprecedented discontent of the population and ultimately miners’ strikes in the summer.

An important theme of 1989 is the growing nationalism and the threat of possible breakup of theSoviet Union—“the nationalities bomb.”  On this issue, Chernyaev seems to understand the situation much better than Gorbachev, who until very late does not comprehend the fact that the Baltic states genuinely want to leave the Soviet Union, maybe up until the human chain of protesters forms on August 23, 1989.  Gorbachev believes that they could be kept in by negotiations and economic pressure.  The events inTbilision April 9, 1989, where the police killed 20 civilians trying to disperse nationalist rallies, should have been a wake-up call.  Chernyaev wonders if Gorbachev understands all the depth of the nationalities issue or if he is still under the influence of the Soviet official narrative of harmonious relations between ethnic groups under socialism.

The summer of 1989 brings the Solidarity victory in the Polish elections and the start of the Hungarian roundtable negotiations culminating in the first non-communist government in Eastern Europe inPolandand the Soviet acceptance of those events.  On the heels of the Polish and Hungarian breakthroughs comes the change of leadership inEast Germanyand the almost accidental yet fateful fall of the Berlin Wall.  In this case, just as on the issue of nationalism, Chernyaev shows a much better understanding of its true meaning than most other Soviet leaders.  In the fall of the Wall, he sees an end of an era, the true transformation of the international system, and a beginning of a new chapter in the European history.  The start of the process of German reunification and theMaltasummit signified the end of the Cold War.

However, for Chernyaev, his position notwithstanding, the year’s main concern was the domestic developments in theSoviet Union, and specifically the insufficient progress in radical economic and political reform.  A lot of entries deal with his disappointment in Gorbachev’s slow or ambivalent actions where he seems to be siding with conservatives, his inability to move more decisively even on the issues that he himself proclaimed, such as land reform.  Chernyaev’s main lament is that Gorbachev is losing time and political power as a result of his indecisiveness while the opposition is growing strong using “the Russian factor” and becoming more anti-Gorbachev and siding with Yeltsin more and more often in the Congress of People’s Deputies.

All through the tumultuous events of 1989, Anatoly Chernyaev remains at Gorbachev’s side, faithful to the ideas and the promise of the reform, but at the same time more and more critical at the weaknesses and inconsistencies of his boss and growing more dissatisfied by the emerging distance in their personal relationship.  The last entry of the year, for December 31, is written in the form of a letter to Gorbachev, expressing all his disappointments and worries about the fate of the reform.  The diary entries allow historians an opportunity to see the days of 1989 as they unfolded, through the eyes of a most perceptive and involved participant.

The Chernyaev Diary was translated by Anna Melyakova and edited by Svetlana Savranskaya for the National Security Archive.