Mikhail Gorbachev R.I.P.

Young'uns, by which I mean anyone under 50, don't understand the Cold War. Frankly, I completed a certificate in Security Studies, and I still don't get it. But it was a threat. A genuine threat.

When I lived in Mannheim, there was an American base just outside the city limits. There was a day when I was going to the little market at the end of the shopping street, right by the tram stop. It suddenly went silent, and I turned to look where everyone else was staring. Pieces of patriot missiles went past. We were all frozen. Three trucks with nose cones went past. The bells rang the quarter hour. The whole thing took less than a quarter of an hour, but my already pacifist self was completely changed.

Reagan was a saber rattler. Gorbachev wasn't. it is thanks to Gorbachev that the cold war ended without a hot war.

With Perestroika and Glasnost, the world transformed. Germany reunified. Poland was allowed to hold elections. Hungary was freed. Ukraine is a nation, thanks to Gorbachev, as are Georgia, Khazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Lithuania, Estonia, Romania, and Latvia. [The former Yugoslavia is a separate case.]

When I was taking International Relations, I was told that only international systems could change the world. Single countries couldn't, much less one person. I argued that King John certainly was one man who'd changed the world. Had it been a few years later, I would have argued Gorbachev was the best example.

Think about his legacy. Then think about the fact that young Russians consider him a traitor who betrayed the motherland.

Remember him for his courage and his actions. Remember him for letting freedom return to eastern Europe.