The opportunities that Gorbachev created for international relations have also been missed, perhaps even lost - here, however, primarily because of the United States.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The reality is that we have missed a lot of opportunities in Iraq because of a failed policy.
The fact is that Americans were sent to Russia that have not been returned.
The essential meaning of perestroika for Gorbachev and his supporters was creating and acting on alternatives to failed and dangerous policies at home and abroad.
I left Gorbachev's office thinking that everything about him was outsized: his achievements, his mistakes, and, now, his vanity and bitterness.
The starting point for understanding the deterioration in the relationship between the U.S. and Russia lies in Washington rather than Moscow. After 1989, Russia was a defeated power. Despite the fine words and some limited gestures, the Americans have treated it like one. Their policy has been one of encirclement.
This president failed so miserably in diplomacy that we are now forced to war.
With hindsight, we see that the Soviet Union never had a chance of world domination, but we didn't know that then.
Everybody has forgotten that Russia helped start the Second World War.
Whoever does not miss the Soviet Union has no heart. Whoever wants it back has no brain.
Following the missile crisis, detente started to gain ground between the United States and the Soviet Union, so the international political climate improved after that.