That moment outside the hospital captured the essence of the man who eventually shattered the philosophical underpinnings of the New Deal, made conservatism a governing ideology, and reshaped the world for eight years. His emphasis on positivism and strength, excessive, perhaps, at times, served as the cornerstone of his power and his political appeal. His success was based on his ceaseless promotion of an exalted vision of America and a theatrical, telegenic approach to presidential leadership that gave him a direct connection to ordinary Americans.
advertisement
Yet there were extraordinary tensions at the core of Reagan's presidency. He called America a "shining city on a hill" but showed little sensitivity to the poor, the homeless, and others who needed help from their government. Critics charged that his embrace of laissez-faire attitudes promoted an atmosphere of greed and profligacy. He talked of fiscal sanity but allowed the deficit to balloon, cutting income taxes while he ramped up defense spending. He left the federal government with enormous structural budget deficits and an immense national debt, but still, the economy boomed.
Reagan saw himself as a man of conviction, but he was not above cutting a deal to get results. He vowed not to make concessions to terrorists but sent arms to Iran in an attempt to win the freedom of Americans held hostage in Lebanon. The resulting scandal almost destroyed his presidency.
On social issues, Reagan hewed to a hard conservative line, opposing abortion, supporting prayer in schools, favoring the abolition of the Departments of Education and Energy, backing tough anticrime bills, appointing conservative judges to the bench, and opening public lands to private development.
One question will dominate historians' assessments of the Reagan era: Did his policies cause, or at least hasten, the collapse of communism? Reagan's defenders say his defense buildup--he increased military spending from $185 billion in 1982 to nearly $304 billion in 1989--and his relentless diplomatic and military pressure and covert actions broke the back of communism, an achievement of profound importance. But his critics argue that communism was collapsing anyway, a victim of its own excesses and structural flaws, and say Reagan wasted billions of dollars on a fool's errand.
The available evidence suggests a middle ground. Anatoly Chernyaev, one of Mikhail Gorbachev's closest aides, believes Reagan's policies were neither inconsequential nor overwhelmingly decisive in forcing the Kremlin's hand. Instead, those policies served as a contributing factor pushing Gorbachev toward political and economic reforms at home and arms-control agreements with the West.
Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative was a constant preoccupation in Moscow. Gorbachev worried that SDI would escalate the arms race to undreamed-of levels, straining Soviet resources to the breaking point, and this fear helped to push him toward accommodation, even though such a system remains unproven. By 1986, Reagan was so convinced that Gorbachev was a practical-minded reformer that he almost took one of the most dangerous gambles in the history of superpower relations. When the two men met again during a wintry October weekend in Reykjavik, Iceland, their talks started with great promise. Gorbachev expressed his willingness to eliminate all Soviet medium-range nuclear missiles from Europe. Talks quickly moved into dangerous territory: Reagan, to the consternation of his hard-line aides, said he would be willing to eliminate all U.S. nuclear weapons if the Soviets did the same. That, Reagan's experts agreed later, would have been a massive error that would have made the West vulnerable to Moscow's huge advantage in conventional forces. Only when Gorbachev insisted that Reagan abandon SDI did the president balk. The summit quickly broke down.
Previous Page
