George Washington to New Hampshire, 29 December 1777 (Detail, GLC03706) The Cold War: Reagan/Gorbachev and the End of the Cold War by Stephen Van Nuys Lake Forest High School http://www.reaganfoundation.org/reagan/speeches/wall.asp Doc. 1: Before students read this document, the teacher should briefly review the crisis around the creation of the Berlin Wall in 1961 and the tension it created between the US and USSR. The teacher should also address the presidency of Ronald Reagan, emerging from the problems of the 1970s (post Vietnam/post Watergate/Carter Administration). Reagan's blunt rhetoric regarding his opposition to détente & SALT II, as well as his public description of the Soviet Union as an "Evil Empire" in 1983 should also be addressed. Reagan's Strategic Defense Iniative (SDI) and its impact on triggering a potential "New Cold War" in the 1980s should also be mentioned. The emergence of Mikhail Gorbachev as General Secretary in the Soviet Union and his programs of restructuring (Perestroika) and openess (Glasnost) should have been covered in class before students read the documents. Finally students should be aware that Reagan and Gorbachev, beginning in 1985, did have several meeting, addressing the reduction of arms and tensions between the two nations, which began a process of "thawing out" the Cold War and will eventually lead to its end. Doc. 1 are exerpts from a speech Reagan gave at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin in Germany in June of 1987. ….Our gathering today is being broadcast throughout Western Europe and North America. I understand that it is being seen and heard as well in the East. To those listening throughout Eastern Europe , a special word: Although I cannot be with you, I address my remarks to you just as surely as to those standing here before me. For I join you, as I join your fellow countrymen in the West, in this firm, this unalterable belief: Es gibt nur Berlin (There is only one Berlin). Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and and check points all the same--still a restriction on the total right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a totalitarian state. Yet it is here in Berlin where the wall emerges most clearly; here, cutting across your city, where the news photo and the televsion screen have imprinted this brutal division of a continent upon the mind of the world. Standing before the Brandenburg Gate, every man is a German, separated from his fellow men. Every man is a Berliners, forced to look upon a scar. President von Weizsacker has said, "The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed." Today I say: As long as the gate is closed, as long as this scar of a wall is permitted to stand, it is not the German question alone that remains open, but the question of freedom of all mankind. Yet I do not come here to lament. For I find in Berlin a message of hope, even in the shadow of this wall, a message of triumph…. …And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadscasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control. Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause for world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!...... 1. What type of document is this and how does this factor into its tone and language? 2. Why do you think Reagan spoke in German in part of this speech; who else had done this, when, why? 3. Why does Reagan refer to the Berlin Wall as a scar? Explain the symbolism of this term. 4. Why is the "German Question" so important to Reagan; was it important to the Soviet Union, why (short and long term)? 5. What might be a reason why Reagan addresses changes occuring within the Soviet Union, what might be his intention? 6. If you were Gorbachev in 1987, what would be one reason why you would allow the Berlin Wall to come down and what would be a reason why you would want to preserve it, be sure to explain both of your answers.