Matlock - Reagan and Gorbachev : how the Cold War ended

REAGAN
AND
GORBACHEV

HOW THE COLD
WAR ENDED

Jack F. Matlock, Jr.

RANDOM HOUSE
NEW YORK

CONTENTS

To
Rebecca Burrum Matlock,
who helped make the good things happen

FOREWORD

Some of the NSC staff are too hard line
and dont think any approach should be made to the Soviets.
I think Im hard line and will never appease.
But I do want to try to let them see there is a better world
if theyll show by deed that they want to get along with the free world.

RONALD REAGAN, diary entry of April 6, 19831

I WAS CHANGING for dinner in my dressing room in the ornate, imitation-French-chateau residence of the American ambassador in Prague when the telephone rang. Prague was not one of our most active diplomatic posts in 1983 and telephone calls at awkward times were not common. In fact, during my eighteen months in Prague, nobody had dared ring me when I was dressing.

Nevertheless, the call pleased me. I had often wondered why my predecessor had installed a telephone in the dressing room. Now I could testify to the wisdom of providing for contingencies, however unlikely.

When I picked up the receiver, I heard the excited voice of the Czech international operator, whose anxiety was all but palpable: Pane Velvyslance (Mr. Ambassador), excuse me for ringing you at home, but the White House is calling from Washington. Twenty-five years of communism had not sufficed to extinguish totally the traditional Czech sense of propriety: one does not disturb an ambassador just before the dinner hour for any but the supreme interests of state.

Dkuji, pkn rozumm (Thanks, I understand perfectly), I muttered, amused at her agitation. First, I was not about to be upset over a call when I was dressing, since it wasup to thena unique experience. Rather like General Halftrack in the comic strip Camp Swampy, at times I wondered if Washington knew we were there. Second, her assumption that the call was important, just because it emanated from the White House, was touching in its navet. I well knew that important business from the White House or State Department was not conducted on open telephone lines. Therefore, the call was most likely to alert me to the travel of a congressman or to cadge an invitation to an embassy dinner for some White House staffers friend who would be traveling in the area.

It was my turn to register surprise when the White House operator, having established that I was in fact Ambassador Matlock, informed me that Judge Clark was calling. I felt a surge of distinctly mixed emotion: it was flattering to be remembered by the presidents assistant for national security, and it was always pleasant to talk to Bill Clark, whom I had known since he came to Washington as deputy secretary of state.

Nevertheless, I suddenly recalled a conversation with Clark in Washington the year before: he had asked if I was interested in the position of Soviet specialist on the National Security Council staff when Richard Pipes returned to Harvard. I told him that I would prefer to stay in Prague, since I had been there only a year. There were certainly plenty of people available in Washington who could handle the Soviet portfolio, which, in any case, was not a very active one in the fall of 1982. I returned to Prague believing that this question was behind me and I could look forward to another couple of years looking after American interests in Czechoslovakia.

My suspicion about the subject of the call proved accurate. The question I thought had been resolved was still open.

Jack, I know we are on an open line and cant discuss details, but you will recall our conversation last November. I just wanted you to know that we are reorganizing, and wed like you to take over a bigger job. It will include all of Europe, your specialty, and Canada to boot. Could you come to Washington next week and talk about it? George Shultz thinks you are the right person, and we have some special projects in mind wed like to discuss.

I answered that I would be delighted to come to Washington and talk it over, but made it clear that I was not eager to leave Czechoslovakia and reenter the bruising arena of Washington politics.

No sooner had I laid the telephone receiver on its cradle and started for Rebeccas dressing room (as I said, it is a palatial residence), to let her know that an abrupt change in our lives might be in the offing, than the ringing resumed. (How prescient my predecessor now seemed!) This time it was Mark Palmer in the State Department.

Jack, he began, I wanted you to know that youll be getting a call soon from Judge Clark, and...

I already have, I interrupted.

Oh, in that case, all I have to say is I hope you didnt say no this time. The secretary really wants you to take this job and hes going to be mighty annoyed if you keep turning it down. Will we see you next week?

Yes, youll see me next week. But Im just not sure about the job. My place is in the field. I like to work in embassies, and like to deal with other countries. Thats why I joined the foreign service. I detest the Washington bureaucracy, and I am sure the feeling is reciprocated. I dont think Im the person you need there now. Besides, I havent even spoken to Rebecca about it yet.

All right, just dont say no until we have a chance to talk. And, by the way, dont think Shultz is going to put you up for another embassy if you disappoint him now.

I get the picture, but Im not convinced. See you next week.

JUDGE CLARK IS an early riser, so it was no surprise when I was invited for a working breakfast at seven the day after I arrived in Washington. We met at the White House mess. Not in the larger room to which every deputy assistant to the president and even most special assistants to the president (the next rung down on the White House bureaucratic ladder) have access, but in the small one reserved for what is known in the West Wing as senior staffthe chief of staff and the full-fledged assistants to the president.

There were four of us at the table. Robert McFarlane, Clarks deputy, whom even casual acquaintances called Bud, and Admiral John Poindexter, then in the number three position of executive secretary, joined the judge and me. At first we talked about Prague, Soviet leader Yuri Andropovs health, and the staff reorganization at the NSC. Geographic and functional specialties would be grouped as they were at the State Department, meaning that there would be a section to cover Europe and Canada, which would include the USSR. Vancouver to Vladivostokthe long way round was the apt description of the portfolio offered.

At seven-thirty Judge Clark left for a meeting with the president and asked McFarlane and Poindexter to brief me on the special project he had mentioned when he telephoned.

When the president came to office, McFarlane began (I paraphrase from memory), he felt that we were too weak to negotiate effectively with the Soviets. Therefore, his first priority was to restore our strength. There is still a lot to do, but the president is satisfied that he has restored enough momentum to our defense programs to deal with the Soviets effectively. In fact, he feels it is time to pursue negotiations aggressively.