114 THE END OF THE COLD WAR
they exercised a degree of caution because they knew that she had
her own concerns about the Strategic Defense Initiative.^82 They were
sensitive to the possibility that this might have coloured her judge-
ment of Gorbachëv. But Reagan was the President, and he trusted her
instincts. She reinforced her message in person by flying to America
and joining the President at Camp David on 22 December 1984. In
their private meeting she repeated her excitement about the potential
she saw in Gorbachëv. Unlike Gromyko, Gorbachëv had let her talk
without interruption even when he disagreed with her – she liked this.
He had been charming and unconstrained.
After Gromyko’s trip, Reagan gave approval to a proposal to
resume talks about arms control in Geneva. Weinberger, Casey and
Kirkpatrick voiced disquiet – and Robert McFarlane, who had suc-
ceeded Clark as National Security Adviser in 1983, agreed with them.
Their obstructiveness discommoded Shultz, who also resented the
paucity of his information about the Strategic Defense Initiative. At a
meeting with its programme chief, Lieutenant Colonel James Abraham-
son, he felt that he received no better an account than Abrahamson
might have passed to a New York Times reporter. Shultz showed him
the door, vowing never to see him again.^83 On 14 November 1984 he
told Reagan face to face about his disquietude. While Shultz carried
out the President’s instructions, Weinberger, Casey and Kirkpatrick
treated him as an enemy and cut him out of their deliberations.
They briefed journalists against him and made damaging leaks. They
refused to follow up official decisions that conflicted with their prefer-
ences. Shultz objected that this made it impossible to construct a team
that could achieve the kind of progress that Reagan wanted. He con-
cluded: ‘So put somebody else in at State who can get along with them.
I can’t – and you will see no results without a team.’ The President was
aghast at the idea that he might resign. Shultz appreciated the reassur-
ance: ‘I’m not ducking out. There’s nothing I’d rather do. I have no
hidden agenda.’^84
Shultz wanted to bring a team to Geneva that enjoyed his confi-
dence and was eager to bring Nitze with him. Rowny disliked what
this implied. Nitze was a veteran negotiator accustomed to require-
ments of compromise, and Shultz turned to him for advice about how
to handle Gromyko.^85 Rowny pleaded to be allowed to join the party to
lend it better balance.^86 The Soviet delegation found Nitze congenial.
One of them, Lieutenant General Nikolai Detinov, called him ‘a man
of culture and learning’. Detinov added: ‘But Rowny, we don’t like,