PREFACE xxihas been helpful in looking out for books and articles in the Russian
Library.
My thanks go to George Shultz for talking to me at length about
his time at the State Department. I am also grateful to Charles Hill,
Executive Assistant to Secretary Shultz in those years, for several
informative conversations. Since it is part of my analysis that George
Shultz – along with Eduard Shevardnadze – was one of the decisive
enablers of the peace-making process, his oral testimony has been
invaluable. I am indebted to Harry Rowen for explaining his memories
and to Jack Matlock and Richard Pipes, who kindly answered queries
by correspondence. On the Soviet side, I have enjoyed discussions in
past years with Mikhail Gorbachëv’s aides Anatoli Chernyaev and
Andrei Grachëv, and former Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Anatoli
Adamishin has cheerfully answered queries about his diary and
offered ideas about lines of research. Lord (Des) Browne, UK Defence
Secretary in more recent years, and Steve Andreasan of the Nuclear
Threat Initiative have sharpened my understanding on the lingering
dangers of nuclear weapons in the world after the Cold War.
I have had frequent discussions at the Hoover Institution with
Robert Conquest, Peter Robinson and Michael Bernstam. Each wrote
influentially at the time of the events under scrutiny. I was helped by
their willingness to explain the idiosyncrasies of the American politi-
cal system and its dealings with the USSR. I would also like to thank
Joerg Baberowski, Tim Garton Ash, Paul Gregory, Mark Harrison,
Jonathan Haslam, Tom Hendriksen, David Holloway, Stephen Kotkin,
Norman Naimark, Silvio Pons, Yuri Slezkine and Amir Weiner for
discussions about the Cold War when we were together in the San
Francisco Bay area. Hoover Institution Director John Raisian’s support
for this and other projects has been warm and consistent over many
years and the financial sponsorship of the Sarah Scaife Foundation has
been much appreciated.
Conversations with Roy Giles at the Russian Centre in St Antony’s
College have given me invaluable insights into Western military think-
ing in the late 1980s. I also thank Laurien Crump for her advice on
sources about the Warsaw Pact while she was a research fellow with us.
I have benefited from bibliographical advice from Archie Brown, Julie
Newton, Alex Pravda and Sir Adam Roberts. Richard Davy offered
ideas on European security history. Over many years, Norman Davies’s
comments on Russia and Europe have enlivened our partnership in
London and Oxford.