GRINDING OUT THE TREATY 291strategic ballistic missiles. Although Gorbachëv complained about the
Strategic Defense Initiative, he did so in a somewhat perfunctory
fashion; he entirely ceased trying to make any further progress in arms
reduction conditional upon Reagan agreeing to scrap his favourite
project. Instead he merely suggested that if the Americans went ahead
with deployment, the Kremlin would order the development and con-
struction of more powerful new missiles that could overwhelm any
defence system. He also repeated his intention to pull Soviet forces out
of Afghanistan. While declining to set a date for the withdrawal, he
promised that it would happen soon. He asked in return for America
to refrain from assisting the mujahidin. Reagan turned down the
request: he could see no reason why the Americans should withhold
help from those who were rebelling against an illegitimate government
installed by the USSR.^31
The exchanges were robust but friendly even though Shultz thought
it insensitive of the President to tell a favourite joke about the USSR
while Gorbachëv was trying to explain his hopes to reconstruct Soviet
society. Shultz said bluntly: ‘Mr President, stop. Gorbachëv makes an
impassioned and positive statement and then you tell a joke that insults
him.’ Reagan refused to curb himself: he used humour to impress his
ideas about the need for the Soviet authorities to acknowledge the
rights of the individual, and he did not mind if he offended them – and
Shultz came to appreciate his President’s attitude.^32
Reagan thought it ‘the best summit we’d ever had with the Soviet
Union’.^33 This was how he briefed Democrat and Republican leaders at
breakfast on 11 December. Surveys of American public opinion indi-
cated a rise in his rating. On all sides he was receiving plaudits. The
world appeared safer after he and Gorbachëv announced their accord
about intermediate-range nuclear forces. Reagan phoned leaders in
Tokyo, Paris and London with his news.^34 He and Shultz were elated
about the prospect of further progress towards arms reduction. A
serious compromise had been mooted at the summit when Shultz
had indicated that the Americans might be willing to adhere to the
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty for several years ahead and abandon their
freedom to carry out tests of the Strategic Defense Initiative. Gor-
bachëv liked any idea of delaying deployment. He in turn signalled
that the USSR would not object to America deploying its system at the
end of the agreed period. This opened a possible route towards a new
treaty on strategic nuclear weapons. On 13 December Shultz made
a jubilant announcement to the world’s media. If only the two talks