298 THE END OF THE COLD WAR
deter an attack, not to start one. To everyone’s surprise, Akhromeev
acknowledged that the Soviet force structure had features of an offen-
sive nature. He asked Carlucci to accept the genuineness of the USSR’s
commitment to military reform. This, he remarked, would inevitably
take time. He teased Carlucci by saying that the CIA must surely have
reported on Soviet military moves towards a defensive posture. Yazov
pointed out that the latest military exercise in East Germany was
entirely premised upon defence.^82
While this was happening at the side of the summit, the spotlight
remained on Reagan. His charm and affability conquered nearly
everyone who saw him in Moscow. He was cheered everywhere he
went, and the only annoyance for him was the way that the Soviet
security agencies manhandled some people in the crowd that gathered
on the street when the Reagans made a surprise appearance.^83 He had
to submit to the usual counter-intelligence precautions at the Ameri-
can embassy, where he and Nancy were staying. As he had done in
Reykjavik, he went into the ‘bubble’ to agree tactics with his travelling
team.^84 There was little new that had to be decided. The Intermedi-
ate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty text had been agreed at the
Washington summit: it remained only for it to be signed into defini-
tive operation.
At their first private meeting, Reagan spoke to Gorbachëv as a
friend and pleaded for the liberalization of rules on religion beyond
the Russian Orthodox Church. Gorbachëv rejected the request. But
they went on talking amicably and agreed to call each other Mikhail
and Ron.^85 At their second one-on-one meeting on 31 May, Gorbachëv
went to his desk drawer and took out letters from Soviet citizens who
had written to congratulate them on the advance towards peace in the
world. Some had named their children Ronald in the President’s
honour. Reagan was touched and offered to write to them personally.
He then gently recommended the benefits of free enterprise and com-
petition. Gorbachëv agreed that traditional state monopolies had not
worked well for the USSR. The single combine-harvester factory in
Krasnoyarsk had produced shoddy machinery until the government
refused to bail it out. Now, he claimed, the standard of output had
reached a satisfactory level. His entire purpose, he told the President,
was to introduce a new form of socialism. He was sure that the people
would support it. He revelled in the way things were going, and said
the Soviet Union ‘was now the number one country in the world when
it came to debate’. He denied wanting to level society out like a wooden