328 THE END OF THE COLD WAR
continued to bail out communism, the NATO countries would only
have to foot an increased bill for their defence – and this seemed at
best a quixotic way of proceeding.^69 The CIA sided with the State
Department. Intelligence reports stressed that Romania was in a very
volatile condition, but Gates and his officials stressed that America
could have only a marginal influence on events in Eastern Europe. It
appeared better to wait on developments.^70 Despite the signs of big
changes on the horizon, the CIA leadership in May 1988 was confident
that there would be no ‘unravelling of Moscow’s East European
empire’.^71 That November the agency asserted that the USSR would
never engage in a unilateral withdrawal from the region.^72
Old assumptions and analyses were trumping open-minded
specu lation. This was equally true in the capitals of America and
the Soviet Union. Everyone felt the ground of politics was shaking. The
American administration sensed that trends were favourable to its
wishes and interests, but nobody in Washington was yet forecasting an
earthquake.