300 a short history of the united states
Herbert Walker Bush pardoned two others in 1992. Caspar Wein-
berger, the secretary of defense, was charged with four counts of per-
jury and making false statements, but President Bush pardoned him as
well.
In his final report Lawrence Walsh stated that there was no credible
evidence that Reagan himself had violated any criminal statute. “Nev-
ertheless, he set the stage for the illegal activities of others by encour-
aging and, in general terms, ordering support of the Contras... when
funds for the Contras were cut off by the Boland amendment.” Most
probably, Jim Wright later said, Reagan “was not really focused on
what he was saying” to his aides or agreeing to, “and had no memory
of it.”
In foreign relations Reagan felt obliged to send troops to
Lebanon in 1983 as part of an international peacekeeping force to help
quell a raging civil war that had brought the country to near-ruin. But
his efforts failed. On October 23 , 1983 , a suicide bomber crashed his
truck, laden with explosives, into the U.S. Marines barracks and killed
241 American servicemen. The President promptly withdrew the re-
maining troops from the country. Despite this tragic disaster, Reagan
himself suffered no political ill effects. He remained as pop ular as ever.
Thereafter he was known as the Teflon President, because nothing po-
litically unfavorable could stick to him.
He enjoyed one final success in foreign affairs when he agreed with
the new Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, to end the deployment of
intermediate-range nuclear forces (INFs) in Europe. On assuming
power as chairman of the Soviet Communist Party in 1985 Gorbachev
inherited severe economic problems that required a different direction
for Russia. He announced a new policy of “openness,” or glasnost, to
rid the country of Soviet-style secretiveness and repression. He advo-
cated a form of free speech and a certain degree of political freedom. In
addition, he proposed a policy of “restructuring,” or perestroika, by
which the failing Soviet economy could be improved by adopting
free-market policies of western capitalistic societies.
To achieve the goals of glasnost and perestroika, Gorbachev had to
cut the size of the Soviet military apparatus and redirect Russia’s eco-