Hey Germany, Ronald Reagan Deserves a Thank You Too

In August 1984 I was a Fulbright scholar to the Federal Republic of Germany.  Ronald Reagan was about to be elected to his second term as president and I was no fan of the Hollywood actor-turned-politician.   

The first week I arrived in Germany, Reagan made his infamous joke during a microphone check.  He quipped, “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you that I’ve just signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever.  We begin bombing in five minutes.”  The irreverent German magazine Der Spiegel ran a picture of Reagan with a clown nose and headline, “Der Spinnt.” (He’s Crazy)

I had protested Reagan’s aggressive foreign policy agenda as a political science student at Clemson University.  I joined the Clemson Peace Club and we met in protest of Reagan administration policies, including missile build-up in Europe and U.S. policy toward Central America.

I was appalled at Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative or Star Wars, and shared the sentiment of many of my European friends that Reagan was more than a bit mad. I even hated holding the same given name as Reagan’s wife.  

Reagan’s Evil Empire March 1983 speech to the National Association of Evangelicals about U.S. and Soviet motives made me reel:

In your discussions of the nuclear freeze proposals, I urge you to beware the temptation of pride, the temptation of blithely declaring yourselves above it all and label both sides equally at fault, to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil.

It was all so black and white, no Technicolor, like a voiceover from Frank Capra’s Why We Fight series.  I worried that the world would see all Americans as harboring the same us versus them mentality that Reagan represented.

My brother Steve disagreed with me.  He loved the fact that Reagan made America feel strong and proud again after four years of malaise under Jimmy Carter.  He wrote me during my stay in Germany and said that I should feel proud to be an American.  I’m sure he hoped that I would defend the American president.  I did not.  

So why my change of heart today?  Well, I’m older now, maybe even a little wiser.  I do see Reagan in a different light.  After twenty years of studying persuasion and public diplomacy, I have to credit Reagan with his disciplined approach to challenging his Cold War nemesis, the Soviet Union.  

A recent column by Malte Lehming in Der Tagesspiegel made me take notice.  Lehming notes that as the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall is about to be celebrated, it is former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev who is credited the most with uniting the two Germanys, not Reagan.  “Gorbymania” is out of control, according to Lehming.  Reagan is derided.  

How can the German people not acknowledge that Reagan’s arm race helped to bankrupt the Soviet Union?  And we shouldn’t forget that it took the Communist-hating president to sit down and negotiate with Gorbachev.  

Gorby and Reagan needed each other for the USSR and USA to meet as two competitors willing to pull each other back from the brink of MADness (Mutually Assured Destruction).  

I can understand that Reagan will never have the Rock Star status in Germany of Mikhail Gorbachev.  Reagan is just too square for the Europeans.  His American awe-shucks humor and sentimental devotion to wife Nancy doesn’t compute.  

Nevertheless, he understood the power of American persuasion in the world.  Reagan wrote that his administration was “determined to stop losing the propaganda war.”  As Nicholas Cull points out in his eloquent historical book, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency (Cambridge University Press), the CIA estimated that at the time of Carter's leaving and Reagan’s ascent to office, the Soviet Union was on foreign propaganda overdrive, spending $2.2 billion to USIA's $480 million.  

Reagan was as ideologically confident about America’s role in the world, according to Cull, as was Kennedy.  Like Kennedy, Reagan shared a devotion to counter-offensives that merged propaganda with disinformation.  We may not always like these tactics, but they do get results.  

In his second term, Ronald Reagan said, “I believe that our public diplomacy represents a powerful force, perhaps the most powerful force at our disposal, for shaping the history of the world.”  With that confidence, Reagan would sit down across the table from Gorbachev and later challenge him at the Brandenburg Gate: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”  By 1988, Reagan was seen by the Russian public as sincere, even likable.  

Twenty years later Reagan deserves credit, along with his ideological sparring partner Gorbachev, for getting the Soviet Union to loosen its iron grip on Europe and allow the reunification of East and West Germany.   

Dr. Nancy Snow teaches courses on war, media and propaganda and advanced public diplomacy at the Newhouse School, Syracuse University, New York.  Reach her at www.nancysnow.com 

 

 

Follow Nancy Snow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/drpersuasion

Comments

[LeeX]

Reagan was the worst president ever. His only saving grace was that he had advisers who had some sense and competency, even tho they were generally a bunch of scoun.drels. Reagan wanted to a full-on war in Central America, he was nutz!

[Nancy Snow - Huffpost Blogger]

Thanks. I'll take a look. This is a blog, not a book. Reagan is a flawed president, and I spoke out against many of his policies while he was president.

[Nancy Snow - Huffpost Blogger]

You are welcome. President Obama knows very well the powerful persuasive impact that Reagan had, which is why he too went to Berlin. It wasn't just to emulate Kennedy.

[Nancy Snow - Huffpost Blogger]

When I lived in Germany for a year the Germans I knew thought the Reagans were a joke. This was a generational attitude, shared mostly by my peers, the very young people in their teens and early 20s. Older Germans appreciated Reagan's dedication to anti-Communism.

Also, "Du spinnst wohl!, Spinnst du?" translates to "You must be crazy!" and "Are you crazy!"

I call Der Spiegel irreverent because it was famous for its bold covers. Yes, that's the nature of many a political statement.

I'm not ashamed of America. I'm simply telling a story about my life at a certain time. If you were to read my books, you'd see that I've been critical of specific US policies my entire life, without that impacting my love of this country I know best.

[John Garner]

Flawed Logic. Reagan only continued a policy that had been in effect for 45 years by Presidents both democratic and republican. Lets not forget Reagan's Illegal wars in central America, arms dealing with Iran, and who knows what else.

[TryToBeFlexible]

Reagan was a truly evil person. His purposeful inaction on the AIDS epidemic led directly to the 50 million infected today, and the millions dead. He was obviously already deep into Alzheimers. Of course, I can see where him making a few bumbling speeches would TOTALLY destroy a vast nuclear empire. After 50 years of proxy wars, weapons races, diplomacy, MAD, etc., it all boiled down to him making some speeches! Yeah, that did it!
And of course, in the right wing mind, EVERYONE loves Reagan. I have to say, I don't know anyone among my intelligent friends who think he was a good president.

[Transit]

Ronald Reagan was a major player during the Cold War. That's a fact. How much he can be accredited to the fall of the Berlin Wall is another thing altogether. Your lament that the German people do not appreciate what he did for them and saying his American awe-shucks humor and sentimental devotion to his wife Nancy doesn’t compute in their minds sadly shows a profound ignorance on your part of the German culture. You couldn't say Glen Beck speaks for all Americans.

And since when is a magazine irreverent because it publishes what amounts to a political cartoon on its cover? isn't that the very nature of the political statement? By the way, "Der spinnt" translates in this case closer to "He's talking through his hat" than it does to "He's Crazy".

Like your brother said, "Proud to be an American" is nothing to be ashamed of. It is shameful, however, to let this stop you from speaking out against those policies which would do harm. I'm thinking of the Iran-Contra Affair, poison gas delivered to Saddam, and agreeing to let Germany, if need be, become the scene of a "Limited Nuclear War". You seem ashamed for having done that. Don't be!

[S1m0n]

If you're credit Reagan's arms race with bringing down the Soviets, you need to credit Carter's Afghan war.

But either way, it's silly. Without Reagan's arms build-up, the Soviet Union would have hit the identical roadblock at the same time. The arms race didn't have that much to do with the weakness of the Soviet economy, and had little to do with it's fall.

[Leatherhelmet]

Reagan was the greatest president since FDR and one of the top five. The Germans will not
give him the credit Gorby gets because Gorby is more of a home boy to whats left of commies in East Germany and the Social Democrats of the West Germany. Unfortunately, Obama is repeating the same mistakes as Carter. He would be smarter to learn what worked for Reagan and what worked for Bill Clinton. Thanks for the nice article on Reagan.

[RabidRightRebel]

Regan was a great President only if you ignore that facts that;
-he was totally financially irresponsible and ran up huge deficits,
-he promoted the transfer of American manufacturing operations to foriegn countries through NAFTA and other trade agreements,
-he sold chemical weapons to Iraq which Saddam used to gas the Kurds, and
-he sold weapons to the Iranians and used the funds to finance right wing death squads in Nicaragua.

But what the heck being financially irresponsible, not caring about American jobs, selling chemical weapons to dictators and financing death squads is what every great President does!!

[thebigbike]

For a different take on the Reagan issue, take a look at Haynes Johnson's thorough and clearheaded recounting of the Reagan years, "Sleepwalking Through History."

[stavros]

Reagan deserves nothing.