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Moscow () — Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who died at the age of 91, warned the United States and Russia to avoid a “hot war” during an interview with in 2019. We recapture the dialogue with reporters below.
The day sat down with Gorbachev in Moscow, then-US President Donald Trump had made a surprise visit to US soldiers in Afghanistan, where he announced that peace talks with the Taliban were resuming. Like the Soviet Union three decades ago, the United States was trying to negotiate an exit from Afghanistan while making sure that the central government in Kabul did not collapse.
In 1989, the United States and the Soviets were on opposite sides of the conflict, with Washington supporting mujahideen fighters trying to topple the Soviet-backed regime government of Afghanistan’s president, Mohammad Najibullah. But just over two years later, the USSR collapsed, aid to the Kabul government dried up, and the Najibullah government fell.
Asked what lessons could be drawn from the withdrawal of Soviet troops, Gorbachev said: “They must withdraw. That’s the main lesson. You know, it’s like a match. The match is lit, a fire spreads. And these clashes, When the major major countries in this conflict become more and more involved, they are dangerous to all nations.”
Russia began withdrawing its soldiers from Afghanistan in the late 1980s.
One of the many historical events that Gorbachev starred in as a leader was the signing of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 1987.
That pillar of arms control effectively fell apart this year, after the United States formally withdrew and the Russian government said the deal had been trashed.
Asked about the demise of the treaty he signed with then-US President Ronald Reagan, Gorbachev expressed hope that such arms control agreements can be revived.
“All the agreements that exist are preserved and not destroyed,” he said. “But these are the first steps towards the destruction of [lo que] must not be destroyed in any case. Therefore, if this path goes further, then everything is possible. This should not be allowed.”
The ultimate goal of arms control, he added, must be to get rid of nuclear weapons altogether.
That, however, seems like a more remote possibility, given the enduring mistrust between Moscow and Washington. During the interview, Gorbachev expressed his hope that Washington and Moscow could find a way to prevent a “hot war” in the future.
“I think this should be avoided,” Gorbachev said, when asked if the world was entering a new and dangerous era of multipolar rivalry between states. “It’s good that there is already a conversation all over the world and people are talking, people are reacting, and this is the most important thing.
“The speakers and the politicians, the people understand that this, the New Cold War, must not be allowed. This could result in a hot war that could mean the destruction of our entire civilization. That must not be allowed.”
That Cold War, of course, has been a subject of intense pop culture interest, especially after the release of HBO’s acclaimed “Chernobyl” television series.
The recent HBO series “Chernobyl” examines Gorbachev’s decision-making during the nuclear disaster.
When asked if he had seen the series, Gorbachev said that he had not, but suggested that his decision-making as Soviet leader at the time of the 1986 nuclear disaster may have been misrepresented.
“I haven’t seen it, but I know in detail” the history of Chernobyl, he said. “I will say that as a result, the most important thing is that we have studied all the reasons [del desastre]. All these conclusions were given to all other countries. These findings are a lesson for all. They say: ‘Why were you silent for several days?’ But I say that it was exactly as I said before, not the other way around. We didn’t understand what had happened.”
Gorbachev is the subject of “Meeting Gorbachev,” a documentary by filmmaker Werner Herzog that opens in Russia on December 5. The film’s reception is a must see: Gorbachev is not revered in Russia the way he was in the West, and his name brings up associations of the painful Soviet collapse that still hangs over society and culture. russians
Publisher’s note: This interview was originally published on December 1, 2019. The information was updated after the death of the former Soviet leader.
