The day they nearly banned the bomb

The celebrated Reykjavik summit in October 1986 between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev was not a disaster, as commonly thought. Instead it marked an important step towards the US and Russia radically reducing their nuclear arsenals, the Cambridge Festival of Ideas will hear next month.

On the 30th anniversary of the summit, historians Professor David Reynolds and Dr Kristina Spohr will discuss its political significance at the time and now at an event at the Festival entitled‘The Day They Nearly Banned The Bomb’ on 26th October.

They say: “Reykjavik is usually thought of as a tragic failure and a historic missed opportunity for nuclear disarmament because neither side was willing to compromise over Reagan’s ‘Star Wars’ Project. Our talk challenges this verdict by looking at what happened over the following year. In fact, neither leader – despite initial dejection – considered Reykjavik a disaster; rather, as Gorbachev said, it was a ‘step in a complicated dialogue’. We follow the two men over the next few months to the conclusion of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty in Washington in November 1987 – the first time the superpowers had actually reduced their nuclear arsenals. This agreement would have been inconceivable without their synergy at Reykjavik, when each leader catalysed the anti-nuclear radicalism of the other.”

This Festival event will reveal what was at stake at the summit. Using transcripts from the meetings, the two historians will role-play parts of the dramatic final session between these two remarkable and much misunderstood personalities and bring alive for a Cambridge audience the theatre of international politics.

It is based on a new book edited by David Reynolds, Professor of International History at the University of Cambridge, and Dr Spohr, Associate Professor of International History at LSE, which is published at a time of renewed debate over nuclear weapons under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of Labour and fears about Russia's current role on the international stage. The book, Transcending the Cold War, explores the role of leadership in the ending of the Cold War – a subject the editors feel has received insufficient attention. They say: “Europe was re-united suddenly and peacefully in 1989-90. There were many reasons for this – people power in the streets, structural change across the Soviet bloc, American military and financial pressure, etc. – but we argue that leaders at the top, acting in tandem, were hugely important. Their contribution has so far been overlooked.”

Transcending the Cold War brings together a team of scholars from five different countries, whose work started at a conference in Cambridge two years ago, in order to explore the vast range of archival materials from the various national archives. The editors emphasize that the book shows the importance of face-to-face meetings and has lessons for today’s Western leaders when dealing with Russia. The challenge, they say, is to know “when to reach out and when to stand firm”. This matters as much in the days of Merkel and Putin as it did in the era of Reagan and Gorbachev.

The Festival of Ideas runs from 17 - 30 October and hosts over 200 events ranging from theatre, art and museum exhibitions to music performances, lectures and debates. Now in its ninth year, most of the Festival events are free and take place in lecture theatres and university buildings around Cambridge. The Festival sponsors and partners are Cambridge University Press, St John's College, Anglia Ruskin University, RAND Europe, Microsoft Research, Cambridge Assessment, University of Cambridge Language Centre, Arts Council England, University of Cambridge Museums and Botanic Garden, Cambridge Junction, Arts and Humanities Research Council, and the Festival media partner is BBC Radio Cambridgeshire.