| Summary/Abstract |
The final half decade of the Cold War was characterized by a series of unexpected developments.1 Despite having subscribed to a Marxist–Leninist ideology for seventy years, in 1986 the Soviet Union responded to an economic downturn by adopting market-style economic reforms and liberalizing political reforms, called perestroika and glasnost, respectively. Even though the Soviet Union had previously seen the United States as inherently imperialistic, in the mid-1980s political rhetoric in the Soviet Union began to depict the United States as less of a mortal enemy and more of a partner in global security. Despite Ronald Reagan’s bellicose political rhetoric and commitment to render the Soviet Union’s nuclear deterrent impotent through the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), the Soviet Union sought to engage the United States in negotiations over the elimination of intermediate.
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