Gorbachev: the man who watched the Berlin Wall fall

Mikhail Gorbachev, who died at the age of 91, will go down in 20th century history as the man thanks to whom the Cold War ended and the Berlin Wall was destroyed. However, between the two main protagonists of these decisive events, Ronald Reagan and Helmut Kohl, and him, things had started badly.

First with Ronald Reagan. Their first meeting took place in Geneva in November 1985. The American President obviously did not retain the favorable impression that François Mitterrand had had, who had been the first to receive the new Secretary General a month earlier and had informed his Washington counterpart. Reagan does not seek to seduce and immediately attacks on human rights, Soviet Jews, political prisoners. Gorbachev responds…