26 Quotes by Stephen Cohen

On March 11, 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev became leader of the Soviet Union, and within a few weeks the full-scale reformation he attempted to carry out both inside his country and in its cold war relations with the West, particularly the United States, began to unfold.

But critics of the war have no reason to regret their views.

There is an enormous amount of medical expense in this case. I imagine it is in the neighborhood of the mid to upper six figures, if not seven figures. And that's just medical expenses, not pain and suffering.

He is the only president after John F. Kennedy to be ahead of his government on India.

Pakistan already has a similar law but its record speaks for itself.

Both sides have tried all alternatives - ranging from ignoring the other side (India), to the use of force (Pakistan), to the threat of the use of force (India again). Now both sides have run out of options other than to sit across the table and talk.

The opportunities that Gorbachev created for international relations have also been missed, perhaps even lost - here, however, primarily because of the United States.

We were tied up in Korea; we were worried about the Russians. And, conceivably, they said 'nuclear' because they didn't want him to do anything for India; that this was a way of raising the stakes so high as to make it not an option.

Twenty years later, then, little, if anything, is left of the historic opportunities Gorbachev opened up for his country and the world.