Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP
Paul Letters
Opinion

Opinion

Paul Letters

The end of history? Communism and the cold war continue to blight democratic ideals 30 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall

  • We still live in a world of authoritarian regimes of Russia, China and North Korea on one side, and the democratic US and its allies on the other, with proxy-war rivalries playing out in Syria and Ukraine. With a renewed arms race and second cold war upon us, what’s changed?

Paul Letters
Paul Letters

Updated: 4:37am, 8 Nov, 2019

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Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (left) and US president Ronald Reagan exchange pens after signing a landmark nuclear treaty in 1987 that cooled the arms race between the two countries. Gorbachev recently warned that abandoning the treaty risks a fresh arms race that endangers the world. Photo: AP
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Paul Letters

Paul Letters

Paul Letters is a novelist, journalist and historian.