That you spoke with him for an interview as many as eight different days. Prof. Taubman yes, my wife and i had eight long interviews with him. And then several other encounters at conferences where i knew he was going to be or he invited me to show up. Person did you see in over those eight different interviews, and how many years whether between all of those . Prof. Taubman the first interview was in 2007. The last was in 2016. What i saw apprised me. He was remarkably natural, informal, warm, humorous,. He did not ask questions in advance. He did not insist on having his own interpreter. Jane and i speak russian. So we did it ourselves. We recorded it. I have not met that many World Leaders, so i cant compare him. But i would be surprised if many of them are as, as i say, natural and informal as he was. Host what did you learn from those interviews . Prof. Taubman one thing i learned was a sense of him as a person, which i just described. In addition, i had questions that i asked over the course of those eight interviews. I had a strategy. One part of the strategy was to quote 10. I would hold up something he had said and read it and ask him to elaborate or take off from it. The reason was i did not want him to simply repeat what he might have. Began at thing was we the very beginning with his grandparents. I knew that he would want to talk about his time in power. Much, much later. But i had been told he might only grant us one interview. It worked. The first interview took two hours. Well my got up to 1949. Sure enough, we had more. Host what were the years he was in power . Prof. Taubman he was in power from march 1985, to december 1991. Christmas day, six years. Go to a chapter near the end called the final days. And the start reading a little bit of it and let you pick up from there. This was august to december of 1991. Gorbachev finally began to purchase opponents. Fewer did the job for him. The conspirators shot his wife and then himself. Former former Armed Services ,hief of staff marshal sir gay who had a broken with the military hardliners to become gorbachevs advisor, but wasnt a salud dissolution with his boss had cut short his vacation rushed to moscow to support the coup. He confessed in a letter what he did to gorbachev, and said i could no longer live with my fatherland. It is dying. Everything i have worked for is destroyed andches hanged himself. There is another one here but i will let you pick up. It seems like strong stuff. Prof. Taubman it is not only strong stuff, it is very indicative of several important things. On the one hand, it shows how disillusioned within with him where people who had worked with him. He had plotted against him in this coup. Joined in the progress. They had been or seem to be hardliners and they were. Now they were devastated with the way the whole thing came out. It is also indicative of how much he had trusted people like them who turned against him and betrayed him. Which was a devastating for him. Everything was devastating for him at the end. He was really, in some ways, isolated and alone, both his former supporters had abandoned him and these colleagues who had betrayed him now killed themselves. Host and another one on this list, a man named cucina. From his to his death apartment window. What role did he play in the coup and why did he take that action . Prof. Taubman key have been a Business Manager for the Central Community of the communist party. He had been the money man. Money, who had the passed it to communist parties in the west, or even to terrorist groups and the west which they did nothing money traceable which they did not want to be money traceable. God knows what else he did. He felt he was compromised by what he had done and i guess could not face the future. Host at the beginning of the chapter, you talk about mrs. Gorbachev and the letters, and later, the 25 notebooks mikhail gorbachev. What is that story . Prof. Taubman mrs. Gorbachev burned at the letters her husband sent to her when she kept a few. I have seen the few she kept. Clearere wonderfully indications of his state of mind. He wrote her one and he was a young man working in the provinces. He was utterly disillusioned with what he saw there. The way the communist party operated. The way the bureaucrats operated. Have been more to her they must have been wonderful and she burned them all because she did not want them ever to fall into the hands of the kind of people who had put them under house arrest. In the summer of august 1991. He burned notebooks, he kept a lot of notebooks in which in colored ink he entered notes to themselves to himself. Would have been a gold mine for a biographer. But that pales in comparison to the pain they must have felt as they destroyed this evidence of their lives. Host you mentioned 40s. Where is it . Prof. Taubman is at the southern tip of the crime area where gorbachev had a beautiful too luxurious villa. Advisor who had thought, until he saw the was aa, that gorbachev selfless political leader. When you saw this villa, he said it god, this is too much. Leading downalator to the beach. Writes, i was disillusioned by that. I followed up on this. I asked gorbachev about this. He said it was designed before i came into power. I am a too, have my own reservations about it. Host why did he use it . It was something that appalled him in other ways. I suppose, he was a man who rose from humble beginnings, as did his wife. I think one of their weaknesses, of which they had several, was that they were they felt they deserved to live well because they were doing so much for their country and had such a cost psychologically to themselves. Host i want to get to the coup in a minute. Two things in your book i wanted you to say more about. After he was out of power, you forbes had a jet for him to travel the united states. Prof. Taubman yes. Power, heas out of made a lot of speeches. He traveled to american cities. I believe he appeared on your program and many others. He did this to continue to spread this message to the world. He thought it was relevant as well as to his own country. But also to make money. Partly for himself, but also to support his foundation. , he had atired president ial library built. It, ivernment paid for believe, probably raised money privately, tivoli. Supportv received no from the government. They let him alone. He had to raise money to create a foundation, stop it, build a building for it. It did a lot of good work, charitable, and enlightenment and in and educational. He didnt did money for that. Host you say ted turner gave him 1 million . To do what . Prof. Taubman to build a building for the foundation after the first building, which the government let him use, for a wild. I think less than one year. It was taken away. Boris succeeded him as president. Yeltsin had granted him the building of on the condition that gorbachev would not criticize him. Gorbachev could not keep quiet. After yeltsin bombarded the parliaments with weapons and after inflation boomed and unemployment grew, gorbachev started criticizing him very severely and yells and got mad and took away his toys. Host i want to show you visio video of a press conference he had at the end of the coup attempt and have you talk about the queue. [video clip] came ander of people demanded a meeting with me. I do not know about such meetings. No one warned me about it. And why these people were here. The head of mike darda said he knew about it, and i said why did you let them through . The head of the kgb and administration of them. Host he is speaking, obviously, at a press conference. He is talking about what happened when the coup attempt was underway. Can you explain what the coup is all about and what were these these circumstances when they try to do this . Prof. Taubman the coup occurred in august, 1991. On vacation. Gone he was dead tired. His wife had said, lets go. The agreed to go. In retrospect, this was foolish. Machiavelli would have told him not to leave town. Because when a top leader who was besieged with critics leave town, they have an opening. They see they seized it. They sent a delegation to his villa on the black sea and they put him under house arrest. They confronted him with an ultimatum. Either you agree with what we are about to do, which was to crush the very program gorbachev was carrying out and reverse his policies these policies, or you stay under house arrest. He refused to do what they wanted to do. They went back to moscow to figure out what to do in his absence. He remained under house arrest. For two or three days until in moscow, people, tens of thousands came out on the street to protect his cause. Yeltsin climbed up on a tank and mobilized the resistance and the totters gave up and returned for us to release him. He put them under arrest. Yeltsin at the time of the coup attempt and whose side was he on . Prof. Taubman when the coup the capitaln was in of kazakhstan. Hugh flew back to moscow. And for some reason, probably because the coup plotters turned out to be the keystone cops, they failed to arrest him. Hoped to is that they get him to join them against. Orbachev but he refused. He instead went to the white house, as it was called. The seat of the russian government. At this point, russia was still part of the soviet union. He mobilized resistance. He forded the coup. The fact that they thought he might be a willing participant goes to show how angry and hostile gorbachev he was to he was to gorbachev at that time. He was one of the 15 republics of the soviet union. By that time, the baltics were breaking away and others were breaking away, too. Host back to the coup. How did they do it . How many people were involved . Security didle mr. Gorbachev have and pain that picture more. Prof. Taubman this delegation from moscow, which included the chief of the armed forces, gorbachevs chief of staff and others arrived at his. Check. By the time they entered, they most ofaced the guards, the guards around the complex. With their own people. They had put trucks or buses blocking the road. Had about 35e other personal bodyguards whom they did not replace. Those bodyguards remained loyal to him. One of the questions that has risen about this whole coup is why didnt he mobilize his bodyguards against the guards whom the plotters had brought . Some of the speculation comes plotterser themselves who claimed falsely, in my view, that gorbachev was part of the plot. There are a couple of other historians who have speculated that gorbachev was part of the plot. This, to me, is totally false. The reason i believe it is false is that if he had tried to mobilize his guards against those guards, there surely would have been a fire fight. In that fire fight, he and possibly his wife, and his daughter and granddaughters who were there, may have been killed. They did not have to be killed for him to want to avoid this. Because what happened during the that,as that she, without and he was deeply devoted to her, and he surely would have coup that to be part of a against himself would have led to Something Like that. It is interesting that i think the best evidence we have he was this, that involved, is his relationship with his wife. He never would have done that. Host what was she like . Prof. Taubman his wife . Most people watching will remember her. She was lovely, smart, she was sophisticated. She was an intellectual. She was a professor of philosophy, she was also rather didactic and humorless. Circles, a, in some wonderful impression. The soviet first lady to look like one and behave like one. She really antagonize people, including soviet women who thought, who the hell unelected her . Nobody. To be her his advisor. The other person she antagonized was nancy reagan who cannot stand her. And with whom it she had several colorful clashes which i was very careful to include in my book. Host from 1987, here is mrs. Corbett mrs. Gorbachev and mrs. Reagan at the white house. [video clip] it is an official house. I would say that a human being would like to live [indiscernible] and indeed it is like a museum. Host there is the chemistry. Prof. Taubman that is one of the scenes i describe in the book. When nancy talks about the white house as a museum sorry, when she talks about the white house looking like a museum, nancy thinks to herself, she has not been upstairs where we live. Wants tor point, nancy show her a portrait of Richard Nixon on the wall. Right he said, who has some sense of great art is interested. Thewants to talk about other art, which in her view, is greater art. She wants to go on. And nancy touches her arm and wants to pull her further into the white house. And she says no, i want to talk to the press. , nancyey meet in moscow turns the tables on her and does the same thing. She wants to leave nancy on, and nancy says no, i want to talk to the press. Host what was the relationship with mrs. Gorbachev after she had the stroke . What happened between the year she had the stroke in the year when she died, 1999 . What was her lifelike than . Prof. Taubman she died of leukemia which was not diagnosed until 1999. She was game. It she continued to play the role of no longer first lady, but the wife, she would travel with him. All of his troubles. Travels. She, or her key, daughter. When he ran for president of russia in 1996, which im afraid was a fools errand because he ended up getting less than 1 of the vote, but he campaigned like crazy. She, who had never gotten over the injury of that stroke, she could function. But she was not herself anymore. She was scarred by all the criticism coming his way. She dragged herself with him to all the 20 cities on that campaign. She was with him when they would not let him speak at a hall on one occasion when one of his critics spat in his face. This must have been torture for her as well as for him. Host what did you find out from him about the way he felt about the public he used to lead turning on him . Prof. Taubman he trusted the rut the soviet people. He trusted them to follow him where they had never gone before. That is, to democratize their country. He trusted them to follow him as he moved to the country toward a market economy. From a command economy. To follow himm and trust him as he made peace in the cold war against the ancient enemy, the united states. He trusted them to build much too much. They turned against him. Economicgood reasons, conditions crashed, they lost their empire which meant a lot up a lot to some of them. Dutchviet union became began coming apart at the seams. By the time he was ousted, he had few supporters. That pained him immensely. Host when did the soviet union become the soviet union . Prof. Taubman 1922, 1923. The soviet union replaced soviet union russia which replace the russian empire. Host why . Lennon wanted to set up more than a nationstate. He wanted to set up an international stage. He believed that all of these countries, former countries, coming together would form a of the world he wanted to see come about in the end. Nations joining together in the spirit of proletarian internationalism. There was an element of compulsion and force. Some were forced to join. Idea ofere given the independence. The national anthem, a parliament. Sometimes a foreign minister. But it was phony because the real power was in the hands of the communist party which was quickly centralized. The language, i want to run a clip of mr. Gorbachev when he came in for the interview and the question had to do, can you speak english . Do you understand english . To some extent, yes. With people often and when you talk about things as you would translate it being translated, you begin to learn. It is a teaching process. Or you said you and your wife speak russian. Tell us what jane, your wifes involvement was and your Research Part . Prof. Taubman jane speaks better russian than i do. She taught russian for 50 years in amherst college. I talked politics and history. We have different vocabulary. I have a political vocabulary in russian. She has a general vocabulary. Put me in a garden, i am speechless. She knows about the garden. Id we spoke with gorbachev, understood a lot but not all. She understood almost all, but not all. When was one funny moment he was describing a garden. He was describing what was growing in his grandfathers garden as he grew up as a boy in southern russia. For did not know the word jane, may i ask you . Cherry pond. Prof. Taubman two did not know the russian word for cherry plum. See, your russian is not perfect. He gave her a short was in in the vocabulary for cherry plums and other related plants. Host how much english did he understand . Prof. Taubman i do not think he understood much. Host what difference does that make an International Relations and how many of the World Leaders speak english . Prof. Taubman a lot of them speaking wish. Especially today. The russians did not. After all the years of jousting is foreign minister with every american secretary of state spoke a lot of english. Not gorbachev. When i wanted to convince him to support me in writing his biography, i sent him a copy of my book in english. He took it come about when it was time to read it, he turned to the russian translation. I must say, i was nervous when i encountered him and he came up to me and patted me on the arm and said, good, solid book, he said in russian. Which i took as sufficient praise from a man who i later learned is somewhat chary about phrasing of the people. Host about 14 years ago, you and i did two one hour program on your other book. It is available in our archive. If you want to catch up with what you were saying back then. Prof. Taubman can i take a moment to tell your audience with my website is . Liamtaubmanbooks. Com. I will not go on about it. Host did you record your interviews or did you write it out . Them. Taubman we recorded we recorded them on a portable tape recorder and then we started recording them on an ipad and a cell phone. We transcribed them all. I could not catch every word. Host what are you going to do with all that . Prof. Taubman i dont know. Im certainly saving them. It has been suggested by somebody that they could become a program or Radio Program or Television Program or a book. Of course, i do not have gorbachevs permission to do use them for anything but interviews for my book. I would have to look into that. I should add there is going to be a russian edition of my book. When he got a copy, which i sent him of the english edition, he sent back and said i thank you from my heart, but i will not give you my impressions of your book until i read the russian edition. Now i am waiting for those impressions. Is 86 years old. Here is an interview he did with bbc last year. One of the things you notice is his different appearance. [video clip] [speaking russian] host what happened he has gained a lot of weight. Prof. Taubman he has had various medical problems. I do not know them all. I presume some of them have required being treated with medication which may have bloated his face. He has lost more than a step. He is a man who used to walk 20 a drop of a hat. Now he uses a cane. He lives himself from a chair with great difficulty. He still has got it up here. That quote in that interview was interesting. He was going back and remembering his fall from power. And the possibility that he could have attempted to mobilize the army on his behalf to save him and the soviet union. And he declined to do so. This was one of the wonderful things about him. Dignity. P power with he did not use force. He always tried to resist using force. He did not want to shed blood. Host if you took a poll in russia today or in the entire 15 countries of the sows of the soviet union and a pole and the united states, how would he rank in those two different places . Prof. Taubman im afraid in russia, and i presume and most of the old soviet union, he would rank low. I would be guessing, but i would of maybe a positive rating 30 at most. I dont know, i would say 67 60 , 70 , maybe more. He is a man who is beloved in the rest of the world but despised by too many in his own land. Host what are we missing . Looking at russia, what is it other than you mentioned the economy. What else did they not want that he was bringing to . Prof. Taubman they were a superpower. For 10 years after the they left, they were a train wreck. They had not only an economy that was in decent enoughs cheap to support them, but they had decent medical care and Social Security and things like that. Now, much of it has been privatized and a lot of people cannot afford it. They have lost an empire. Not on it. Not Everybody Loves an empire. But they had when. They lost it. Some of them miss it. Is other element i think although they loved gorbachev in the beginning because he followed three dead men walking, their former leaders, who were lovedck and died, they him for his vigor, or his energy, for his articulate this as well as his program. They decided he talked too much, talked to long. In an effort to explain himself. He was weak, russians, too many of them like a strong hand leader. They have one now. That helps to explain some of his overwhelming popularity. Put on thet to screen from 1917 when let a mere linen took over, if you have a moment to give us a little bit on each one of them so we can put in perspective. For those on the radio, you have five years with landon, joseph stalin, two years with my link off, nine years with chris jeff, 18 years with creche now. , andear with training a go six years with gorbachev. linen was a genius at figuring up our were his own creed predicted you never seize power. Stalin a brutal dictator who built on the dictatorship thatlenin began. Helps hi when the war at an incredible bright helped him win the war as an incredible price. Weak, only there for one year or so. Ushchev full of energy, colorful, profane, trying to make amends for his own Guilty Association with stalin, unmasking stalin as a criminal and then being thrown out. Presided,rovided all of the others led. He learned that if he just chaired the meetings, rather than try to dominate them, he could keep power and he did. Under him, stagnation in the soviet union. Host if i were a student in russia, and im getting history, what are they telling me about those early leaders . Whos up and whos down . Prof. Taubman i dont think putin loves lenin, because he made a revolution. Putin doesnt want a revolution against himself. He knows stalin did a lot of things, but on the other hand stall and built up this country into a world power, won a war, so proven admires that. I dont think of everything so microsoft. Proven probably doesnt like khrushchev because he attacked the leadership of it country. He backed out of confrontations, where putin may think russia will look like a coward. Probably i think putin admires him because he kept the lid on an explosive country. A lot of russians admire brezhnev because this was before the collapse and the chaos of the elson. I think putin tiptoes around brezhnev. Whodemarle called was a man may have been a strong hand leader even as the head of, the kgb. Putin may model himself. During a go probably know attention to him whatsoever. Gorbachev, putin said the collapse of the soviet union was a geopolitical click catastrophe and gorbachev presided over that. Putin lets him alone and hasnt arrested him, even though hes been critical of putin. I dont think hes a great fan. Yeltsin is the man who made putin. He appointed him, acting president supported him in the election, to become president. He kept his word, didnt reveal the dirty laundry in putins closet. Is associated in the minds of resin people with kate russian people with chaos of those years. Putin praises him but not too much. Gorbachev,u ask mr. What would he say . I know he was up and down, where is he now . Prof. Taubman last thing i saw him sayprof. Taubman was in the very last you months. 2017, i read an interview in which he was asked if he still trusts him, and he said i do. Believes thathev a certain tomato of authoritarian amount was needed after the elson years. He misjudged putin thinking he was a hard democrat who would put the country back together and democratize it or allow it to democratize. That have not turned out to be the case. I think gorbachev is torn, very critical. One other thing i think needs to be said, as frail as he is, he still wants to have some influence over the russian president. Therefore, politician that he still is, he speaks carefully about that russian president. Host talk about the Gorbachev Foundation for a moment. Have you ever seen where the money comes from . Prof. Taubman i know that it not from his lecture fees, that i was part of the overaction, he charged 100,000 when he could. He costs figures for a lecture around six figures all for a lecture on the world. There are some americans who i gather that wanted to help them, and invited him to give lectures. He did this for many years. He made a lot of money. He probably raise money in addition from places i dont know about. We know ted turner helps them out in building the structure in which the foundation now exist. Thats what i know. Host you say his daughter was the Vice President , tell us about her. Is a taubman his daughter charming and smart woman, very tough, as well as beautiful. Him, sheery loyal to became his hostess, lived in nearby so that she can come to his aid if he ever needed it. Days sheld that these spends a lot of time in germany. Be devastatingst to him to be left alone with bodyguards and cooks and chauffeurs in a villa on the outskirts of moscow. Im sure she comes to visit him, i heard from friends of his that he has reconciled himself to this because she the reason she moved to germany, apart from medical reasons for her husband is that she couldnt take anymore vindictive against him, which had been flung at him for all of these years. Its a sign of how he has steeled himself to his base that he continues to take it. He could have lived in germany, they would have taken him. He couldve lived in the united states. But he stayed in his country and received the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Host what about the government of russia and the support they are giving him now . Prof. Taubman i cant really say for a fact. I dont know. I dont think much, if any. Host when you went about your , the khrushchev book was 20 years. Prof. Taubman that one took almost 20, this one i did twice as fast. Host are you still teaching . Prof. Taubman i stopped teaching in order to finish the book. I could go back, but i think id rather find another project. I dont have one yet, but i am looking. Host of all the people you write about, who would be the most interesting besides khrushchev and gorbachev . Prof. Taubman thats one of the problems, i like to write about political leaders because they have a big impact on people. If you can figure them out as individuals, you can understand what they did to their countries, in part. Whos left . I thought of brezhnev, but i dont think he was interesting enough as an individual. But im not putin, sure i have the guts to do that. Im probably too old. Putin doesnt mike it when people doesnt like it when people look into his life. Some of them end up in a bad way when they do. You really think he would come after you . Prof. Taubman its probably a fantasy of an older biographer looking for another project to think that somebody would care enough about what hes doing to go after him. Host why does he have the ability to stay in power for so long . Prof. Taubman hes very shrewd, hes very clever, is very tough. He takes no prisoners. He is a veteran of the kgb. Hes a man who has seen it all in this world. He doesnt shrink from doing whatever needs to be done to hang onto power. I think your jobs problem was that he did shrink from rings that he could have done to hold onto power. Proven has read machiavelli, tooev talked about much, too long. Putin measures his words, putin can be profane, he can Say Something awful things to give pause to people who may think of moving against him. Gorbachev was much more diplomat, polite. Host we cover his News Conference every year, i think the last one was for our long. Whats the point . Prof. Taubman that is a fee of endurance, as well as intellect. If you cover it, you probably can see what he has in front of him. I dont believe he can possibly have enough on paper in front of him to answer all those questions, yet he does. He is smart. Its a feat of endurance, what does that tell people accept that you are strong, intellectually, physically, you can endure. Anyway, its a feat that gives pause to his opponents and his enemies if they need pause, which they dont, because hes already shown them that he stuff. That hes tough. Host where did you travel . Prof. Taubman we travel to moscow many times. We also traveled down to the city of structure for in southern russia, which is north of the town were gorbachev was born. A very small village. We went there and we walked along the road which passed the land where his father and grandfather had a house up from a river. We went back and with his help we met people, he introduced us to his former associate and friends, and colleagues. We interviewed them with our tape recorder at some length. Cities. To other butuld have liked to go, that is not a government dr. , i dont think we would have been allowed in. Backto the village host to the village where he grew up, what did you learn from the people there . Prof. Taubman we didnt find anybody in the village itself who knew him. Let me take that back. We went down the road about 20 kilometers to the high school he went to. Kid who high school had been a classmate of his. Gorbachev a bit about as an excellent student and a physically strong kid. A kid who had dared to talk back teachers. The most interesting testimony about him as a schoolboy came from somebody we didnt meet, but others have met and interviewed. This was his former girlfriend who talked about him. She commented on how he would go up to teachers and challenge them or push them to explain things, that he hadnt understood in class. The most interesting thing she told was how on one occasion he chastised her for doing a bad job of editing the wall newspaper in their school. 10 minutes later, he after out to the movies. She said to him, how can you do this . How can you tell me ive done a bad job and then asked me out on a date . He answered Something Like these are two entirely different spheres of activity. To me, this was important because it conveyed his selfconfidence, even verging on arrogance that he emerged from his childhood with. With the help of one other thing. He and his father won the two highest metals the soviet union could give for breaking records harvesting grain on a combine. He really took off his metal as a way of showing his fellow students that he was no country pumpkin, even though thats the way he struck them. Host i want to show you a couple of things. An ad he did with his granddaughter. We will be right back. Its not just for pizza hut, it expresses the divisions in the country about what he did. Ago, if youe years went to that pizza hut and went thing in my same have been true with mcdonalds or the headlines are on the block. Why did they do that . Prof. Taubman i presume not everybody had dollars. Russians didnt, they wanted russian customers. Host what is it like in moscow or russia today compared to what it was at the time mr. Gorbachev was there . Prof. Taubman it is a different world. There are these tall skyscrapers , some of them are business buildings, some are luxurious apartment complexes. Jam thata traffic makes new york city look like your area. You couldo be like get somebody to take you across town in a 1015 minutes, now the only way to come close to that is on the metro because otherwise you will sit in traffic forever. In gorbachevs time people still look the way a lot of them have looked in earlier years like russians and in somewhat drab you can tell who they russian and looking at her shoes. You would likely be approached if you were wearing jeans by people that wanted to buy your genes. Now everything is for sale at high prices. In the brokerage of years, there were still long lines in stores for staples, as well as luxury goods. Now, there are supermarkets. Its a modern world city. Travel, it is not a totalitarian regime. People can travel abroad, they can say what they want within limited circles. There is one newspaper, which gorbachev coowns which speaks the truth without favor. There is one Radio Station on which almost anything can be said. It is a city that differs from both gorbachevs time and before. Very different, less russian in a sense than it used to be russian. Host why is lenin still in a tomb in red square . Prof. Taubman probably because andould be to embarrassing complicated to bury him elsewhere. You had to start explaining him, what he did, why he did it, why he was in it, why youre taking him out. Why do this . A lot of people would it might various aspects of that of peoplen a lot wouldnt like to aspects of that explanation. Host how long in your opinion will he be in charge of the country prof. Taubman hes up for reelection next year. He changed the constitution so he has a sixyear term if he is reelected. Everyone assumes he wont be reelected. That would mean he would be in 20002024. There was a fouryear interval when he was not president. His sidekick was president. It turned out that putin was dominating those years. Years, if i can go back to what you are counting s i think you said Something Like 17 or 19. Thats not right. Whats the year you have there . 9 years close to stalin , which is a hell of an achievement in both a positive and mostly negative sense of that. Host that was my math, not yours. Russia . Stalin now in prof. Taubman physically he is an unheard in onurn. Khrushchev removed him from the mausoleum in 1961 in the dark of night under armed guard. Itchet go wrote a palm about poland about it poem about it. He was the second most popular leader in the 20th century in the eyes of russians. This may have been 810 years ago. He still encounter little statuettes of him on the dashboard of taxis or on buses because he was strong, so the union was strong, people think in retrospect that at least they had enough to eat and could buy it. Im afraid history does strange things to peoples memory. Some people look better as time goes by, some people look worse. Down, andsort of gone now come up again, and will probably go down again. This inwant you to put perspective. It speaks for itself. What impact did he have on that country . Prof. Taubman he was a complicated man, an impossible man. Gorbachev in a way lifted him up to be an ally. For him that wasnt enough, so he turned against gorbachev, both because he wanted power and he wanted to go farther than gorbachev was going. They quarreled. It was a bitter mutual entity. One wonders, if they had only remained earners partners, could they have triumphed in the end . Couldnt remain partners, it was partly gorbachevs fault. Then yeltsin became the boss, and he did some good things when Russian Television mocked him, he allowed them to do so. When the press allowed him has mocked him, he allowed them to do so. He also presided what was over 10 years of chaos, five or six of them at least. By the time he left office, russia was in bad shape and it got he thought putin thought it needed putin. So yeltsins legacy on top of Everything Else was he gave them putin. Host what did our leaders think abortion else in. Prof. Taubman it was a wonderful book called the hand them, they both grabbed the hand of the father who beat them and told them to stop. They both had huge appetites. Punchesrolled with the which kennedy never did,. Bushr yeltsin and bush, but yeltsin was nuts for a long time. Yeltsin came to washington in 1989, and winning get out of the car and wouldnt get out of the car until Condoleezza Rice promised an audience with bush, which he didnt get immediately anyway. Ways like weed in just saw on the tv. Down. E seemed to calm on their next encounter, he behaved like a statesman. Bush finally decided that yeltsin was the future of russia, that he would go farther than gorbachev in democratizing russia, that he may be an even better friend for the united states. He could hold it together whereas it was falling apart. Host when he gets to the end of his life, how do you think the russians will treat him, always the big ceremony. Compared to what the rest of the world will do. Prof. Taubman i think the first thing to say is that they will feel better about him in the initial aftermath of his passing. They didnt like his wife, but when she died they said something some lovely things about her. I think there will be a time of he will and nostalgia, probably get a modicum ceremony from the government. He wont get the full honors that despite everything, he deserves. Host which book was harder . The khrushchev book or the gorbachev book . Prof. Taubman what you are really comparing here is a dead leader with a livelier as a subject live leader as a subject. He was easier because there are people around who knew him, he was no longer around to interview. That would have been wonderful to interview cool shop khrushchev. We learned a lot from gorbachev, a lot of people who worked with him are still around. Some of the people who worked with gorbachev were reluctant to talk about him. I suspect because hes still alive and they might have been at least partly critical of him, whereas the people who are still alive who worked with khrushchev were willing to be devastating about him because he was no longer around. Its a mixed bag with both, but i love doing both. Host the book is robert ionna his life and times gorbachevs life and times. I thank you very much. Visit us at q a. Org. Q a programs are also available as cspan podcasts. If you enjoyed this weeks q a interview with William Taubman, your some other programs you may like. Judy shelton on the economic problems that led to the collapse of the soviet union. Crack shirley talked about his book on ronald reagan. Simon on his book the romanovs. You can watch this anytime or search our entire Video Library at cspan. Org. Cspans washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up up monday morning, we will talk about hollywood and the Democratic Party with Hollywood Reporter jeremy bar. Then a look at lobbying during the trump administration, the Weekly Standard will join us. How the federal government is aiding to combat wildfires. Former agriculture undersecretary Robert Bonnie will take your calls and comments. Be sure to watch cspans washington journal live at 7 00 eastern on monday morning. Join the discussion. Tomorrow night at the National Press club, a discussion with the executive editors of the Washington Post and the new york times. They will talk about the first amendment, the media, and president trumps statements about press freedom. Live coverage beginning at 8 00 eastern on cspan, online at these been. Org, or on the free cspan radio app. Cspan, where history unfolds daily. In 1979, cspan was created as a Public Service by americas Cable Television companies. It is brought to you today by your cable or satellite provider. British Prime Minister theresa may takes questions from members of the house of commons. Then Scottish National party Leader Speaks at her partys conference. President trumps announcement concerning the iran nuclear agreement, at 11, another chance to cq and eight with William Taubman on his book gorbachev. On wednesday, british Prime Minister theresa may filled in questions on domestic issues, including the universal credit program, dental health, and the deadline for brexit negotiations. This is 45 minutes. Questions to the Prime Minister. This morning i had meetings with colleagues and others. I shall have further such meetings later today. Will noteme minister that yesterday was Mental Health a. As Mental Health problems affect one in four people