GBH Openvault
War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; At the Brink; Interview with Valentin Falin, 1987
Part of War and Peace in the Nuclear Age.
12/30/1987
Valentin Falin was an influential career Soviet diplomat, and later journalist, who specialized in European and particularly German affairs for most of the Cold War. In this interview, he goes into detail about the development of the political thinking of leaders of the Federal Republic of Germany over time. He includes a personal and political assessment of former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt. Much of the rest of the discussion deals with the Reykjavik summit of 1986 -- Soviet objectives and views of how the negotiations unfolded. He considers the summit a success, not least because it led to the watershed meeting in Washington, although it could have accomplished more. His final remarks cover the broad nature of the U.S.-Soviet conflict.
License Clip
- Series
- War and Peace in the Nuclear Age
- Program
- At the Brink
- Program Number
105
- Title
Interview with Valentin Falin, 1987
- Series Description
The first atomic explosion in the New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945, changed the world forever. This series chronicles these changes and the history of a new era. It traces the development of nuclear weapons, the evolution of nuclear strategy, and the politics of a world with the power to destroy itself.
In thirteen one-hour programs that combine historic footage and recent interviews with key American, Soviet, and European participants, the nuclear age unfolds: the origin and evolution of nuclear weapons; the people of the past who have shaped the events of the present; the ideas and issues that political leaders, scientists, and the public at large must confront, and the prospects for the future. Nuclear Age highlights the profound changes in contemporary thinking imposed by the advent of nuclear weapons. Series release date: 1/1989
- Program Description
In October 1962, the Soviet Union and the United States are at the brink of nuclear war, the 13 most harrowing days in the nuclear age.
“I remember leaving the White House at the end of that Saturday and thinking that might well be the last sunset I ever saw,” recalls former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara of Black Saturday, the day the Cuban missile crisis pushed the world to the brink of nuclear war. Aleksandr Alexseev, Soviet ambassador to Cuba at the time, recalled, “We and the Cubans decided that, in order to avoid a United States invasion, we should supply Cuba with missiles.” The US effort to overthrow Fidel Castro at the Bay of Pigs was an expression of President Kennedy’s disbelief about the missiles in Cuba while it surprised Soviet leader Khrushchev according to his speechwriter,Feodor Burlatsky. Major General William Fairborne, speaks about how “We loaded whole blood and a hundred coffins onto the carrier Iwo Jima.” Looking back on those 13 days, former Secretary of State Dean Rusk reflects, “...we’ve got to find some way to inhabit this speck of dust in the universe at the same time.”
- Duration
00:52:27
- Asset Type
Raw video
- Media Type
Video
- Subjects
- Gorbachev, Mikhail
- Akhromeyev, Sergey Akhromeyev
- Nitze, Paul H.
- Perle, Richard Norman, 1941-
- Reagan, Ronald
- Nuclear arms control
- Germany
- Soviet Union
- United States
- Strategic Defense Initiative
- Antimissile missiles
- Schmidt, Helmut, 1918 Dec. 23-
- Summit meetings--Iceland--Reykjavik
- Locations
- Moscow, USSR
- Genres
- Documentary
- Topics
- Global Affairs
- Science
- History
- War and Conflict
- Contributors
- Falin, V. M. (Interviewee)
- Publication Information
- WGBH Educational Foundation
- Citation
- Chicago: “War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; At the Brink; Interview with Valentin Falin, 1987,” 12/30/1987, GBH Archives, accessed December 22, 2024, http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_155D25B05CA84645878A0B59548259F7.
- MLA: “War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; At the Brink; Interview with Valentin Falin, 1987.” 12/30/1987. GBH Archives. Web. December 22, 2024. <http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_155D25B05CA84645878A0B59548259F7>.
- APA: War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; At the Brink; Interview with Valentin Falin, 1987. Boston, MA: GBH Archives. Retrieved from http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_155D25B05CA84645878A0B59548259F7