The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism by Paul Kengor

The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism
by Paul Kengor, PhD

Growing up, I often heard stories from WW2 veterans speaking of how certain facts and details were not known to them about the war and for years after their service. I watch documentaries and wonder how people who lived during those days feel when watching these programs. Well, Dr. Kengor’s work provided me a glimpse into those types of feelings. I remember the day I became aware of Ronald Reagan and politics. It was in 1975 when Reagan was pressured by President Ford to make a few remarks after Ford had barely beaten him for the Republican nomination. A rather odd thing to do—invite someone you defeated to speak after you just beat them. What did Reagan say at the spur of the moment…he dwelt on the horror of being on the brink of nuclear annihilation with the Soviet Union! I was nine years old and was becoming aware that the Soviet Union was set on a course of world domination. Growing up I heard lessons in school about the “domino theory” which stated that once a country fell to communism surrounding the countries would fall to it like dominoes as well. I remember watching reports about how we were lagging behind in our ability to respond to the aggression of the USSR. I had heard so much doom, gloom and loathing of our country; which contributed to our decline. I recall looking at a book by Hal Lindsey (which I do not recommend and you would probably have trouble finding today since it was false and irrelevant then and now) entitled The 1980s – Countdown to Armageddon which detailed the arms race and its march to the so-called Apocalypse. I knew that if Ronald Reagan became president, he would deal with this situation. I knew that when I was nine years old! It is amazing to me that we still have people who think that Ronald Reagan was just lucky to be at the right place at the right time when communism fell. I can speak from first hand observations--these people were not prophets then and are reporting the facts today! Sure, being at the right place at the right time is important. However, one should think about this expression “Events sometimes shape the man but sometimes the man shapes the events.“ This would be true of Reagan—he was a man who shaped and molded events.

Kengor summed up Reagan strategy when he came to office as “A) America needs to join the arms race against Soviets, B) the Soviets will try to match the arms race, C) ‘hope’ of ‘disarmament’ will follow, and D) “this is what we’re [Reagan administration] doing’ because ‘we want peace.’” (p. 378). Reagan often outlined his strategy with the Soviets a bit more concisely—“Here's my strategy on the Cold War: We win, they lose."

When Ronald Reagan was asked about his critics, he humbly and confidently replied, “We are confident that history will judge us fairly.” Paul Kengor has devoted a large portion of his endeavors to research documents that have recently been declassified. Information that I always suspected but did not have access to is largely detailed in this account with over 1,200 footnotes. He utilized a series National Security Decision Directives (NSDD) which were signed by Reagan to provide a woven portrait of the strategy Reagan and his advisors designed and executed to confront the Soviets on every possible front except direct warfare. I came across Kengor’s research along these lines from one of his articles detailing how Ronald Reagan and Saudi Arabia privately colluded together to cripple the Soviet Union. How? Reagan provided military and intelligence to Saudi government in exchange for OPEC’s increased oil production—as much as five fold which drove prices down. Driving my gas guzzling 1974 Plymouth, I can recall vividly when prices went below ninety cents per gallon despite the naysayers that said I would NEVER EVER see gas below a dollar a gallon (funny thing is I kept hearing the same thing about $2 a gallon fairly recently.) What Kengor reminded me of is that everyone was excited that OPEC was doing this but there was no plausible explanation for their actions. If you have a large percentage of market supply, why would you lower your price? Especially if you are an allegedly greedy oil tycoon! But Kengor’s investigation reveals that the explanation was Reagan and the King had a mutual enemy—atheistic communism. If Saudi Arabia wanted to hurt the Soviets, whose large source of revenue was oil exports, what would they do? Increase the oil supply, force prices down, and watch the Soviet revenue dry up and lead to huge deficits. That article prompted me to move The Crusader to the top of my reading list.

This work is more than a re-telling of the ending of the Cold War during the 1980s. It reveals how Ronald Reagan was more than slightly interested in defeating Communism as President. He had a nickname in Soviet circles even before he won election—“the crusader”. Reagan had fought communism for years prior to becoming President and had called for the tearing down of the Berlin Wall multiple times before the 1980s. Kengor details these accounts in a satisfying narrative and adds footnotes to provide sources to back up the narrative. I read and relived the drama of the 1980s as I worked through this book. Thanks to God, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pope John Paul II, Lech Valesa and others the Cold War was brought to close with a decisive victory for the United States and democracy. Particularly satisfying were the details in the Soviet press and testimonials from those behind the Iron Curtain and in the former Soviet Union.

Some are closed to facts based on bias or circumstances close to them that prohibit their ability to see matters from a proper perspective. I’ll admit, Ronald Reagan has been my political hero for years so I could be charged with bias as well. But before one dismisses the subject, consider this one fact:

In 1980 there were 56 democracies in the world; by 1990, there were 76. The numbers continued an upward trajectory, hitting 91 in 1991, 99 in 1992, 108 in 1993, 114 in 1994, a doubling since Reagan entered the Oval Office. By 1994, 60 percent of the world’s nations were democracies. By contrast, when Reagan lamented the lack of freedom in the mid-1970s, the number was below 30 percent. (page 307)

Regardless of what critics of Reagan will say, the truth will endure. Indeed, history will judge Reagan fairly. As the shrill of the critics fade, people will remember the swelling crowds of people who poured out in devotion at the funeral for the man who crusaded against communism and preserved our Republic. I know, I was there in Washington DC but was unable to make it into the Rotunda due to the large number of admirers. People drove for hours, stood and walked for blocks, battled heat, cold and rain just to catch a glimpse of the hearse; which carried his casket from the Capitol to the service at the cathedral. I know, I was one of those who walked, waited, stood and saluted on the route next to the World War 2 Memorial.

I recall the farewell words President Reagan uttered which included this “The lesson of all this was, of course, that because we're a great nation, our challenges seem complex. It will always be this way. But as long as we remember our first principles and believe in ourselves, the future will always be ours. And something else we learned: Once you begin a great movement, there's no telling where it will end. We meant to change a nation, and instead, we changed a world.” Anyone who has a globe of the world back from 1980 and compares it to a globe made today knows this to be true!

Paul Kengor’s work is delightful and informative reading. Anyone who seeks to know the facts and wants the documentation to back the facts up will find The Crusader – Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism a treasure to use in teaching younger generations who were not even born when Reagan was President. Young lives that truly may have not been.