Jason Saltoun-Ebin

“The Reagan Files” is history in real time. It consists of transcripts and, when those remained classified, summaries of meetings of the National Security Council during the whole Reagan Administration with a few transcripts from the Reykjavík Summit and phone calls with foreign heads of government.. It is unfiltered, without analysis other than what has or has not been declassified and what has been chosen for inclusion. The accounts cover the myriad of issues confronting the NSC including Iran, Panama, Lebanon, Libya and Qaddafi, the PLO, KAL 007 (Korean airliner shot down after straying into Soviet airspace), disarmament negotiations, missile deployment, SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative, Star Wars) aid to Poland during the period when Solidarity was challenging the Communist government, the Soviet gas pipeline to Europe, aid to the Contras in Nicaragua, among others.

Why would someone read history in the raw, without the perspective provided by analysis and context? I found several reasons why I am glad that I did. It provides a window into how NSC meetings are run. Each has one to three topics for discussion and, often, for decision. Participants generally include the President, Vice-President, principle cabinet officers such as Secretaries of State, Defense, Attorney General, and National Security Advisors or their representatives. Depending on the topic the Ambassador to the United Nations, Secretaries of Treasury, Commerce and Agriculture and lower level specialists would often attend. The topic would be presented and the participants would give their analysis, frequently in an institutional capacity, such as “the State Department believes”, “Defenses agrees”. Give and take would help focus the issues. Decision would either be reached by consensus or by the President. Vice-President Bush would interject occasionally but President Reagan, for the most part, would listen until a decision was called for.

The accounts also provide insights into the personalities involved. We can evaluate Alexander Haig, George Shultz, Casper Weinberger, Donald Regan, Jeanne Kirkpatrick and Ed Meese, just to name a few, in their own words.

Readers are able to understand the interests that drove policy decisions. They varied from issue to issue and were strategic, military, financial, commercial, agricultural and others we might not have thought of are realized how they influenced particular conclusions. One gains an appreciation or confirmation of President Reagan’s goal of defeating the Soviet Union and ridding the world of nuclear weapons.

This is a tome is organized chronologically (as it was lived) and that can be read straight through, which or you can choose particular topics in which you have an interest. The Table of Contents is very helpful if you pick and choose. It can serve as a reference when reading about a topic and want to get to what really happened or why it was handled as it was. Author Jason Saltoun-Ebin has performed a valuable service for history buffs, or amateur historians, who want to get the source material.

I did receive a free copy of this book without an obligation to post a review.… (mehr)