Transcripts For CSPAN2 Discussion On Fall Of The Berlin Wall

Pam donaldson. [applause] thank you, thank you. Ladies and gentlemen welcome to this mornings program. You know there are states that all of us have that are very personal and there are dates that we have as a country that we all share. In my lifetime december 7, 1941, november 22, 1963, 911. These are three terrible dates for the country and then theres november 9, 1989. Good news, the fall of the berlin wall. Its a subject that we are going to discuss today. How did it happen . What are the consequences . He did this . Who knew . For a look at whats in store for us this morning its a pleasure to welcome andrew card who served in three administration with Ronald Reagan as Deputy Assistant to the president and director of intergovernmental affairs. George Herbert Walker bush, the secretary of transportation and with george w. Bush he was the white house chief of staff. Andrew card. [applause] thank you very much, sam. I wanted to be here. We are grateful for Georgetown University and the Foreign Service for helping to host us and the atlantic counsel and we are also grateful for the Reagan Foundation and their institute helping to host this event. We have many many people here who should be introduced and im not going to ask everyone to stand was important and im not going to ask everyone to sit who is important so other more important people can stand. I am here to say that we are proud to have laura welsh clark here, the president s daughter. [applause] and his granddaughter. [applause] we also have folks in the atlantic counsel here. [applause] british robinson is here from the barber bush literacy foundation. [applause] we also have the eu deputy head of delegations Michael Curtis here. [applause] and the chairman deputy chief of missions Richard Boyington is here. [applause] this is a remarkable day because we are remembering a truly remarkable event. I am about to introduce someone who i have the greatest respect for. Above all i know three absolutes about the speaker that i will introduce. First the world changed profoundly when he was secretary of state under president george h. W. Bush. As freedom and democracy began to spread around the globe the cold war ended peacefully. Germany was reunited as a member of the Treaty Organization in the soviet union imploded. At the same time todays speaker assembled International Coalition that ejected saddam husseins troops from kuwait, orchestrated the madrid conference with israel and all of its arab neighbors discussed piece for the very first time in negotiated Nuclear Arms Reduction treaties with the soviet union and russia. All of that happened after he observed president Ronald Reagan is one of her nations best secretaries of the treasury and before then as white house chief of staff. A position for which he is still considered to be the gold standard. Reciting his many achievements could take a long time but im mindful of the speakers second absolute. He always asks that his introductions of famby shorts. Which leads me to the third absolute which is of course that when this gentleman asks you to do something its best that you do it. I was honored to be asked for him to do something and served president Ronald Reagan and abruptly to washington d. C. So im proud and honored to introduce a great american, one of americas most remarkable leaders and id like you to welcome the 61st u. S. Secretary of state the honorable james a. Baker the third. [applause] thank you ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much and thank you andy for that overthetop introduction. Thank you as well and he for your many many contributions to this nation. You have been an exemplary Public Servant in the country appreciates it. Ladies and gentlemen welcome to the first collaboration between four institutions that i greatly admire for their excellence in preserving the past and in advancing public policy. The george and Barbara Bush Foundation, the Ronald Reagan Foundation Atlantic counsel and George Town University all represent the very best in their respective fields. Im confident that todays lessons from the fall of the berlin wall will be an informative and useful examination of an historic event that led to the peaceful conclusion of the cold war. What happened three decades ago this week fundamentally changed the world. Since then when im asked which american president was responsible for the end of the cold war i typically have replied that it was all of those american president s. Democrats and republicans alike from harry truman through george h. W. Bush. Each of them was firmly committed to a free and undivided europe but as someone who served in one capacity or another for four of those president s i hope you can understand why today i want to add that some cold war president s were more directly involved than others. Ronald reagans soaring rhetoric he came etched in the hearts and minds of people around the world who desired freedom, who after all can forget that picture of the gipper at the Brandenburg Gate when he said mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. And so two years after that historic speech the wall to come down on november 9, 1989. As momentous as the occasion was president bush 41 understood that the soviet union remained a distinct and potent willful security threat. Rather than stick in the eye of the soviet counterparts President Trump president bush chose claret diplomacy. As a result 11 months after the wall came down germany was reunited peacefully as a member of the north atlantic Treaty Organization. Over the objections i might add of some of our allies and of course the soviet union. Shortly thereafter the 45 year cold war ended with a whimper rather than with the nuclear bank that we had all feared as the soviet union itself was dissolved. Today our nations leaders confront their own unique set of International Challenges and as we commemorate the 30th anniversary of the fall of that roland wall i think it is instructive to recall three factors that both president s reagan and bush kept in mind as seismic changes were underway in europe and around the world. First both understood that Domestic Support is critical for the successful implementation, i would say formulation and implementation of Foreign Policy a Foreign Policy that does not have domestic Political Support will not last very long. Unless americans backed the decisions of their president s those policies are doomed to with her and eventually fail. President s reagan and bush both new that they would be more successful if they had the broad backing of the American People and they both crafted bipartisan foreign policies accordingly. Secondly, International Support of course is also critical. Both president reagan and president bush realized that a large component of american strength was that we were the promoter and champion of the liberal world order their revolved around open markets, multilateral institutions and liberal democracy. Allies mattered. They still do and americana in those days was there northstar. Third, both of those president s understood the importance of thoughtful and sustained diplomacy. Both developed strong relations with other foreign leaders particularly soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev chairman chancellor helmut kohl british Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher canadian Prime Minister brian rooney and others. Those relationships nurtured trust between countries and help them reach pragmatic solutions. In the end of course no one individual was responsible for the fall of the berlin wall and the end of the cold war. Every american president since truman played indispensable roles. Above all else it was the enduring. Of the citizens of a captive nation that finally tipped the scale toward freedom. The lessons that president s reagan and bush provided during that critical window of history remain as pertinent today as they were back then. So is our nation continues to confront many daunting challenges the foreign policies of Ronald Reagan and george h. W. Bush remain models that all american president would do well to follow as they seek to promote americas interests and values around the world. Thank you all very much. [applause] sierra thank you very much secretary baker. Im delighted that you agreed to spend a few more minutes with us if youll just have to see that well call you back shortly. Wait for the call. Reporters want to be where the action is. When it did story is there for the telling sometimes careful preparation brings that about. The times it just happens unexpectedly and in the days of Ronald Reagan gave a humdrum speech and came out and suddenly was met with this brave lets from a young man who was standing 5. 5 feet away. When it comes to this great story that we are revisiting today there was one, only one American Television journalist on the scene when the berlin wall began to crumble. Tom brokaw, anchor and managing editor of nbc nightly news. He was in berlin on a different assignment that is hidden tells it one of the biggest stories in the world here are some of brokaws recording reporting that night from the berlin wall. It was tonight when the world changed right before our eyes. Good evening live from the berlin wall on the most historic night in the country. The berlin wall was such a big part of our lives and it was such a physically imposing barricade. It was so much uglier and so much more oppressive than people realized that when you saw on television. Ronald reagan is gone there. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. John kennedy. Even with all the turmoil that was going on it seemed unlikely that wall that was once such a solid image of oppression would come down in some fashion and then in a heartbeat it did. I was the only journalist on the air the night the berlin wall came down. I owned that story and that was the end of the soviet empire. We got lucky. Id like to tell you that i knew the wall was coming down. Unfortunately i didnt know but it did come down on my watch and i will never forget it. East germany reads a country in turmoil tonight. I arrived in berlin two days ago because there was so much going on. In eastern sector was able to get into these are the first time and do some reporting from there. You all represent the best of east germany. Cynically that afternoon there was a famous News Conference in which the propaganda chief screwed up. Was handed a paper the in that said the politburo has decided all citizens of the ger can leave the ger come back at any of the transit points. I look at my Chairman National cameramen and sound man and i said that he say what i thought he said . They were astonished. They said, he did but that means you can go over the wall and come back any time you want to. This man gets up and leaves the room. I had an interview arranged with him right after that News Conference and i went up and i read it back to him. Do i understand you correctly, the citizens of the gdr can leave here in a checkpoint that they choose for personal reasons. Their freedom to travel. I went downstairs with some of my. Colleagues and i said its over. The wall is over. We got out and call the office in new york and midday back in the states started making preparations for going on there that night frantically trying to get a broadcast put together. I rushed out their. There were lots of students from the west who had come to the top of the wall and each chairman guards were trying to hose them off. Then my heart sank thinking theres not going to be anybody there. Ive made a big deal about the wall coming down. The people got back up on the wall and by the time we came on air at at 6 30 it was chaos. A historic moment tonight. The berlin wall can no longer its these chairman people. The evening news with tom brokaw tonight from west berlin. We had a path of the satellite to get on the air so that night he came on the air and we owned the story. Though cbs, no nbc. What youre watching live on television as is a historic moment, moment that will live forever. The destruction of the berlin wall. Which is throughout the script. Id written this whole broadcast and i said to our producer, stay with me. Im going to have to adlib everything. Im going to do colonol my experience about whats been going on in eastern part of not just germany but the soviet union and have assisted defining moment. The First Time Since the wall was erected in 1961 people will be able to move through clearly. I just kept thinking before we went on the air i use the astronauts prayer and cleaned it up some, dont this up. This is a big deal. As we were standing there somebody said oh my god, look. They are taking down the wall. There was a guy with a mallet and a chisel hammering away at the wall. The wall effectively has come down and i mean physically as well. A chunk of the berlin wall. The party of the brandenburg went on all night long as they chipped away at the wall and they danced on top of it. I thought this is a story of humankind. Political tyrants can only go so far but in the end its how people respond to their captivity and how they get out of in a relate to one another. Its a night to remember. Indeed it is a night to remember. [applause] those of us at abc remembered it he was there. He did it and when you are confronted with the real deal just except it and we do and we praise him for a. Joining us now live from berlin is one of americas premier journalists still today finding good stories, tom brokaw. Welcome, tom. [applause] thank you sam. Thank you very much. Thank you everybody. It was very exuberant and watching it today rings back lots of memories. You remember today 30 years later about that night at the wall . I remember it vividly and i want to say at the outset it was not just me. It was the whole nbc team. Her Foreign Editor two days earlier i said i dont know whats going to happen. Theres a lot of activity there. We were around for 24 hours before the memorable News Conference came. We had a satellite ordered in the cameramen on another bridge and got the first film of the people coming across the bridge into, from east germany and west germany. On the confluence of all those forces and i remember as if it were yesterday sam standing there thinking my god this is one of the biggest stories of my lifetime of the 20th century. We have got to get it right in with the help of all my colleagues and at the end of the night we did get it right. He was absolutely thrilling and i remember one of our techies going over and getting a piece of the wall and shipping it off and giving it to me. Tom something you know very well james a. Baker, iii secretary baker is with us today here in washington and he would like to say a few words with you. Secretary baker if you would come back up here take whatever time you require, sara and when you are finished with tom im going to come back to him. Tom, how are you doing . Im doing well, james. I have a question for you before you begin a question for me. Go ahead. We later learned, was going to say we later learned that jackowski got around to the politburo said they could not leave. They were looking at the possibility that they would have a program where they could leiva to come back. A prominent historian at harvard did the whole story and shabazz v. Left that News Conference a went back to the compound for all of the politburo members lived and they were all asleep or they didnt know was going on. My question for you is did we have an any indication from her espionage people and our intelligence people that there was a possibility of that this was going to happen . And short answer tom is no. He came every bit as much of a surprise to us as it did to you. I remember it very well. I was hosting at lunch for Corazon Aquino president of the philippines and the state department and an aide passed me a note saying people were allowed free transit now between the gdr and the republic of germany and it looked like a wall might be coming down. They raised a toast to that prospect excuse myself and went over to the white house to meet with president bush and rhett scowcroft to tell them about what our response to be. And you know i think history will clearly mark the correctness of george bushs moderated response to what was a cataclysmic event because he knew that we still had a lot of business to do with gorbachev and shevardnadze and we werent going to stick it in there i bet the answer to your question is as far as i know we didnt have any advance knowledge intelligence or otherwise. One of the things we look at and make trips back here a sense that i spent the day at the headquarters. That wasnt infamous group on the east part of germany that was arresting citizens left and right. I saw four miles of files of east chairman citizens and finally that complete pressure on citizens that they could live their lives as they want to broke through. I thought the wall came down mostly because of the west but also citizens from the ground up in the east pushing back. Tom that is actually right and i have given a few remarks at this event in which ive said i dont think any single american president was responsible for the fall of the wall. Everyone of our american president and every administration from harry truman through george h. W. Bush was steadfast in opposing the spread of communism and the imprisonment if you will of the people of th