A recently released memo from former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher found that shortly after the 1986 Reykjavik summit in 1986, where US and Soviet leaders met to discuss attempts to reduce their respective nuclear stockpiles, Reagan rang Thatcher to recommend a book based on a hypothetical Third World War between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
According to an account of a phone call between Reagan and Thatcher just after the talks in Iceland, the president "strongly commended" the prime minister to read the novel Red Storm Rising, written by author Tom Clancy.
In which Thatcher's private secretary records Reagan urging her to read Tom Clancy's then latest book for insights pic.twitter.com/HGP0PcDrEa
— Stephen Murray (@smurray38) December 30, 2015
The fact Reagan urged Thatcher to read a Tom Clancy book in order to understand Soviet strategy says all you need to know about the Cold War
— Matt Dawson (@mattpdawson) December 30, 2015
The memo, marked secret and written by Mrs Thatcher's private secretary and foreign policy advisor, described how Reagan thought the fiction novel was an "excellent" account of Moscow's intentions during the talks.
"The President strongly commended to the Prime Minister a new book by the author of 'Red October' called (I think) 'Red Storm Rising'. It gave an excellent picture of the Soviet Union's intentions and strategy. He had clearly been much impressed by the book," the memo read.
The story's plot details a war fought to the brink of a nuclear battle between NATO and the Moscow-headed Warsaw Pact, and how Soviet forces would offer Washington a generous negotiation offer while secretly planning for war.
Has anything changed since Tom Clancy wrote Red Storm Rising? #Russia #NATO https://t.co/2JecODCZtm pic.twitter.com/rbta2mkahg
— Will Semmes (@WillSemmes) December 15, 2015
While it is unsure how much Red Storm Rising impacted the president's thinking, the memo clearly shows that the novel and its plot was clearly on Reagan's mind in the lead-up and aftermath of the Reykjavik meeting with Gorbachev in 1986.
The revelations are also sure to give ammunition to critics of Regan's foreign policy, given his fascination with a fiction book in during a time of highly tense and complicated geopolitical issues.
A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP https://t.co/4IDHNadE8r pic.twitter.com/meSHmMD2Qs
— Quartz Teasers (@qzcards) December 30, 2015
While the novel's author, Tom Clancy, has been credited as being an astute observer of the Cold War, the writer later admitted that his primary source for information into NATO military strategies didn't come from classified material, but from a freely accessible naval warfare board game.
