Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev – now 88 and not in good health – but deeply engaged in the world and the primary threat under which we live every day. Watch the short video below – his eyes, his leaning forward to listen, the determination of his face and voice, his deep concern and his warm humour at the end – in spite of all.
Deep inside he must feel sadness. What he did to make the world, and his own country, a much better place and the vision he had of a new Common European Home has been systematically ignored by much lesser, non-visionary minds – leaders who have neither the knowledge nor the intuition enabling them to recognize the essential importance of peace – and restructuring thinking and politics to achieve peace.
Instead, we are now in a situation where it is reasonable to talk about a New Cold War, or Cold War 2.0 – ten TFF articles about it here.
In terms of vision, civil courage, statesmanship, peace-making and creativity, I do not hesitate to place him as Number One among my generation’s European statesmen, closely followed by politicians such as Willy Brandt, Urho Kekkonen, Olof Palme – and surely others could be mentioned including Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel. And I would include Jimmy Carter from the non-European West, in particular for his tremendous work for a better world ever since having been President.
They reached out way beyond their own time and their own space. They were macro-thinkers. They were guided by vision, ethics and courage to use their power for the common good – to question and stand up against the mainstream thinking of their era. But they were also doers – change-makers for real.
What a contrast between this type of politicians – these intellectual personalities – and those we have to live with in today’s Europe.
Note
Here an excellent article by John Laughland who places Gorbachev in the centre of this revolutionary change. And it’s nice to see that RT (Russia Today) publishes it.
