Way out there in the blue
Subtitle: Reagan, Star Wars, and the end of the Cold War
By: Frances FitzGerald.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2000
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 592
Subjects: Reagan, Ronald; Strategic Defense Initiative; Nuclear arms control -- United States -- History; Cold War; United States -- Politics and government -- 1981-1989; United States -- Foreign relations -- 1981-1989; United States -- Foreign relations -- Soviet Union; Soviet Union -- Foreign relations -- United States
Description: "Using the Star Wars missile defense program as a magnifying glass on his presidency, Frances FitzGerald gives us a wholly original portrait of Ronald Reagan, the most puzzling president of the last half of the twentieth century.".

"The idea that America should have an impregnable shield against nuclear weapons was Reagan's invention. His famous Star Wars speech, in which he promised us such a shield and called upon scientists to produce it, gave rise to the Strategic Defense Initiative. Reagan used his sure understanding of American mythology, history and politics to persuade the country that a perfect defense against Soviet nuclear weapons would be possible, even though the technology did not exist and was not remotely feasible.

His idea turned into a multi-billion-dollar research program. SDI played a central role in U.S.-Soviet relations at a crucial juncture in the Cold War, and in a different form it survives to this day.".

"Drawing on research, including interviews with the participants, FitzGerald offers new insights into American foreign policy in the Reagan era. She gives us portraits of major players in Reagan's administration, including George Shultz, Caspar Weinberger, Donald Regan and Paul Nitze, and she provides a radically new view of what happened at the Reagan-Gorbachev summits in Geneva, Reykjavik, Washington and Moscow."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [566]-573) and index.