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On May 7th, 1945, Britain's Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, | 0:00:25 | 0:00:31 | |
had some wonderful news for the nation. | 0:00:31 | 0:00:34 | |
Hostilities will end officially | 0:00:35 | 0:00:39 | |
at one minute after midnight tonight. | 0:00:39 | 0:00:42 | |
CHEERING | 0:00:42 | 0:00:43 | |
After six long years of fighting, | 0:00:46 | 0:00:49 | |
British, American and Soviet forces | 0:00:49 | 0:00:52 | |
had finally defeated Hitler's Nazi Germany. | 0:00:52 | 0:00:55 | |
But as the nation rejoiced, a new enemy was looming on the horizon. | 0:00:58 | 0:01:03 | |
We knew them well. | 0:01:06 | 0:01:08 | |
They were our former allies, the Soviet Union. | 0:01:08 | 0:01:12 | |
Many people assumed that with victory won against the Germans and the Japanese, | 0:01:14 | 0:01:18 | |
we could all settle down to a lifetime of peace. | 0:01:18 | 0:01:21 | |
But we were already facing a new kind of conflict. | 0:01:21 | 0:01:25 | |
An armed standoff against the totalitarian empire | 0:01:25 | 0:01:28 | |
of the Soviet Union. | 0:01:28 | 0:01:30 | |
In the months following the war, Soviet-backed communists | 0:01:32 | 0:01:36 | |
seized power across eastern Europe. | 0:01:36 | 0:01:39 | |
For Churchill, these developments confirmed | 0:01:41 | 0:01:44 | |
his long-standing suspicions of the Soviet Union. | 0:01:44 | 0:01:48 | |
But there was little he could do. | 0:01:48 | 0:01:50 | |
Just weeks after victory, Churchill was voted out of Downing Street. | 0:01:51 | 0:01:56 | |
The next spring, Churchill boarded a train | 0:02:04 | 0:02:07 | |
heading deep into the American Midwest and went on holiday. | 0:02:07 | 0:02:12 | |
But he was keen to remind the world of his enduring influence. | 0:02:12 | 0:02:16 | |
And as his train rattled through the night, | 0:02:19 | 0:02:21 | |
Churchill and his travelling companion cracked open the cards | 0:02:21 | 0:02:24 | |
and started knocking back the bourbon. | 0:02:24 | 0:02:27 | |
But Churchill's drinking partner wasn't just anybody, | 0:02:34 | 0:02:37 | |
he was a man called Harry S Truman, | 0:02:37 | 0:02:39 | |
President of the United States. | 0:02:39 | 0:02:42 | |
# Oh, give me land | 0:02:42 | 0:02:44 | |
# Lots of land | 0:02:44 | 0:02:46 | |
# Under starry skies above | 0:02:46 | 0:02:49 | |
# Don't fence me in... # | 0:02:49 | 0:02:51 | |
Churchill had been invited to speak at a small liberal arts college | 0:02:51 | 0:02:56 | |
in Fulton, Missouri, | 0:02:56 | 0:02:57 | |
the home state of President Truman. | 0:02:57 | 0:03:01 | |
It was meant to be an off-duty speech. | 0:03:01 | 0:03:04 | |
But as Churchill admitted to Truman, | 0:03:04 | 0:03:06 | |
he wanted his words to be heard across the world. | 0:03:06 | 0:03:11 | |
# But I ask you, please | 0:03:11 | 0:03:14 | |
# Don't fence me in... # | 0:03:14 | 0:03:16 | |
While Churchill was travelling across America, | 0:03:16 | 0:03:19 | |
he wrote to Britain's new Labour Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, | 0:03:19 | 0:03:22 | |
and casually mentioned that he might be giving a speech | 0:03:22 | 0:03:25 | |
very similar to one he'd already given at Harvard two years before. | 0:03:25 | 0:03:29 | |
But that wasn't entirely true. | 0:03:29 | 0:03:31 | |
This was going to be something different. | 0:03:31 | 0:03:33 | |
In Washington, Churchill had asked Harry Truman to help him write it. | 0:03:33 | 0:03:37 | |
"It's your speech," Truman said, "you write it yourself." | 0:03:37 | 0:03:40 | |
He even refused to read a draft. | 0:03:40 | 0:03:42 | |
But that night on the train, a few stiff drinks down the line, | 0:03:42 | 0:03:46 | |
Truman changed his mind. | 0:03:46 | 0:03:48 | |
And when he put the speech down, he said it was, "Admirable." | 0:03:48 | 0:03:52 | |
"It would do nothing but good," he added, | 0:03:52 | 0:03:54 | |
"although it would make a stir." | 0:03:54 | 0:03:56 | |
That was putting it mildly. | 0:03:56 | 0:03:58 | |
For Joseph Stalin and for many others, | 0:03:58 | 0:04:01 | |
this was the moment when the Cold War began. | 0:04:01 | 0:04:04 | |
On March 5th, 1946, Churchill and Truman | 0:04:06 | 0:04:09 | |
were shown into Westminster College's spruced-up gym, | 0:04:09 | 0:04:13 | |
the only place large enough to cram everyone in. | 0:04:13 | 0:04:16 | |
And it's one of the great privileges of my lifetime | 0:04:16 | 0:04:19 | |
to be able to present to you | 0:04:19 | 0:04:20 | |
that great world citizen, Winston Churchill. | 0:04:20 | 0:04:24 | |
APPLAUSE | 0:04:24 | 0:04:26 | |
From Stettin in the Baltic | 0:04:32 | 0:04:35 | |
to Trieste in the Adriatic, | 0:04:35 | 0:04:38 | |
an Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent. | 0:04:38 | 0:04:42 | |
Behind that line lie all the capitals | 0:04:42 | 0:04:46 | |
of the ancient states of central and eastern Europe. | 0:04:46 | 0:04:51 | |
And all are subject, in one form or another, | 0:04:51 | 0:04:54 | |
not only to Soviet influence, | 0:04:54 | 0:04:57 | |
but to a very high and, in some cases, increasing measure | 0:04:57 | 0:05:00 | |
of control from Moscow. | 0:05:00 | 0:05:04 | |
An Iron Curtain had dropped around Poland, | 0:05:05 | 0:05:08 | |
Hungary, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria. | 0:05:08 | 0:05:11 | |
In this Iron Curtain speech, | 0:05:13 | 0:05:15 | |
Churchill was the first Western statesman | 0:05:15 | 0:05:18 | |
to single out the Soviet Union as the greatest threat to world peace. | 0:05:18 | 0:05:23 | |
And he also gave us a three-word phrase | 0:05:23 | 0:05:26 | |
that we're still arguing about to this day. | 0:05:26 | 0:05:30 | |
A special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire | 0:05:30 | 0:05:35 | |
and the United States of America. | 0:05:35 | 0:05:38 | |
APPLAUSE | 0:05:38 | 0:05:39 | |
Churchill himself was half American | 0:05:40 | 0:05:42 | |
and he passionately believed | 0:05:42 | 0:05:45 | |
that Britain's security and prosperity | 0:05:45 | 0:05:48 | |
depended on closer ties with our American cousins. | 0:05:48 | 0:05:51 | |
So in this gym in the Missouri heartland, | 0:05:53 | 0:05:56 | |
he set out to woo his listeners, | 0:05:56 | 0:05:58 | |
to persuade them to stick with the Western Alliance | 0:05:58 | 0:06:01 | |
and to stand by Britain in the face of a new and terrible enemy. | 0:06:01 | 0:06:06 | |
For the next half century, | 0:06:09 | 0:06:11 | |
the world was locked in an ideological battle | 0:06:11 | 0:06:15 | |
between communist east and capitalist west. | 0:06:15 | 0:06:19 | |
Totalitarianism against democracy. | 0:06:21 | 0:06:24 | |
Churchill's Iron Curtain had descended. | 0:06:26 | 0:06:31 | |
# 'S wonderful | 0:06:41 | 0:06:43 | |
# 'S marvellous | 0:06:44 | 0:06:46 | |
# You should care for me... # | 0:06:46 | 0:06:50 | |
October, 1956. | 0:06:52 | 0:06:54 | |
And here, outside Covent Garden's Royal Opera House, | 0:06:54 | 0:06:58 | |
people had been queuing for three days | 0:06:58 | 0:07:00 | |
for the hottest tickets in town. | 0:07:00 | 0:07:02 | |
We're very keen. | 0:07:04 | 0:07:06 | |
We've been doing this for about ten years at Covent Garden, | 0:07:06 | 0:07:09 | |
but we've never had a three-day queue. | 0:07:09 | 0:07:11 | |
For London's culture vultures, | 0:07:11 | 0:07:13 | |
this was an evening not to be missed. | 0:07:13 | 0:07:15 | |
A rare British appearance by the Bolshoi Ballet. | 0:07:15 | 0:07:19 | |
The performance even had the royal seal of approval. | 0:07:22 | 0:07:25 | |
The Bolshoi was Russian culture at its most glorious. | 0:07:29 | 0:07:33 | |
Glittering and exotic. | 0:07:33 | 0:07:35 | |
It was also a shiny example of Soviet soft power, | 0:07:35 | 0:07:39 | |
art in the service of communism. | 0:07:39 | 0:07:41 | |
But even as the dancers were gliding across the London stage, | 0:07:41 | 0:07:46 | |
another European capital was experiencing | 0:07:46 | 0:07:49 | |
a very different kind of Russian visit. | 0:07:49 | 0:07:53 | |
The night the Bolshoi captivated London | 0:08:00 | 0:08:03 | |
has gone down in history as Bloody Thursday. | 0:08:03 | 0:08:06 | |
Because hundreds of miles away on the great Hungarian plain, | 0:08:06 | 0:08:10 | |
Soviet tanks were rumbling towards Budapest | 0:08:10 | 0:08:14 | |
in a raw display of old-fashioned hard power. | 0:08:14 | 0:08:18 | |
On October 23rd, 1956, | 0:08:21 | 0:08:23 | |
thousands of people had taken to the streets of Budapest | 0:08:23 | 0:08:27 | |
demanding an end to Soviet rule. | 0:08:27 | 0:08:29 | |
As the demonstrations gathered momentum, | 0:08:30 | 0:08:33 | |
Hungary's communist leaders called on Moscow for help. | 0:08:33 | 0:08:37 | |
And as dawn broke just two days later, | 0:08:39 | 0:08:42 | |
30,000 Soviet troops entered Budapest. | 0:08:42 | 0:08:45 | |
For four days, the Red Army opened fire on the crowds. | 0:08:49 | 0:08:53 | |
And then, on November 4th, a new wave of tanks were sent in. | 0:08:56 | 0:09:01 | |
After six days of fierce fighting, the uprising was finally crushed. | 0:09:01 | 0:09:08 | |
But it was at the cost of at least 4,000 Hungarian lives. | 0:09:08 | 0:09:13 | |
Never had there been a more brutal | 0:09:13 | 0:09:16 | |
or a more spectacular demonstration | 0:09:16 | 0:09:18 | |
of the Soviet Union's determination | 0:09:18 | 0:09:21 | |
to crush all dissent behind the Iron Curtain. | 0:09:21 | 0:09:25 | |
But here in London, Hungary wasn't even the first item on the agenda | 0:09:25 | 0:09:29 | |
for Sir Anthony Eden's Conservative government. | 0:09:29 | 0:09:32 | |
Because at the very moment that the Red Army was rumbling into Budapest, | 0:09:32 | 0:09:36 | |
British tanks were taking part | 0:09:36 | 0:09:38 | |
in an equally controversial military adventure. | 0:09:38 | 0:09:41 | |
# Please, please, please, please...# | 0:09:41 | 0:09:45 | |
That July, the Egyptian government had seized control | 0:09:45 | 0:09:49 | |
of a major waterway running through their country. The Suez Canal. | 0:09:49 | 0:09:55 | |
In Britain, the news came as a terrible shock. | 0:09:55 | 0:09:58 | |
Britain had controlled the canal since the 1870s. | 0:10:00 | 0:10:03 | |
And it had become a vital route for British trade, | 0:10:03 | 0:10:07 | |
cutting through Africa and linking Europe to Asia. | 0:10:07 | 0:10:12 | |
Now Prime Minister Anthony Eden wanted to snatch it back. | 0:10:12 | 0:10:16 | |
But his timing couldn't have been worse. | 0:10:16 | 0:10:19 | |
And as the crises of Suez and Hungary unfolded side by side, | 0:10:19 | 0:10:25 | |
the limits of British power were painfully exposed. | 0:10:25 | 0:10:30 | |
In Hungary, the Kremlin ignored the West's hand-wringing protests | 0:10:33 | 0:10:37 | |
and mercilessly throttled a popular revolution. | 0:10:37 | 0:10:42 | |
But at Suez, the Americans refused to back | 0:10:42 | 0:10:46 | |
our little show of military muscle. | 0:10:46 | 0:10:48 | |
They were outraged that Britain had sent in troops | 0:10:48 | 0:10:52 | |
without consulting their allies. | 0:10:52 | 0:10:54 | |
And they also wanted to send a message. | 0:10:54 | 0:10:56 | |
That the days of the old European empires | 0:10:56 | 0:10:59 | |
throwing their weight around were over. | 0:10:59 | 0:11:03 | |
Washington, not London, was now the heart of Western power. | 0:11:03 | 0:11:08 | |
Britain was forced into a red-faced withdrawal. | 0:11:08 | 0:11:12 | |
It was a sharp reminder that we were no longer the superpower of old. | 0:11:12 | 0:11:17 | |
For the British people, the events of 1956 | 0:11:17 | 0:11:21 | |
were a humiliating lesson in the harsh new realities | 0:11:21 | 0:11:25 | |
of the Cold War world. | 0:11:25 | 0:11:28 | |
On 22nd October, 1962, President John F Kennedy | 0:11:40 | 0:11:46 | |
revealed terrifying news to the Western world. | 0:11:46 | 0:11:49 | |
The purpose of these bases can be none other | 0:11:51 | 0:11:55 | |
than to provide a nuclear strike capability | 0:11:55 | 0:11:58 | |
against the Western hemisphere. | 0:11:58 | 0:12:00 | |
American spy planes had discovered Soviet missiles on Cuba, | 0:12:01 | 0:12:06 | |
just 100 miles from the American coast. | 0:12:06 | 0:12:10 | |
I call upon Chairman Khrushchev | 0:12:10 | 0:12:12 | |
to halt and eliminate this clandestine, reckless | 0:12:12 | 0:12:16 | |
and provocative threat to world peace. | 0:12:16 | 0:12:18 | |
For years, the front line in Europe | 0:12:18 | 0:12:21 | |
had seemed the most likely Cold War flashpoint. | 0:12:21 | 0:12:25 | |
But the Cuban crisis showed that east and west could clash anywhere. | 0:12:25 | 0:12:31 | |
And now, as Kennedy ordered a blockade around the Cuban coast | 0:12:32 | 0:12:36 | |
to stop the delivery of further Soviet missiles, | 0:12:36 | 0:12:40 | |
the British people watched and waited. | 0:12:40 | 0:12:44 | |
Meanwhile, Britain's Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, | 0:12:46 | 0:12:50 | |
offered the President his support | 0:12:50 | 0:12:52 | |
and tried to see whether he could have any influence | 0:12:52 | 0:12:55 | |
over the fate of the world. | 0:12:55 | 0:12:58 | |
"Hello? Can you hear me now?" | 0:12:58 | 0:13:01 | |
"Yes, sir. I hear you very clearly | 0:13:01 | 0:13:03 | |
"and I'll hand the phone to the President. Over." | 0:13:03 | 0:13:06 | |
"Hello, Prime Minister." | 0:13:07 | 0:13:09 | |
"Hello. What's the news there? Over." | 0:13:10 | 0:13:13 | |
During the crisis, Harold Macmillan spoke to President Kennedy | 0:13:17 | 0:13:20 | |
almost every day, often very late at night. | 0:13:20 | 0:13:24 | |
Now, Macmillan was almost 70, | 0:13:24 | 0:13:25 | |
whereas Kennedy was just 45. | 0:13:25 | 0:13:28 | |
But Macmillan was well aware that in this conflict, | 0:13:28 | 0:13:31 | |
it was the younger man, the American, | 0:13:31 | 0:13:33 | |
who was really calling the shots. | 0:13:33 | 0:13:35 | |
And that he himself was basically just a junior partner. | 0:13:35 | 0:13:38 | |
But Macmillan always liked to see himself as the wise old counsellor | 0:13:38 | 0:13:42 | |
offering all the benefits of his experience. | 0:13:42 | 0:13:45 | |
The Greek to Kennedy's Roman. | 0:13:45 | 0:13:47 | |
# I want to be happy | 0:13:54 | 0:13:57 | |
# I want to be... # | 0:13:57 | 0:13:59 | |
The world stood at the edge of darkness. | 0:13:59 | 0:14:01 | |
This was a genuine doomsday scenario | 0:14:01 | 0:14:04 | |
that might mean the end of civilisation itself. | 0:14:04 | 0:14:08 | |
# But a mushroom cloud hangs over my dreams | 0:14:08 | 0:14:12 | |
# It haunts my future and threatens my schemes... # | 0:14:12 | 0:14:15 | |
Some people could only think of their nearest and dearest. | 0:14:15 | 0:14:19 | |
Among all the stories about British reactions to the Cuban crisis, | 0:14:20 | 0:14:24 | |
this one strikes me as particularly moving. | 0:14:24 | 0:14:27 | |
"A father of six kept his three eldest children from school yesterday | 0:14:27 | 0:14:30 | |
"so that the whole family could be together during the Cuban crisis. | 0:14:30 | 0:14:35 | |
"Mr Peter Gardner, a 44-year-old company director | 0:14:35 | 0:14:38 | |
"from Shoreham, Sussex, explained, | 0:14:38 | 0:14:41 | |
"'I could not protect my children in a bomb raid, nor could anyone else, | 0:14:41 | 0:14:45 | |
"'but I feel we should all be together at this dangerous time.'" | 0:14:45 | 0:14:50 | |
-# We prayed -# We prayed | 0:14:51 | 0:14:53 | |
# We partied, we laughed and we pray... # | 0:14:53 | 0:14:56 | |
With the Third World War apparently only moments away, | 0:14:56 | 0:14:59 | |
this was as close as Britain ever came to nuclear annihilation. | 0:14:59 | 0:15:04 | |
# I cling to my baby | 0:15:04 | 0:15:07 | |
# And she clings to me... # | 0:15:07 | 0:15:10 | |
And then the Kremlin blinked. | 0:15:10 | 0:15:13 | |
On 28th October, the Russians agreed to dismantle the missiles. | 0:15:14 | 0:15:19 | |
The crisis was over. | 0:15:19 | 0:15:21 | |
The British people could breathe a great sigh of relief. | 0:15:22 | 0:15:27 | |
# Please, please, please | 0:15:27 | 0:15:29 | |
# Where did you go? | 0:15:29 | 0:15:30 | |
# Where did you go? # | 0:15:30 | 0:15:33 | |
And so could Harold Macmillan. | 0:15:33 | 0:15:36 | |
But the reality was much, much more frightening | 0:15:47 | 0:15:50 | |
than either Macmillan or the British people had ever guessed. | 0:15:50 | 0:15:54 | |
Because if the missile crisis had escalated, | 0:15:56 | 0:15:58 | |
we would have been the launch pad | 0:15:58 | 0:16:01 | |
for the Americans' attack on the communist block. | 0:16:01 | 0:16:04 | |
All thanks to a deal struck in the 1950s. | 0:16:04 | 0:16:08 | |
The arrangement was called, Project Emily. | 0:16:12 | 0:16:15 | |
It sounds innocuous enough, | 0:16:15 | 0:16:17 | |
but under the terms of the deal, | 0:16:17 | 0:16:19 | |
the Americans installed 60 Thor ballistic missiles | 0:16:19 | 0:16:22 | |
on RAF sites up and down the United Kingdom. | 0:16:22 | 0:16:25 | |
By hosting the Thors, | 0:16:27 | 0:16:29 | |
the Government had effectively drawn a target on Britain | 0:16:29 | 0:16:33 | |
and invited the Kremlin to take aim. | 0:16:33 | 0:16:36 | |
And what neither the public, nor, more shockingly, | 0:16:36 | 0:16:39 | |
Macmillan himself knew during those long days and nights in October, | 0:16:39 | 0:16:44 | |
was just how close to that attack Britain almost came. | 0:16:44 | 0:16:49 | |
The Cuban crisis was a chilling reminder of Britain's vulnerability. | 0:16:54 | 0:16:59 | |
It left many people convinced that a devastating nuclear war | 0:16:59 | 0:17:04 | |
was now not a possibility, but a terrifying probability. | 0:17:04 | 0:17:08 | |
In June 1982, a hero of the old west came riding into town. | 0:17:23 | 0:17:29 | |
The Hollywood actor turned President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, | 0:17:30 | 0:17:35 | |
had arrived in London for what would be an historic visit. | 0:17:35 | 0:17:39 | |
You wanted law and order in this town. You've got it. | 0:17:44 | 0:17:47 | |
I'll shoot the first man that starts for those sticks. | 0:17:47 | 0:17:50 | |
Come on! | 0:17:50 | 0:17:51 | |
This was Ronald Reagan's first visit to Britain | 0:17:51 | 0:17:54 | |
as President of the United States. | 0:17:54 | 0:17:57 | |
He stayed at Windsor Castle | 0:17:57 | 0:17:59 | |
and it was, he wrote in his diary, "A fairytale experience." | 0:17:59 | 0:18:02 | |
Early the next morning, in the calm before the storm, | 0:18:04 | 0:18:07 | |
Reagan saddled up his horse | 0:18:07 | 0:18:09 | |
and went for a ride here at Windsor Great Park. | 0:18:09 | 0:18:12 | |
With him was his trusty sidekick. | 0:18:12 | 0:18:15 | |
On this occasion, the Queen. | 0:18:15 | 0:18:18 | |
But he wasn't here just to show us how to ride a horse Western style. | 0:18:23 | 0:18:28 | |
Reagan had come to make a speech | 0:18:28 | 0:18:30 | |
in which he would present his vision | 0:18:30 | 0:18:33 | |
of the Soviet Union's inevitable demise. | 0:18:33 | 0:18:36 | |
The President spoke in Parliament's Royal Gallery, | 0:18:37 | 0:18:40 | |
dwarfed by paintings of Waterloo and Trafalgar. | 0:18:40 | 0:18:44 | |
Great British victories over another evil empire. | 0:18:44 | 0:18:47 | |
FANFARE | 0:18:47 | 0:18:50 | |
And one phrase in particular captured Reagan's confidence | 0:18:52 | 0:18:56 | |
that communism was doomed. | 0:18:56 | 0:18:58 | |
APPLAUSE | 0:18:58 | 0:19:00 | |
The march of freedom and democracy, which will leave Marxism-Leninism | 0:19:00 | 0:19:04 | |
on the ash heap of history as it has left other tyrannies | 0:19:04 | 0:19:08 | |
which stifle the freedom and muzzle the self-expression of the people. | 0:19:08 | 0:19:12 | |
'..leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history | 0:19:12 | 0:19:16 | |
'as it has left other tyrannies...' | 0:19:16 | 0:19:18 | |
This speech was Ronald Reagan's manifesto for winning the Cold War. | 0:19:18 | 0:19:22 | |
And at its heart was a sense of moral certainty | 0:19:22 | 0:19:26 | |
that the communists were wrong and we in the West were right. | 0:19:26 | 0:19:30 | |
In many ways, Reagan was echoing another speech | 0:19:30 | 0:19:32 | |
made by a great international statesman on foreign soil. | 0:19:32 | 0:19:35 | |
Winston Churchill's speech at Fulton, Missouri, in 1946. | 0:19:35 | 0:19:40 | |
Now, that was the speech in which Churchill coined the phrase, | 0:19:40 | 0:19:43 | |
the Iron Curtain. | 0:19:43 | 0:19:45 | |
And it's often seen as the moment that the Cold War began. | 0:19:45 | 0:19:48 | |
And now, here in the Palace of Westminster, | 0:19:48 | 0:19:51 | |
Reagan took the great man's career | 0:19:51 | 0:19:54 | |
as an inspiration for victory. | 0:19:54 | 0:19:56 | |
During the dark days of the Second World War, | 0:19:56 | 0:20:00 | |
when this island was incandescent with courage, | 0:20:00 | 0:20:04 | |
Winston Churchill exclaimed about Britain's adversaries. | 0:20:04 | 0:20:08 | |
"What kind of a people do they think we are?" | 0:20:08 | 0:20:11 | |
Afterwards, at a Number 10 lunch in the President's honour, | 0:20:19 | 0:20:22 | |
Mrs Thatcher told Reagan that she thought his speech magnificent. | 0:20:22 | 0:20:27 | |
He had, she said, written a new chapter in our history. | 0:20:27 | 0:20:31 | |
It was time, they thought, to say what we really believed. | 0:20:31 | 0:20:36 | |
Time to take on the Soviet Union and beat it. | 0:20:36 | 0:20:41 | |
For Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, | 0:20:41 | 0:20:43 | |
the status quo was no longer an option. | 0:20:43 | 0:20:46 | |
Their mission wasn't to contain communism, it was to roll it back. | 0:20:46 | 0:20:50 | |
To exploit its weaknesses | 0:20:50 | 0:20:53 | |
and to assert our strengths. | 0:20:53 | 0:20:55 | |
Free markets, free speech | 0:20:55 | 0:20:58 | |
and above all, military strength. | 0:20:58 | 0:21:01 | |
So to Reagan's critics, his image of the ash heap of history | 0:21:01 | 0:21:05 | |
was disturbingly appropriate, | 0:21:05 | 0:21:07 | |
but you didn't need to be a card-carrying CND supporter | 0:21:07 | 0:21:11 | |
to appreciate this fantastic poster. | 0:21:11 | 0:21:14 | |
"She promised to follow him to the end of the earth. | 0:21:14 | 0:21:17 | |
"He promised to organise it!" | 0:21:17 | 0:21:18 | |
We often think of Margaret Thatcher as the ultimate Cold War warrior, | 0:21:32 | 0:21:36 | |
talking tough and looking tough. | 0:21:36 | 0:21:40 | |
But this wasn't always the case. | 0:21:42 | 0:21:44 | |
# Her hair is hollow gold | 0:21:45 | 0:21:48 | |
# Her lips sweet surprise... # | 0:21:48 | 0:21:51 | |
The daughter of a grocer, | 0:21:51 | 0:21:53 | |
Margaret Thatcher had risen from humble beginnings. | 0:21:53 | 0:21:56 | |
When she became the first female leader | 0:21:56 | 0:22:00 | |
of the Conservative party in 1975, | 0:22:00 | 0:22:02 | |
many people saw her as an irritating, short-lived fluke. | 0:22:02 | 0:22:07 | |
There's a little bit sticking up there. | 0:22:07 | 0:22:09 | |
You can see it in the reflection. | 0:22:09 | 0:22:11 | |
Then, in 1976, she delivered a speech | 0:22:12 | 0:22:16 | |
that would transform her image for ever. | 0:22:16 | 0:22:19 | |
In Britain, her speech made little impact, | 0:22:29 | 0:22:32 | |
but 2,000 miles away in Moscow, | 0:22:32 | 0:22:35 | |
a young Soviet journalist called Yuri Gavrilov | 0:22:35 | 0:22:39 | |
was paying close attention. | 0:22:39 | 0:22:41 | |
And he coined a phrase that gave Mrs Thatcher her warrior image. | 0:22:43 | 0:22:47 | |
And here it, is Gavrilov's article, under the ominous title, | 0:22:49 | 0:22:53 | |
Iron Lady Frightens. | 0:22:53 | 0:22:56 | |
"The Conservative leader, Margaret Thatcher," he says, | 0:22:56 | 0:22:59 | |
"recently gave a spiteful anti-Soviet speech | 0:22:59 | 0:23:02 | |
"at Kensington Town Hall. | 0:23:02 | 0:23:03 | |
"Pretentiously entitled, Wake up, England! | 0:23:03 | 0:23:07 | |
"In her hysterical speech, | 0:23:07 | 0:23:09 | |
"the Russians are trying to take over the world. | 0:23:09 | 0:23:11 | |
"And, according to Mrs Thatcher, the English people are asleep | 0:23:11 | 0:23:15 | |
"and oblivious to the danger which only she can see." | 0:23:15 | 0:23:19 | |
You know, the funny thing about Gavrilov's article | 0:23:19 | 0:23:22 | |
is that he meant those words, Iron Lady, as an insult. | 0:23:22 | 0:23:26 | |
But, of course from that day on, | 0:23:26 | 0:23:29 | |
Margaret Thatcher wore them with defiant pride. | 0:23:29 | 0:23:32 | |
I stand before you tonight | 0:23:32 | 0:23:35 | |
in my Red Star chiffon evening gown. | 0:23:35 | 0:23:39 | |
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE | 0:23:39 | 0:23:41 | |
My face softly made up and my fair hair gently waved. | 0:23:48 | 0:23:53 | |
LAUGHTER | 0:23:53 | 0:23:55 | |
The Iron Lady of the Western world. | 0:23:57 | 0:24:00 | |
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE | 0:24:00 | 0:24:03 | |
A Cold War warrior, | 0:24:05 | 0:24:08 | |
an Amazon philistine, | 0:24:08 | 0:24:11 | |
even a Peking plotter. | 0:24:11 | 0:24:15 | |
LAUGHTER | 0:24:15 | 0:24:16 | |
Well, am I any of these things? | 0:24:16 | 0:24:18 | |
ALL: No! | 0:24:18 | 0:24:20 | |
Well, yes, if that's how they... | 0:24:22 | 0:24:24 | |
LAUGHTER | 0:24:24 | 0:24:26 | |
Yes, I am an Iron Lady. | 0:24:26 | 0:24:29 | |
Margaret Thatcher had found her mission, | 0:24:33 | 0:24:36 | |
as a committed crusader against communism. | 0:24:36 | 0:24:39 | |
We must start with the essence of our Conservative belief. | 0:24:41 | 0:24:45 | |
Individual liberty. | 0:24:45 | 0:24:48 | |
When she became Prime Minister in May 1979, | 0:24:49 | 0:24:53 | |
these beliefs underpinned all her political objectives. | 0:24:53 | 0:24:57 | |
And eight years later, in March 1987, | 0:25:01 | 0:25:04 | |
she was ready to take them | 0:25:04 | 0:25:06 | |
directly to the heart of the communist empire, Moscow. | 0:25:06 | 0:25:12 | |
At last, the Soviet people saw the Iron Lady for themselves. | 0:25:12 | 0:25:18 | |
She wanted to show the world | 0:25:18 | 0:25:20 | |
that she was the West's most respected and experienced leader. | 0:25:20 | 0:25:25 | |
And she saw herself as the chief representative | 0:25:25 | 0:25:28 | |
of the West's increasingly wealthy society. | 0:25:28 | 0:25:32 | |
the Western economy was entering a new era of growth and confidence, | 0:25:33 | 0:25:37 | |
but in the East, the Soviet alternative to capitalism | 0:25:37 | 0:25:42 | |
was grinding to a halt. | 0:25:42 | 0:25:44 | |
# Everybody wants to rule the world... # | 0:25:44 | 0:25:47 | |
Here, in the heart of the Kremlin, | 0:25:49 | 0:25:51 | |
would the Iron Lady denounce the Soviet bear or embrace it? | 0:25:51 | 0:25:55 | |
Mrs Thatcher told the press that of all her foreign visits, | 0:25:55 | 0:25:59 | |
this was one she was most prepared for. | 0:25:59 | 0:26:01 | |
She was ready, she said, for a long dialogue, | 0:26:01 | 0:26:04 | |
plenty of disagreements and a hostile press. | 0:26:04 | 0:26:08 | |
CHEERING | 0:26:08 | 0:26:10 | |
Mrs Thatcher had dressed to impress. | 0:26:14 | 0:26:16 | |
With her glamorous array of hats, coats and tailored suits, | 0:26:19 | 0:26:23 | |
her look symbolised the Western luxury, | 0:26:23 | 0:26:26 | |
to which the Soviet people aspired. | 0:26:26 | 0:26:29 | |
# She's a juvenile scam never was a quitter | 0:26:29 | 0:26:32 | |
# Tasty like a raindrop She's got the look... # | 0:26:32 | 0:26:34 | |
Everywhere she went, she was mobbed. | 0:26:34 | 0:26:36 | |
# She's got the look | 0:26:36 | 0:26:38 | |
# She's got the look | 0:26:38 | 0:26:39 | |
# She's got the look... # | 0:26:39 | 0:26:41 | |
The Russians admired strength. | 0:26:41 | 0:26:42 | |
And here, on primetime TV, | 0:26:42 | 0:26:45 | |
was the warrior queen in full force. | 0:26:45 | 0:26:49 | |
Look, if you attack us, | 0:26:49 | 0:26:52 | |
you will have such a terrible time that you cannot win. | 0:26:52 | 0:26:56 | |
And isn't that the best defence to anyone who threatens you? | 0:26:56 | 0:27:01 | |
Doesn't...? One moment. | 0:27:01 | 0:27:03 | |
..Doesn't the bully go for the weak person, not for the strong? | 0:27:03 | 0:27:07 | |
You have more... If you take this view, | 0:27:07 | 0:27:10 | |
I wonder why you have so many nuclear weapons. | 0:27:10 | 0:27:13 | |
To the Russians, Britain's Prime Minister | 0:27:16 | 0:27:19 | |
had once been the capitalist enemy, | 0:27:19 | 0:27:22 | |
but now they treated her like a film star. | 0:27:22 | 0:27:25 | |
Here in the Kremlin, they didn't call Margaret Thatcher the Iron Lady any more, | 0:27:27 | 0:27:31 | |
they called her the lady with the blue eyes. | 0:27:31 | 0:27:34 | |
Here in Britain, Mrs Thatcher remains | 0:27:36 | 0:27:39 | |
a controversial and divisive character. | 0:27:39 | 0:27:41 | |
But there's no denying her impact | 0:27:43 | 0:27:45 | |
in those last days of the Cold War. | 0:27:45 | 0:27:47 | |
CHEERING | 0:27:51 | 0:27:54 | |
At time when Soviet communism was flagging, | 0:27:54 | 0:27:56 | |
she strove unceasingly | 0:27:56 | 0:27:58 | |
to represent and advance | 0:27:58 | 0:28:01 | |
the Western way of life. | 0:28:01 | 0:28:03 | |
And in the end, she won. | 0:28:03 | 0:28:05 | |
East Germany has tonight opened its borders to the West. | 0:28:07 | 0:28:10 | |
28 years after the Berlin Wall was built, | 0:28:10 | 0:28:13 | |
its people are once more free to travel anywhere. | 0:28:13 | 0:28:16 | |
# With or without you | 0:28:22 | 0:28:26 | |
# With or without you | 0:28:26 | 0:28:31 | |
# I can't live | 0:28:31 | 0:28:35 | |
# With or without you | 0:28:35 | 0:28:40 | |
# With or without you. # | 0:28:40 | 0:28:43 |