0:00:07 > 0:00:09Frank Meehan is 93.
0:00:10 > 0:00:14He enjoys a peaceful retirement in the genteel town of Helensburgh.
0:00:14 > 0:00:18He spends his time taking the air, enjoying the views,
0:00:18 > 0:00:20reading, meeting friends,
0:00:20 > 0:00:22and he's able to look back on
0:00:22 > 0:00:24a life of extraordinary memories and secrets.
0:00:27 > 0:00:29We were in the car, waiting.
0:00:29 > 0:00:31I was getting more and more nervous.
0:00:31 > 0:00:37And round the car was a group of East German goons,
0:00:37 > 0:00:39you know, the security people.
0:00:40 > 0:00:42I wonder if they have ever asked themselves...
0:00:42 > 0:00:46A life dealing with the most powerful people on Earth.
0:00:46 > 0:00:48Don't underestimate him, I'd say,
0:00:48 > 0:00:52and I told that to Democratic friends after I'd seen him.
0:00:52 > 0:00:55And they said, "Oh, Frank," you know,
0:00:55 > 0:00:58"you're like everybody else - you've fallen for the old actor," you know?
0:01:01 > 0:01:04A life spent at the heart of the events that shaped
0:01:04 > 0:01:07the 20th century and continue to shape the world today.
0:01:09 > 0:01:12What strikes me about Russia, these years,
0:01:12 > 0:01:16is the tremendous sense of loss that they have,
0:01:16 > 0:01:19of power and position.
0:01:20 > 0:01:24This quiet man was a key player in the great standoff between
0:01:24 > 0:01:27the West and the Soviet Union.
0:01:27 > 0:01:29Frank Meehan is Scotland's Cold Warrior.
0:01:41 > 0:01:42In his tenth decade,
0:01:42 > 0:01:44Frank Meehan looks back on a life which
0:01:44 > 0:01:47has taken him from Clydebank in the Blitz
0:01:47 > 0:01:49through military service as a GI
0:01:49 > 0:01:53to a 40-year career as a US diplomat.
0:01:53 > 0:01:57But his path to the heart of the great 20th-century standoff
0:01:57 > 0:01:59was an unusual one.
0:01:59 > 0:02:03Frank's mother was from Dalmuir, his father from Northern Ireland.
0:02:03 > 0:02:07In the 1920s, they tried building a life in America.
0:02:07 > 0:02:11Homesickness brought them back, but their son, Francis Joseph,
0:02:11 > 0:02:16was born in New Jersey on Valentine's Day 1924.
0:02:16 > 0:02:20This gave him US citizenship, and it would shape his career and life.
0:02:20 > 0:02:23He moved to Clydebank aged nine.
0:02:24 > 0:02:25You spent your teenage years
0:02:25 > 0:02:28- in this part of Scotland, the west of Scotland...- Yeah.
0:02:28 > 0:02:31..at a time when it was being bombarded by the German air force.
0:02:31 > 0:02:33Yeah, we got a bad air attack in...
0:02:33 > 0:02:37It was in March 1941.
0:02:37 > 0:02:39I was then 17, I think, yeah.
0:02:41 > 0:02:45A lot of deaths and a lot of destruction.
0:02:45 > 0:02:47They were after the shipyards, Brown's Shipyards,
0:02:47 > 0:02:51and Singer's Factory, which was doing munitions at this...
0:02:51 > 0:02:55- Sewing machine factory.- Yeah, but it had gone over to munitions.
0:02:55 > 0:02:57Where were you on the nights of the bombardment?
0:02:57 > 0:03:02We were in the shelter, and I remember listening to
0:03:02 > 0:03:04the stick of bombs coming down.
0:03:04 > 0:03:07You know, they started far away, then the stick comes,
0:03:07 > 0:03:10you know, they come closer, it was a heavier bump.
0:03:10 > 0:03:14And the house next door got incendiary bombed,
0:03:14 > 0:03:18it was destroyed. So, yeah, it was not pleasant.
0:03:18 > 0:03:22And did you work on the aftermath of the bombing?
0:03:22 > 0:03:26I remember I worked cleaning out houses
0:03:26 > 0:03:29that had taken incendiary bombs
0:03:29 > 0:03:33where the whole contents had just sort of been burned up.
0:03:33 > 0:03:38You had to clear them out and then they were going to be rebuilt.
0:03:38 > 0:03:44And, um, I helped builders one vacation by carrying the hod,
0:03:44 > 0:03:48- that proverbial job. - So you were a brickie's labourer.
0:03:48 > 0:03:50I was, yeah, I was...
0:03:50 > 0:03:53Yeah, I think maybe that's what made me think it would be better
0:03:53 > 0:03:56- to go into the Foreign Service. - FRANK LAUGHS
0:03:56 > 0:03:59I wasn't a great hod-carrier.
0:03:59 > 0:04:01Britain was pretty impressive, I thought.
0:04:01 > 0:04:06You know, the people I knew up in Clydebank, they were...
0:04:06 > 0:04:08They took it all well, I thought.
0:04:12 > 0:04:16After school and a degree at Glasgow University, Frank's life took
0:04:16 > 0:04:18an odd turn for a Clydebank boy.
0:04:20 > 0:04:22His country of birth came calling and
0:04:22 > 0:04:26he was drafted into the US Army during the Liberation of Europe.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29I was in an infantry company,
0:04:29 > 0:04:34trained in the infantry and then we were sent up from France to Germany,
0:04:34 > 0:04:41and to a little town called Marburg an der Lahn, north of Frankfurt.
0:04:41 > 0:04:46And that was in late 1945, and so I...
0:04:46 > 0:04:49That was my first look at Germany.
0:04:49 > 0:04:53And could hardly believe it. It was so appalling.
0:04:53 > 0:04:59Frankfurt was in ruins, and you wondered if it would be
0:04:59 > 0:05:04possible ever to recover anything of, you know, civilisation there.
0:05:04 > 0:05:05It was a ruin.
0:05:07 > 0:05:09A desert, you might say.
0:05:09 > 0:05:13So, that was my first look at Germany, and it was a very...
0:05:14 > 0:05:16..ominous sort of look about the place.
0:05:16 > 0:05:19You wondered if it would ever come back.
0:05:19 > 0:05:22You were a fluent German speaker by this stage already.
0:05:22 > 0:05:24Pretty good, yeah.
0:05:24 > 0:05:27Did you talk to ordinary Germans about the Nazi catastrophe?
0:05:27 > 0:05:29Did they...?
0:05:29 > 0:05:32Did they show you any insight into what had been going on
0:05:32 > 0:05:34during those years?
0:05:34 > 0:05:38No, I don't think you got much of that.
0:05:38 > 0:05:40I think they were being very careful.
0:05:40 > 0:05:45First of all, you were an American, you know, and what were you?
0:05:45 > 0:05:48You know, were you an investigator?
0:05:48 > 0:05:52Were you someone who could turn them in if they said the wrong thing?
0:05:52 > 0:05:55So I think there was great care in dealing with us.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58At least, that was the feeling I had.
0:05:58 > 0:06:03But I have to say that I gradually got to know people better
0:06:03 > 0:06:06and then they would talk about the war years.
0:06:06 > 0:06:10When did you first get intrigued by what was happening in...?
0:06:10 > 0:06:13Cos you would spend your whole career in Communist Eastern Europe
0:06:13 > 0:06:14and the Soviet Union.
0:06:14 > 0:06:18When did you first get intrigued about what was going on
0:06:18 > 0:06:21- on the other side of that divide? - Right.
0:06:21 > 0:06:25Well, as often happens in life, I think, someone,
0:06:25 > 0:06:28some person had an influence on me.
0:06:28 > 0:06:32It was a guy I knew, also a foreign service officer,
0:06:32 > 0:06:39a guy called Dick Davies, who had served in both Warsaw and Moscow
0:06:39 > 0:06:44by the time I met him, and he got me interested.
0:06:44 > 0:06:46You know, he got me interested in Russia.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49Once you get the Russian bug, you know, it's hard to lose it,
0:06:49 > 0:06:51so I think I've had it ever since.
0:06:51 > 0:06:53Can you remember what that curiosity was?
0:06:53 > 0:06:57- Because, I mean, I share it, I have it too.- Yeah, you're one too.
0:06:57 > 0:07:00Yeah, I've got the bug, so what was it about...?
0:07:00 > 0:07:04You could see the divide. It was right there.
0:07:04 > 0:07:09I think it was, you know, what often lures young people - the unknown.
0:07:09 > 0:07:12You know, it was just, what was this world?
0:07:12 > 0:07:15Who were these people who had, you know,
0:07:15 > 0:07:18almost collapsed under a German attack,
0:07:18 > 0:07:22had fought their way from Stalingrad right to Berlin
0:07:22 > 0:07:27and now had this weird system that I couldn't understand
0:07:27 > 0:07:29and wanted to understand?
0:07:29 > 0:07:33And of course, there was a professional point of it too.
0:07:33 > 0:07:36I could see that, you know,
0:07:36 > 0:07:41if I was going to move into this field of international relations
0:07:41 > 0:07:45and the American Foreign Service, that Russia was going to be
0:07:45 > 0:07:48the main problem that we would have to look at.
0:07:48 > 0:07:50Why the American Foreign Service?
0:07:50 > 0:07:53Because you've got this dual identity,
0:07:53 > 0:07:55part Scottish, part American.
0:07:55 > 0:07:58Why the Americans and not the British?
0:07:58 > 0:08:01I read in the Army newspaper, Stars And Stripes,
0:08:01 > 0:08:07that you could get a three-day pass to take the examination,
0:08:07 > 0:08:12and a three-day pass was something that any GI would, you know,
0:08:12 > 0:08:14would look at carefully.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18And I went up to Bremerhaven to do the written exam.
0:08:18 > 0:08:22Didn't do terribly well in it, Allan,
0:08:22 > 0:08:24but managed to scrape through.
0:08:24 > 0:08:28Enough to be eligible to take the oral examination,
0:08:28 > 0:08:30which I did then a little later.
0:08:30 > 0:08:33Did a bit better in that, I think, so...
0:08:37 > 0:08:41Frank's career in the Foreign Service took him to Moscow.
0:08:41 > 0:08:46There, he would soon be drawn into the story of Gary Powers.
0:08:46 > 0:08:48- NEWSREADER:- The Supreme Soviet in Moscow hears Premier Khrushchev
0:08:48 > 0:08:52announce that an American plane was shot down over Soviet territory,
0:08:52 > 0:08:54but it also leads to an admission that the US
0:08:54 > 0:08:58has been conducting reconnaissance flights high over the Soviet Union
0:08:58 > 0:09:00by U-2 planes like this one.
0:09:00 > 0:09:03It is a civilian-piloted, unarmed research plane
0:09:03 > 0:09:06carrying special photographic equipment.
0:09:06 > 0:09:10Powers was a pilot of the top-secret U-2 spy planes.
0:09:10 > 0:09:14In May 1960, he was shot down over the Soviet Union.
0:09:14 > 0:09:18He survived and the plane's wreckage was captured by the Soviets.
0:09:18 > 0:09:22It plunged both superpowers into a crisis.
0:09:22 > 0:09:24None of us knew about the plane.
0:09:24 > 0:09:26I didn't know what a U-2 was,
0:09:26 > 0:09:30I doubt very much whether anybody in the embassy knew.
0:09:30 > 0:09:32But suddenly,
0:09:32 > 0:09:37Khrushchev was making a speech in the Supreme Soviet.
0:09:38 > 0:09:45He said, "We've shot down this American plane, this spy plane."
0:09:45 > 0:09:50He said, "The Americans are probably wondering
0:09:50 > 0:09:54"what happened to the pilot," which of course we were wondering...
0:09:54 > 0:10:01He said, "Well, I just want to tell them we have the pilot."
0:10:02 > 0:10:06That was really... That started a lot of things off.
0:10:06 > 0:10:10So that must have gone through the embassy like a bolt of lightning.
0:10:10 > 0:10:12We were all astounded.
0:10:14 > 0:10:15What do you do?
0:10:15 > 0:10:19Where are Soviet-American relations going now?
0:10:19 > 0:10:20He was put on trial.
0:10:20 > 0:10:25He was put on trial and given a prison sentence.
0:10:25 > 0:10:28Then there was a rather interesting incident
0:10:28 > 0:10:34where the Russians put what was left of the U-2 on display,
0:10:34 > 0:10:39so the question was, who would go to look at it?
0:10:40 > 0:10:44I was not involved in the decision-making on this point,
0:10:44 > 0:10:48but I think the ambassador's thinking
0:10:48 > 0:10:52was that it wouldn't be a good idea to send a military guy to do it,
0:10:52 > 0:10:57because they might sort of engineer some incident
0:10:57 > 0:11:03which would cause further difficulties in bilateral relations.
0:11:03 > 0:11:09So the upshot of this was that I was told to go and look at it.
0:11:09 > 0:11:11So you must have been quite nervous.
0:11:11 > 0:11:13It would have been a tense few moments for you.
0:11:13 > 0:11:16Yeah, I was pretty nervous. I wondered what was going to happen.
0:11:16 > 0:11:20I was on my own, which is, when I think on it, rather curious.
0:11:20 > 0:11:22I would have thought it would have been better
0:11:22 > 0:11:23to send somebody with me.
0:11:23 > 0:11:28There was a security guy sort of checking people as you went in.
0:11:28 > 0:11:33I went up to him and showed him my diplomatic ID.
0:11:33 > 0:11:36He looked at me in that cold way they did.
0:11:36 > 0:11:39He then looked at the ID again and looked at me again.
0:11:42 > 0:11:46Then a big grin spread over his face and he said, in Russian,
0:11:46 > 0:11:50"Be my guest. It's your plane. Go ahead."
0:11:50 > 0:11:53THEY CHUCKLE Could you make sense of the plane?
0:11:53 > 0:11:55When you looked at it, did it make any sense to you?
0:11:55 > 0:11:58No, I wouldn't know one end of a plane from another.
0:11:58 > 0:12:00This was a rather peculiar plane.
0:12:00 > 0:12:03But I'd been down to see it anyway, you know?
0:12:07 > 0:12:09Frank returned to Berlin,
0:12:09 > 0:12:12where he was to play another part in the Gary Powers' story.
0:12:12 > 0:12:14Less than two years later,
0:12:14 > 0:12:18America learned that Moscow was prepared to swap the pilot
0:12:18 > 0:12:22for Rudolf Abel, a Soviet spy who had been caught in Brooklyn.
0:12:22 > 0:12:25The swap was to take place near the Berlin Wall,
0:12:25 > 0:12:28and Abel's American lawyer, James Donovan,
0:12:28 > 0:12:32was asked by the CIA to help mastermind the trade.
0:12:32 > 0:12:36This is the story told in the 2015 film Bridge Of Spies,
0:12:36 > 0:12:39and Frank played a key role in it.
0:12:39 > 0:12:43The exchange took place at the beginning...
0:12:43 > 0:12:47February 10th, I think, 1962,
0:12:47 > 0:12:52where Powers and Abel were exchanged on Glienicker Bridge.
0:12:54 > 0:12:56I was...
0:12:56 > 0:13:02I went over to East Berlin to pick up Frederic Pryor,
0:13:02 > 0:13:04the student who had been arrested.
0:13:04 > 0:13:07You're talking about it as though it's quite a matter-of-fact thing.
0:13:07 > 0:13:10- Hmm.- But actually you were a young diplomat
0:13:10 > 0:13:13- and you were right at the epicentre.- Yeah.
0:13:13 > 0:13:15Of the global Cold War,
0:13:15 > 0:13:18which could have exploded at any moment into the Third World War.
0:13:18 > 0:13:21Did you feel the burden on your shoulders?
0:13:21 > 0:13:24I don't remember it that way.
0:13:24 > 0:13:26I mean, there were tense moments, obviously.
0:13:26 > 0:13:32I didn't know, for instance, when I was walking over to get the kid,
0:13:32 > 0:13:35Pryor, I didn't know how he would be -
0:13:35 > 0:13:39would he be well? Would I get him?
0:13:39 > 0:13:43Would I be able get out myself? It was all sort of touchy stuff.
0:13:49 > 0:13:50Frederic Pryor was waiting in a car
0:13:50 > 0:13:53on the east side with Wolfgang Vogel,
0:13:53 > 0:13:56an East German intelligence officer whom Frank had befriended.
0:13:58 > 0:14:03I went over and I said something like,
0:14:03 > 0:14:08"Well, Wolfgang, I'm ready. Have you got Pryor?"
0:14:08 > 0:14:11He said to me, "Frank, we're not ready yet.
0:14:11 > 0:14:14"Just get into the car and we'll wait."
0:14:14 > 0:14:17What he was waiting for was word from the bridge that
0:14:17 > 0:14:21the Powers-Abel exchange had taken place.
0:14:21 > 0:14:25When that took place, then we got the word, or he got the word.
0:14:25 > 0:14:28How did the word come through?
0:14:28 > 0:14:33We were in the car, waiting. I was getting more and more nervous.
0:14:33 > 0:14:39Round the car was a group of East German goons, you know,
0:14:39 > 0:14:43the security people. One of them came over.
0:14:43 > 0:14:46They must have had word from the bridge.
0:14:46 > 0:14:50They came over to see Vogel and said, "Well, you know, it's OK."
0:14:50 > 0:14:54It was at that point that Vogel turned to me and said,
0:14:54 > 0:14:58"OK, fine, you can go." So that was the end of it.
0:14:58 > 0:14:59So you got out the car and walked across.
0:14:59 > 0:15:02Walked across. As simple as that.
0:15:02 > 0:15:05- Nothing to it.- Did Pryor say anything to you after that?
0:15:07 > 0:15:11He thanked me. He thanked me. But we had arranged...
0:15:11 > 0:15:13He wanted to see his mother and father.
0:15:13 > 0:15:16I did not go with him
0:15:16 > 0:15:19up to meet his parents.
0:15:19 > 0:15:23I sort of finished little bits of business I had to do at
0:15:23 > 0:15:28Checkpoint Charlie, just then went off on my own.
0:15:28 > 0:15:30- Did you see the film?- Yes, I did.
0:15:30 > 0:15:31What did you think?
0:15:31 > 0:15:34Good film. Yeah, good film.
0:15:34 > 0:15:36What you'd expect from Spielberg.
0:15:36 > 0:15:38The Berlin scenes were great.
0:15:46 > 0:15:49The recreation of the wall was perfect.
0:15:49 > 0:15:53I mean, it really took me back to this weird bit of my life,
0:15:53 > 0:15:56you know, weird bit of German history,
0:15:56 > 0:16:00where you had this strange thing in the middle of the city.
0:16:00 > 0:16:04- It was a good movie. - Historically accurate?- Yeah.- Mostly.
0:16:04 > 0:16:06Yeah, mostly.
0:16:14 > 0:16:16After a spell as ambassador to Czechoslovakia,
0:16:16 > 0:16:20Frank took up the same role in Poland in October 1980,
0:16:20 > 0:16:24his arrival coinciding with the birth of Solidarity -
0:16:24 > 0:16:27the democracy movement that had grown out of strikes
0:16:27 > 0:16:29in the Gdansk shipyards.
0:16:29 > 0:16:34- Did you have contacts with the revolutionaries?- Yeah.
0:16:34 > 0:16:38We had very good contacts. He was really smart.
0:16:38 > 0:16:43He was politically a very clever guy, I thought. A moderate too.
0:16:43 > 0:16:46He was leading this, what I thought,
0:16:46 > 0:16:49what I think you could say was a revolution,
0:16:49 > 0:16:54but he was doing it in an extremely careful, clever, moderate way.
0:16:54 > 0:17:00He had to deal with militants on his own side in the Solidarity movement.
0:17:00 > 0:17:03Part of his problem was to sort of control them
0:17:03 > 0:17:09so that they didn't push things far too fast. He was good at that.
0:17:09 > 0:17:10I was impressed.
0:17:10 > 0:17:13Were you conscious that you were laying yourself open to the charge
0:17:13 > 0:17:17that the American Foreign Service is always open to,
0:17:17 > 0:17:22which is that you're pushing the American interest in countries that
0:17:22 > 0:17:27are in the sphere of interest of another power, that you're advancing
0:17:27 > 0:17:31American interests at the expense of America's traditional rivals?
0:17:33 > 0:17:37Well, I think that's what you're sent to do, really.
0:17:37 > 0:17:40- Interfering in the internal affairs of another state?- No.
0:17:40 > 0:17:45No, I think that was... That's what they'd say I was doing.
0:17:47 > 0:17:54No, I think there's a stage well before that where you have
0:17:54 > 0:17:57American interests in mind.
0:17:57 > 0:18:04The whole business of trying to chart what was going on in Poland,
0:18:04 > 0:18:08and especially the question of the Soviet interest
0:18:08 > 0:18:12and Soviet courses of action and what was likely and unlikely.
0:18:12 > 0:18:14That was all pretty heavy stuff,
0:18:14 > 0:18:18pretty important stuff that you had to try and follow.
0:18:18 > 0:18:22So I spent a good deal of time on that.
0:18:23 > 0:18:27Then in the winter of 1981, into '82, martial law.
0:18:27 > 0:18:29After all the months of chaos,
0:18:29 > 0:18:33it was Eastern Europe's traditional answer to major reform -
0:18:33 > 0:18:36a swift, highly efficient military operation that clamped in
0:18:36 > 0:18:39martial law throughout the country.
0:18:39 > 0:18:42- The last military coup in Europe. - Was it? Yeah.
0:18:42 > 0:18:47I was in Washington, which was not a smart thing to do.
0:18:47 > 0:18:49So you missed it.
0:18:49 > 0:18:52I think if there's going to be a revolution in Eastern Europe
0:18:52 > 0:18:56and you're the American ambassador, you should be in the country for it.
0:18:56 > 0:18:59So I had things to do in Washington.
0:19:02 > 0:19:04I'd sort of gone home...
0:19:04 > 0:19:07It wasn't only official.
0:19:07 > 0:19:10We hadn't been home in four years.
0:19:10 > 0:19:15We were kind of anxious to see the kids and stuff like that.
0:19:17 > 0:19:22But not a good idea to be there when the action is in the other site.
0:19:22 > 0:19:25- I was told to get back in quickly. - And you managed to?
0:19:25 > 0:19:28- Yeah.- They sealed the borders, didn't they?
0:19:28 > 0:19:31Yeah. I got in by flying to Berlin
0:19:31 > 0:19:35and then being driven to the border,
0:19:35 > 0:19:38the Polish-East German border,
0:19:38 > 0:19:40and then the embassy in Warsaw
0:19:40 > 0:19:45sent down a little van for me,
0:19:45 > 0:19:47to take me into Warsaw.
0:19:47 > 0:19:52Not only me but to take some communication specialist
0:19:52 > 0:19:56that we were rushing in with some equipment that was needed
0:19:56 > 0:20:01for this sort of rather edgy bet we were going into.
0:20:01 > 0:20:04Sad going back into it, though.
0:20:04 > 0:20:06The thing had changed, obviously,
0:20:06 > 0:20:10and it was... From then on, it was not as much fun, I'd say.
0:20:10 > 0:20:12When we look back on it now, it seems the beginning of the end
0:20:12 > 0:20:16for Communism, but that's something we've imposed on it in retrospect.
0:20:16 > 0:20:19- It didn't feel like that at the time, did it?- I mean... No.
0:20:19 > 0:20:21I think you're right there.
0:20:21 > 0:20:25It looked, to me, as if you'd have quite a lot of martial law,
0:20:25 > 0:20:29but things were moving. I mean, you might not see them.
0:20:33 > 0:20:36Frank's last posting as an ambassador
0:20:36 > 0:20:38was back in Communist East Germany,
0:20:38 > 0:20:40between 1985 and 1988.
0:20:40 > 0:20:43His study at home in Helensburgh is full of mementos
0:20:43 > 0:20:46from his long career.
0:20:46 > 0:20:50Well, Allan, these are the commissions I mentioned to you.
0:20:50 > 0:20:54There are three of them, one for each embassy I had.
0:20:54 > 0:20:56Czechoslovakia is the first there.
0:20:56 > 0:20:59- And that's from Jimmy Carter. - From Jimmy Carter.
0:20:59 > 0:21:01And then, as I think I said to you,
0:21:01 > 0:21:05I was sort of pushed into Warsaw rather quickly
0:21:05 > 0:21:07when Solidarity started going,
0:21:07 > 0:21:09so that was again from Carter,
0:21:09 > 0:21:12but right at the end of his administration...
0:21:12 > 0:21:14That was a key appointment, wasn't it?
0:21:14 > 0:21:17Yeah. That was the biggest one I had, really,
0:21:17 > 0:21:19and I think the most important one I had,
0:21:19 > 0:21:22and then the third one was East Germany,
0:21:22 > 0:21:27which I always regard as a booby prize, you know?
0:21:27 > 0:21:31I wanted Moscow, didn't get it,
0:21:31 > 0:21:35and so I got East Berlin as a sort of booby prize,
0:21:35 > 0:21:37but one I liked, though.
0:21:37 > 0:21:40- And that's from Ronald Reagan. - That was from Reagan.
0:21:40 > 0:21:43And Reagan was the president I saw...
0:21:44 > 0:21:48..not much of him, but I saw him in a working situation,
0:21:48 > 0:21:51and I found that he was extremely good.
0:21:51 > 0:21:53Republicans and many Democrats in America
0:21:53 > 0:21:57think of him now as the president who won the Cold War.
0:21:57 > 0:21:59There was a lot more to it than that.
0:21:59 > 0:22:03Russia was beginning to crackle and rumble...
0:22:03 > 0:22:05You must have been in office, probably in East Germany,
0:22:05 > 0:22:07when he made that famous speech,
0:22:07 > 0:22:10saying, "Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall."
0:22:10 > 0:22:11I was there. Yeah.
0:22:11 > 0:22:16There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable.
0:22:16 > 0:22:18Come here to this gate.
0:22:18 > 0:22:22Mr Gorbachev, open this gate.
0:22:22 > 0:22:25CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:22:25 > 0:22:29Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
0:22:29 > 0:22:32And I must say, I thought, "Hmm..."
0:22:32 > 0:22:34You know?
0:22:34 > 0:22:36OK, not bad PR,
0:22:36 > 0:22:39but is it going to do anything, you know?
0:22:39 > 0:22:41And it turned out the idealist was right.
0:22:41 > 0:22:44Yeah. Don't underestimate him, I would say.
0:22:44 > 0:22:48I told that to Democratic friends after I'd seen him,
0:22:48 > 0:22:51and they said, "Oh, Frank, you're like everybody else.
0:22:51 > 0:22:54"You've fallen for the old actor," you know?
0:22:54 > 0:22:57But I was impressed by him. He was good.
0:22:57 > 0:23:00So, you must have served at least half a dozen presidents.
0:23:00 > 0:23:03- Let's just count them. Truman first.- Yeah.
0:23:03 > 0:23:05Eisenhower. Kennedy.
0:23:05 > 0:23:07Lyndon Johnson.
0:23:07 > 0:23:08Nixon.
0:23:08 > 0:23:10- Ford.- Yeah.
0:23:10 > 0:23:12Carter.
0:23:12 > 0:23:13- Reagan.- Reagan.
0:23:13 > 0:23:15- Bush Senior.- Yeah.
0:23:15 > 0:23:19- That's nine presidents you worked for.- Gosh.
0:23:19 > 0:23:20How time goes by!
0:23:20 > 0:23:22That's quite a career.
0:23:22 > 0:23:23Yeah. It was good.
0:23:29 > 0:23:32Frank retired just a year before the Berlin Wall fell,
0:23:32 > 0:23:35and in the countries he'd served in,
0:23:35 > 0:23:38the Communist regimes were swept away one by one.
0:23:38 > 0:23:40It's one of the great mysteries, to me,
0:23:40 > 0:23:44as I look back on it in my own work.
0:23:44 > 0:23:48I still have difficulty
0:23:48 > 0:23:50understanding exactly what
0:23:50 > 0:23:52happened to the Russians,
0:23:52 > 0:23:56that they decided to pack in and leave East Germany.
0:23:56 > 0:24:00And to give that up to simply go home
0:24:00 > 0:24:05seemed to me, then, an almost inexplicable decision,
0:24:05 > 0:24:08and it still seems to be puzzling.
0:24:08 > 0:24:11We had that period in Russia, seven, eight years,
0:24:11 > 0:24:14when it looked as though Russia might well democratise,
0:24:14 > 0:24:16- even Westernise...- Hmm.
0:24:16 > 0:24:20..and Yeltsin looked like a succession of Westernising tsars,
0:24:20 > 0:24:25going back into the 18th century, but Putin emerged from that.
0:24:25 > 0:24:28Why did that happen, do you think?
0:24:28 > 0:24:34One of the difficulties I have is knowing just what produced Putin,
0:24:34 > 0:24:39and what is producing change in the Russian leadership now.
0:24:39 > 0:24:42I don't know if you've been struck by this,
0:24:42 > 0:24:45but we have Putin and Medvedev,
0:24:45 > 0:24:47who have been trading jobs,
0:24:47 > 0:24:50you know, president and prime minister,
0:24:50 > 0:24:54happily, since, what, 2000, or something like that.
0:24:56 > 0:24:59I've been... That can't go on for ever.
0:24:59 > 0:25:06And I have no sense of what is producing leadership change there.
0:25:06 > 0:25:09So this is much more like a personal autocracy, a monarchy,
0:25:09 > 0:25:12- than the Soviet Union ever was like? - Yeah.
0:25:12 > 0:25:14The more I look at Russia today,
0:25:14 > 0:25:19the more I'm reminded of the last years of the Tsars -
0:25:19 > 0:25:24Russia, say from, you know,
0:25:24 > 0:25:271900 to 1917 -
0:25:27 > 0:25:29but I think it suits them,
0:25:29 > 0:25:34and what strikes me about Russia, these years, is
0:25:34 > 0:25:38the tremendous sense of loss that they have,
0:25:38 > 0:25:41of power and position.
0:25:41 > 0:25:45You know? They've lost so much since the fall of the Soviet Union,
0:25:45 > 0:25:50and I think that part of Putin's hold on Russia
0:25:50 > 0:25:52is that he expresses this.
0:25:52 > 0:25:57- And to some extent, Putin mitigates the humiliation.- That's right.
0:25:57 > 0:26:00For instance, by taking Crimea back.
0:26:00 > 0:26:03Crimea doesn't belong to anybody but Russia,
0:26:03 > 0:26:07is the Russian view of it, so that would tremendously popular.
0:26:07 > 0:26:11Let me ask you about the country that you served for decades.
0:26:11 > 0:26:13- The United States.- Uh-huh.
0:26:13 > 0:26:15The election of Donald Trump.
0:26:15 > 0:26:19Does that... That changes things fundamentally, doesn't it?
0:26:19 > 0:26:23Trump is a phenomenon.
0:26:23 > 0:26:26He's a political phenomenon...
0:26:26 > 0:26:30that we don't quite...at least I don't quite grasp yet.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35He broke most of the rules that I would have given him
0:26:35 > 0:26:37if he'd come to me and said,
0:26:37 > 0:26:39"How do I become an American president?"
0:26:39 > 0:26:45And what it has left me is with a kind of rather obvious thought,
0:26:45 > 0:26:50you know, if a guy has done all this by breaking the rules,
0:26:50 > 0:26:52you wonder if he might not think,
0:26:52 > 0:26:55"You just keep on breaking rules and you'll win."
0:26:55 > 0:26:59Let me ask you about the strange divided identity you have
0:26:59 > 0:27:02between being Scottish and American.
0:27:02 > 0:27:05- Hmm.- How do you feel?
0:27:05 > 0:27:07Do you feel Scottish, or do you feel American?
0:27:07 > 0:27:10I feel American, I think, yeah.
0:27:10 > 0:27:12But, you know, I know Scotland well.
0:27:12 > 0:27:15Must know it well, since I grew up here,
0:27:15 > 0:27:19and have tremendous affection, obviously,
0:27:19 > 0:27:20for Scotland.
0:27:20 > 0:27:23I don't want to be too sentimental on it
0:27:23 > 0:27:26but I love it.
0:27:26 > 0:27:28But I am an American.
0:27:28 > 0:27:31Why did you decide to settle in retirement in Scotland
0:27:31 > 0:27:33and not go back to the United States?
0:27:33 > 0:27:35Well, that's a fairly easy one.
0:27:35 > 0:27:37Margaret wanted to...
0:27:37 > 0:27:39My wife wanted to come here,
0:27:39 > 0:27:42and I felt I owed it to her a bit
0:27:42 > 0:27:47because I'd dragged around Eastern Europe all our married life,
0:27:47 > 0:27:52and we were counting up, when we came here,
0:27:52 > 0:27:54when we came to Helensburgh,
0:27:54 > 0:27:58it was our 23rd full move
0:27:58 > 0:28:00in our married life.
0:28:00 > 0:28:03Now, when you've asked a wife to do that,
0:28:03 > 0:28:05I think you do owe her something.
0:28:05 > 0:28:07- And are you happy here? - Yeah. Yeah, I am.
0:28:07 > 0:28:10I mean, I miss the States, you know?
0:28:10 > 0:28:12It's good fun there.
0:28:12 > 0:28:13Lots of things happen.
0:28:13 > 0:28:16I'd like to be in Washington now, for instance,
0:28:16 > 0:28:18to see all this stuff.
0:28:18 > 0:28:21I'd like to watch it close up.
0:28:21 > 0:28:23HE CHUCKLES
0:28:24 > 0:28:27- Thank you very much. That's great. - You're very welcome, Allan.