"Re-elected in 1984, [Reagan] sought to assure the Soviet leadership that he wanted peace; he also signalled that he sought a resumption of negotiations. This was not going to be easy. Andropov had been in poor health at his accession to the General Secretaryship, and he died in February 1984. His successor Konstantin Chernenko had been Brezhnev’s personal assistant. Mental agility beyond the routine tasks of administration had never been one of his strong features and he was already badly ill with emphysema. Reagan was trying to parley at a table at which he was the solitary sitter. Yet fortune smiled on the American strategy when, in March 1985, Chernenko died and was succeeded by Mikhail Gorbachëv."
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Heads of stateGeneral Secretaries of the Communist Party of the Soviet UnionAtheists from RussiaPeople of the Cold WarCommunist Party of the Soviet Union members
Original Language: English
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Sources
Robert Service, Comrades!: A History of World Communism (2010)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Konstantin_Chernenko
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Konstantin Chernenko
Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko (24 September 1911 – 10 March 1985) was a Soviet politician, who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
11 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Konstantin Chernenko →
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