White House Diaries

Wednesday, November 20, 1985

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The last day of the summit & this time Mr. G. was host. We went to the Soviet mission & he took me into a small room with interpreters. This was my chance to have at human rights. I explained that I wasn’t telling him how to run his country—I was asking for his help; that I had a better chance of getting support at home for things we’d agreed to if he would ease some of the restrictions on emigration etc. I told him I’d never mention what he was doing out loud but he’d find that I could better meet some of his requests for trade etc. He argued back sort of indicating that he thought they treated their people better than we did ours. He quoted statements made by some of the feminist extremists to prove we were unkind to women. I fought back—only time will tell if I made any headway.

In the plenary I took off on arms control then he fired back about S.D.I. creating an arms race in space & the stuff really hit the fan. He was really belligerent & d--n it I stood firm. That took us til lunch. In the P.M. session I tried out a written proposal for a joint statement. Upshot was we cut short the meeting and our teams went at the problem of a joint statement. He & I & the interpreters went into a small room & wound up telling stories. We were there ’til 5:30 then the teams came in with a number of things agreed upon & several we didn’t. We broke up to leave them still at it so he & I could get ready for the reception at the Swiss Presidents home. Then they were here for dinner. It was a pleasant evening & a small informal dinner. Over coffee some of our aides (both his & mine) came over to tell us they were having trouble on the joint statement—his people were trying to withdraw some things they had already agreed to. There was some brisk language & at 5 A.M.—the statement ended up the way we’d wanted it! And I think it was because Mr. G. told his guys to quit what they were doing.