Malta Summit

The argument

This argument holds that the Cold War ended because its own leaders formally ended it — at the Malta Summit of December 1989, where the heads of the two superpowers met and declared the era of confrontation over. The summit's circumstances and substance were unambiguous. Weeks after the Berlin Wall fell, US President George H. W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev met aboard ships anchored off the coast of Malta, the first summit of the post-Wall world. There, the two men announced a new relationship between their countries: Gorbachev assured Bush that the Soviet Union would never start a hot war against the United States and declared that the two nations no longer regarded each other as enemies, while both leaders spoke of an era of lasting peace and cooperation. Commentators at the time captured the symbolism in a phrase — 'from Yalta to Malta': the conference system that had opened the division of Europe was closed by a conference ending it. The argument's logic rests on what kind of thing the Cold War was. A confrontation defined by the mutual hostility of two principals is ended the way it was conducted — by those principals. When the leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union jointly declare that the enmity is over, and conduct policy accordingly thereafter — arms reductions, German reunification accepted, cooperation in place of crisis — the conflict has ended by the declaration of the only parties with standing to end it. Everything that followed, including the Soviet Union's dissolution in 1991, confirmed rather than created that conclusion. From this standpoint, the question has an official answer given by the war's own protagonists. Because Bush and Gorbachev declared the conflict over at the Malta Summit, this argument holds, the Cold War ended.

Premises

Counter-arguments

A declaration is evidence about intentions; it is not a constitutive act. The Cold War was not a legal state of affairs that a communiqué could terminate — no war had been declared, so none could be undeclared — and Malta produced no treaty, no signed agreement and no binding instrument of any kind. It was a conversation between two leaders, one of whom would be out of office within three years and whose state would cease to exist within two. The criterion also has an awkward history behind it. Declarations by the principals had been made before: the 1972 Moscow summit produced signed agreements and a formal declaration of the basic principles of peaceful coexistence, stating that the two powers would proceed from the premise that there was no alternative to peaceful relations. The rivalry resumed within the decade. If a joint declaration by the principals ends the conflict, the Cold War should have ended in 1972 — and any account that explains why it did not will apply equally to 1989. Treating the Soviet dissolution as mere confirmation makes the choice of Malta look arbitrary. The fall of the Wall preceded it by weeks; the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, the reunification of Germany, the Belovezha Accords and the lowering of the Soviet flag over the Kremlin followed. Each is a candidate for the moment the conflict ended, and no reason is offered for ranking a meeting above the material events on either side of it — particularly since the argument itself cites those events as evidence that the declaration was sincere, which concedes that the declaration alone would not have sufficed. And the sibling position goes unanswered. It holds that the structural rivalry — force postures, contested spheres, alliance expansion — persisted regardless of what was announced. Pointing again to the announcement does not engage that claim.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] The summit produced no treaty or binding agreement; it was a discussion, and the 'no longer enemies' language was a statement of intent by leaders — one of whom left office within three years, and whose state ceased to exist within two. [Rejecting P2] Declarations by the principals had been made before without ending the conflict: the 1972 Moscow summit produced signed agreements and a formal declaration of peaceful coexistence, after which the rivalry resumed. If such a declaration were constitutive, the war should have ended then. [Rejecting P3] Treating the dissolution as mere confirmation makes the choice of Malta arbitrary — the fall of the Wall preceded it and the Warsaw Pact's dissolution followed — and citing the subsequent cooperative policy as evidence concedes that the declaration alone would not have sufficed.