Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher, Great Britain’s first female prime minister, served during Ronald Reagan’s tenure as U.S. president (1981–1989) and joined him in opposition to the Soviet Union. In the following viewpoint, taken from a speech to the Heritage Foundation’s “Leadership for America” gala on December 12, 1998, Thatcher argues that it was the Reagan Doctrine that won the Cold War. According to Thatcher, appeasement of the Soviet Union weakened the West. When Reagan took office, Thatcher maintains, he took an aggressive stand against communism and convinced the American people that U.S. military superiority was necessary to oppose Soviet domination. Reagan’s stance against communism was vindicated, she contends, when the Soviet Union released control of its Eastern European satellites...