The last time I was in Krakow was after Christmas in December 1989, shortly after the Berlin Wall came down. I was an undergraduate, just starting out on my journalistic career, reporting on the end of the Cold War.
My first interview break had been to corner Ronald Reagan's Secretary of State George Shulz in the Cambridge Union bar after an evening debate on the end of the Soviet Union. His line was that with the Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan and Gorbachev signing the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 1987 - removing the threat to NATO of mid-range Soviet missiles in Europe – the so-called "Brezhnev Doctrine" was over.
