ABSTRACT
Mikhail Gorbachev's policy was predicated on a gradual evolution of the bipolar security system in Europe and the continued existence of the German states. The important shift was Gorbachev's willingness to repudiate the Brezhnev doctrine. Initially, Gorbachev showed a reluctance to face the issue squarely, in part because he did not want to destabilize the Gustav Husak/Milos Jakes regime in Prague, which was closely associated with the period of "normalization" following the Soviet-led invasion in 1968. Some Soviet officials, in fact, openly complained that this preoccupation with the United States had blinded the US to trends toward greater political and military self-assertion on the part of Western Europe: Soviet policy, they charged, had failed to pay sufficient attention to these changes. During late 1987 and early 1988, however, the outlines of a new policy toward Eastern Europe-a "Gorbachev doctrine" began to emerge. Gorbachev's "new thinking" provided an important framework for the shift in the Soviet approach to conventional arms control.
