ABSTRACT
The US bureaucracy, the American public, Congress and the allies were all surprised by President Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) announcement. However, the most interesting reaction was from the Soviet Union. The SDI speech was a surprise to the Washington defence and foreign policy bureaucracy, apart from National Security Adviser William Clark, John Poindexter and Robert McFarlane. That the SDI speech was a surprise to the bureaucracy is evidence that the introduction of the SDI was very much due to President Reagan. The American public was surprised to learn that the US had no defence against Soviet or other missiles. In Congress, the day after the SDI announcement several Democratic members of the House responded with sharp criticisms of the SDI. The allies were concerned about the SDI because they feared that the US would become less interested in NATO's security, consequently threatening the alliance.
