My most memorable experience working under Reagan began in the Spring of 1987. The President was going to make a trip to Italy for the Venice Economic Summit and the White House received a request from Helmut Kohl, the Chancellor of West Germany, asking the President also to visit Berlin, which was then celebrating its 800th anniversary. Several ranking international officials had visited including Mikhail Gorbachev, which concerned Kohl. He wanted the American President to visit West Berlin.
After the White House agreed, I was given the assignment of writing Reagan’s speech, so off I went to Germany with a pre-advance group: the people who deal with the German press and the German security.
When we arrived, the first thing we did was go to the site where the President would speak. I had never been to West Berlin before, but right there at the Wall, with the Brandenburg Gate rising behind it and off to one side the Reichstag still pock-marked from shells and bullets, you could feel the sense of oppression. In some ways you could feel the weight of history. I was at that point a young speechwriter in trouble, because I realized the setting was unlike any other setting in which the President had spoken, and writing material that would be equal to that setting was going to be a challenge.
My next stop in Berlin was the office of the ranking U.S. State Department official in Berlin. He was
