When, in 1989, George H. W. Bush took office, he and his administration believed the alliance was essential. They left office thinking the same thing—even if during that time the Berlin Wall fell, Germany was unified, and the Soviet Union collapsed. For Bush and his advisers, the logic of NATO both as a bulwark against Moscow’s influence and as a means of preventing the establishment of a shaky system of alliances in Central Europe continued to apply after the end of the Cold War. The need to salt the earth against a potential reconstitution of Soviet power, and the desire to ensure that the
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