In December 1989, Malta became the centre of world attention. In those days, the country hosted the USSR-US summit, an event that turned the political (and, consequently, geographical) world order upside down. At the first-ever joint press conference, Mikhail Gorbachev stated that the world was entering a new era. President Bush supported the statement by saying that Malta had laid the foundation for the future. Thirty-one years later, we talked to the participants and organisers of those events to understand what exactly happened and why both sides are grateful to the Maltese for their hospitality.

No one expected such severe weather conditions from the island of sunshine. Of course, the choice of location had nothing to do with the climate. The idea came from George W. Bush's administration and the Soviet side agreed. Malta was an attractive place for a meeting due to its neutral position on political issues as well as its location - a neutral country that does not have obsessive sympathies to any of the parties. The US administration wanted to make emphasis also on equality and neutrality by the accommodation location of delegations. It was planned that the participants would stay in a warship and the President would arrive on the island by helicopter.

The mooring, outside the port (though within Maltese waters), was supposed to symbolize the neutral waters. There was no hidden agenda. Everything was transparent. In contrast, Soviet diplomats rushed to look for the best hotels on the island for Gorbachev. However, they quickly realized that it would be nice to mirror the Americans' idea and accommodate the chairman on a Soviet liner. The cruise ship, Maxim Gorky, was suitable for this purpose. It was not a military ship but a civilian one. Moreover, it was a luxurious bourgeois floating hotel designed for rest and relaxation, a beautiful symbol of peaceful intentions. Exactly in such an atmosphere it was necessary to assure the world: "I will never start a war against the USA."

Diplomats remember that when they learned about the upcoming summit just a couple of weeks before, they had to pull themselves together and get into a mad schedule. The embassy at that time was small (the delegation had been renting a small villa in Swieqi), the apartments of the staff were not large either but with a lifestyle quite in line with the Mediterraneans: relaxed and calm. Malta was considered a "pleasant exile", an abundant, beautiful country, where nothing happens. That's why older diplomats dreamt of living on the island and young people rushed to more eventful places. It should be mentioned that after the summit, the embassy moved to its current location, Kappara.

At the beginning of December 1989, Malta became the Earth's capital. Following these events, tourism in the country entered another level. Understanding the historical scale of events and PR benefits, the Maltese were enthusiastic about the Summit and were ready to welcome two very important world leaders. The local police did not become anxious when crowds of the world's most frightening security services appeared and ordinary Maltese people communicated with Soviet interpreters and journalists in bars with great interest. There was an atmosphere of freedom and friendship, so unusual to Soviet people. An interpreter from Moscow, who worked at the summit, recalls: "We ran into a local restaurant for lunch, at that moment Gorbachev, who spoke Russian, was on TV. The surrounding Maltese asked me to translate his words literally. I was horrified: without the usual generalization of translation, the phrases turned out to be long and essentially meaningless. The surrounding people were surprised to clarify: so it does not mean anything? And I responded that there was nothing bad, we are here for peace."

Indeed, if an ordinary American considers those events as "negotiations between the two powers" (and many say that they remember well the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the summit was "somewhere at that time"), for Soviet people that was a celebration. This is how the participants describe it: "We are used to living in constant stress, daily fear of the whole world. Intimidation and pressure were coming from both sides. And finally, we were not expected to hate the "enemy" anymore, neither to dream about sacrificing our lives and the lives of millions, billions of people, for someone's political failures." Soon, the song Fresh Wind will become a symbol of the era. In it, all the lines are dedicated to obtaining the long-awaited freedom:

I am not the same today as yesterday,

The fresh wind has raised my wings,

Old skin exploding at the seams

With the new skin I hug the sky.

Fresh wind did not come in vain,

Shaken off the dust, and opened a window for me.

I had been dreaming of fresh wind for a long time,

Fresh wind, you and me on the same side.

 

In present-day Russia, this song could have sounded politically wrong; it would hardly have been danced to in the Kremlin today.

Foreigners wildly liked Gorby. Even though his speeches were written by a whole team of professionals each time trying to get to the target audience, we must admit that without his consent, it would have been impossible. Yet, he was strictly censored - party censorship could not be avoided even by the general secretary. While the American and Maltese media immediately reported news from the summit, the Soviet journalists had to spend long hours getting their texts approved. The Maltese television gladly took the opportunity to talk to Soviet guests, who had been previously inaccessible to the media.

The inclement weather scared no one, not even the superstitious. The waves pounded relentlessly and it was impossible to reach the American ship, thus the main meeting was held on board the Maxim Gorky. The storm did not stop for a second. It was only after all the events, when Bush said goodbye and his helicopter left the island, did the clouds part and the bright, warm sun shone again. Even skeptics believed in world peace.

At Reagan's funeral in Washington, responding to the statement that the Americans won the Cold War, Gorbachev said "we all lost the Cold War and won only when it ended" estimating the losses in trillions of dollars on each side. The only war that is won is the one that has never happened. The Maltese summit was victorious.