James A. Abrahamson administration to announce the program would cease. Abrahamson accompanied President Reagan to Reykjavik, Iceland, for the Reykjavik Summit on October 11, 1986, to meet the Soviet leader, Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev. The subject of the Strategic Defense Initiative's technological advances and their effects on the strategic nuclear balance between the United States and the Soviet Union during the last years of the Cold War was raised by the Soviets at the meeting. During the post-summit press conference, Gorbachev said Reagan's insistence on deploying SDI had "frustrated and scuttled" the opportunity for an agreement. Abrahamson was promoted to lieutenant general on
Malta Summit Malta Summit The Malta Summit comprised a meeting between US President George H. W. Bush and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, taking place on December 2–3, 1989, just a few weeks after the fall of the Berlin Wall. It was their second meeting following a meeting that included Ronald Reagan, in New York in December 1988. During the summit, Bush and Gorbachev would declare an end to the Cold War although whether it was truly such is a matter of debate. News reports of the time referred to the Malta Summit as the most important since 1945, when British prime