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Secrets & Spies: A Nuclear Game review: How a hot water bottle helped a chilly Mrs T to thaw the Cold War, writes CHRISTOPHER STEVENS
CHRISTOPHER STEVENS: This was the story John Le Carré never told, how the West averted war with the Soviet Union thanks to Nancy Reagan's astrologer and Thatcher's trusty hot water bottle.
Reagan's security services didn't know how the UK was getting its intel, but the President and his wife decided to trust it, and launched a charm offensive... guided by the star charts of celebrity astrologer Joan Quigley, whom they regularly consulted during their time in the White House. The planets must have been in perfect alignment, because Reagan's folksy speech — about an American couple, Jim and Sally, who befriend Russian lovebirds Ivan and Anya at the bus stop — struck the right note in Moscow. But here we glimpsed her behind the scenes in Downing Street, overseeing flower arrangements for a state banquet in honour of Mikhail Gorbachev, Chernenko's successor — and a man, according to our secret source, who was ready to strike a deal to end the arms race.
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