--- title: Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me About History description: In my lifetime, no one person has had the impact on the world that Mikhail Gorbachev—who died Aug. 30 at 91—did canonical: https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2022-08-31T22:07:22.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:53:57.749Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me og:description: In my lifetime, no one person has had the impact on the world that Mikhail Gorbachev—who died Aug. 30 at 91—did og:url: https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5d5e9d9944a3dcfc/698a3515b3fce3163a0c99a2/Gorbachev-Bono-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2400 og:image:height: 1350 og:image:alt: Gorbachev-Bono-01 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me twitter:description: In my lifetime, no one person has had the impact on the world that Mikhail Gorbachev—who died Aug. 30 at 91—did twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5d5e9d9944a3dcfc/698a3515b3fce3163a0c99a2/Gorbachev-Bono-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me About Our Power to Change History > Sponsored content. 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Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. by [Bono](https://time.com/author/bono/) ## Bono Aug 31, 2022 10:07 PM UTC  Mikhail Gorbachev in 1995 Mikhail Gorbachev in 1995 Dana Gluckstein—MPTV/Reuters by [Bono](https://time.com/author/bono/) ## Bono Aug 31, 2022 10:07 PM UTC In my lifetime no one person has had the impact on the world that Mikhail Gorbachev, [who died Aug. 30 at 91](https://time.com/5636727/mikhail-gorbachev-dies/), did. Though Vladimir Putin would attempt to pull down the digital blinds, the rolling back of the Iron Curtain is right next to Neil Armstrong’s walking on the moon as the most awe-­inspiring events I’ve witnessed on a television. But unlike the moon, the world Mikhail Gorbachev landed on was one I walked on myself. Two epoch-­making events: one signaling human ambition to challenge the boundaries of where we might live; the other [redrawing the boundaries](https://time.com/6209992/mikhail-gorbachev-end-cold-war/) of where we actually do live. For a quarter-­century, my wife Ali has worked with an Irish NGO, [Chernobyl Children International](https://www.chernobyl-international.com/). Along with other Irish volunteers, Ali has made regular journeys to the region; on one such trip she met Anna, one of several thousand children brought to Ireland for surgical procedures. Anna was adopted by a family in Cork, and she became Ali’s goddaughter. And as the universe would have it, Anna was staying with us one weekend in 2002 when Gorbachev dropped by. Anna had been born with severe physical disabilities due to the radiation poisoning of her parents, following the [nuclear accident at Chernobyl](https://time.com/5255663/chernobyl-disaster-book-anniversary/). As she entered the room in which the great man sat, we sensed the poignancy of this unexpected meeting.  A drawing of Mikhail Gorbachev that Bono sent the former Soviet President as a birthday card on his 90th Bono Gorbachev’s voice quieted to a murmur as he explained that it was that 1986 nuclear disaster at Chernobyl that convinced him the Soviet Union could not continue as it was: “I thought to myself, if the state cannot control a nuclear power plant of this significance, then the state is no longer functioning as a state. The state is kaput … When we see the devastation that splitting an atom can cause, then this is untenable; this cannot ever be acceptable. The Soviet Union was no longer viable; it has to find a new path—a path that must include rapprochement with the West.” **_Read more:_** [_Mikhail Gorbachev Championed ‘Glasnost’ and ‘Perestroika.’ Here’s How They Changed the World_](https://time.com/5512665/mikhail-gorbachev-glasnost-perestroika/) So this had been a moment when Mikhail Gorbachev changed his own history and ours. We discover history doesn’t have to shape us. The world is more malleable than we imagine, and things do not have to be the way they are. History is clay and can be pummeled or punched, corralled or even caressed, into a whole new shape. _This piece is adapted from_ [Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story](https://bookshop.org/a/4973/9780525521044), _to be released Nov. 1 from Knopf._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/"},"headline":"Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me About Our Power to Change History","datePublished":"2022-08-31T22:07:22.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:53:57.749Z","description":"In my lifetime, no one person has had the impact on the world that Mikhail Gorbachev—who died Aug. 30 at 91—did","url":"https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/","keywords":["remembrance"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5d5e9d9944a3dcfc/698a3515b3fce3163a0c99a2/Gorbachev-Bono-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Bono","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/bono/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5d5e9d9944a3dcfc/698a3515b3fce3163a0c99a2/Gorbachev-Bono-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Gorbachev-Bono-01","caption":"Portrait of Mikhail Gorbachev in 1995","creditText":"Dana Gluckstein—MPTV/Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/remembrance/","name":"remembrance"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/6210094/bono-mikhail-gorbachev-remembrance/","name":"Bono: What Mikhail Gorbachev Taught Me About Our Power to Change History"}}]}] ```