President Ronald Reagan was anti-communistic. Before Gorbachev came to power, he used to profess his absolute abhorrence of the Soviet Union and would have nothing to do with them. But his views mellowed somewhat after Gorbachev, however, it did not mean he changed his views about communism but he was more concerned with the threat of nuclear weapons and he saw that it was possible to achieve peaceful relations with the Soviet Union, even though that peaceful relation took a long time to happen.