I wasn't entirely aware that he was still alive. Nonethless, it's an interesting interview. He mentions that his home was bugged (though I'm not sure why he thinks it was the Russians and not the Americans doing the bugging. He also says that Russia (and perhaps the world) would be better off if the Soviet Union had held in tact (not as communism, but rather as a single integrated entity - almost sounds like he describing the ultimate goal of the EU, a unified cultural and economic entity). From Spiegel:
SPIEGEL: There is a theory that you often repeat, but that we are unable to understand, namely that the Soviet Union could still have been saved even after the coup.
Gorbachev: And it could have. It's just that we were too late in beginning to reform it. Some wanted a federation, but the majority of the republics wanted a united state with elements of a confederation. Then I proposed a referendum. When we voted on the proposal, Yeltsin angrily slammed his fist on the table. He was against it, of course. He announced openly that he could no longer work with Gorbachev, and that they had to part ways with him. Then came the referendum, and the people supported me.
SPIEGEL: Seventy-six percent.
Gorbachev: That means that the union was destroyed against the will of the people, and it was done deliberately -- with the participation of the Russian leadership, on the one hand, and that of the putschists, on the other.
SPIEGEL: What would be better today if the Soviet Union still existed?
Gorbachev: Isn't that clear to you? Everything had grown together over the decades: culture, education, language, the economy, everything. They were building cars in the Baltic republics and airplanes in the Ukraine. We still can't get by without each other today. And a population of 300 million was also a plus.
