What a time to die – and I say that with melancholy. We live in an era when so many of the towering figures of history are dying and leaving behind civilisation’s children without guardians.

Mikhail Gorbachev was no angel, but as the last leader of the USSR, he represented a moment when the world held out hope for a peaceful future for Europe – a re-unification with the lost empire that cut itself off to protect its jealous and fragile collectivist regime.