 McCauley thought Gorbachev displayed "great tactical skill" in maneuvering successfully between hardline Marxist-Leninists and liberalisers for most of his time as leader, although added that he was "much more skilled at tactical, short-term policy than strategic, long-term thinking", in part because he was "given to making policy on the hoof".Doder and Branson thought Gorbachev "a Russian to the core, intensely patriotic as only people living in the border regions can be.