Thick snowflakes fall in front of the window of the office on Leningradsky Avenue in northwestern Moscow. Mikhail Gorbachev's foundation has been located here for the past 23 years -- a place for political research projects, charity initiatives, conferences and book publishing.

Photos from bygone eras hang on the walls. There's one showing the former Soviet leader with George Bush Sr., in another he is with François Mitterrand. Still others depict Gorbachev with Helmut Kohl and Shimon Peres. There are also numerous images of his wife Raisa Gorbachev, who died in 1999 after a battle with leukemia. One in oil hangs over his desk while the large-format photograph across the room is the last photo taken of the former first lady. Gorbachev's voice falters when he speaks of her.

The 83-year-old has undergone three serious operations recently -- one on his spine, prostate surgery and another on his carotid artery. Now he's facing a fourth. The medication he takes has changed his face and he no longer likes to be photographed. "I always look like a bulldog in photos now," he says. "Mr. Gorbachev, you don't look like a bulldog," we respond. "Of course I do -- now stop it."

He then dispatches a press officer to grab a photo of him published by a Russian newspaper. If one was so inclined, slight similarities with a bulldog could perhaps be found. Even more so after the two-and-a-half hour interview he gave SPIEGEL. He has seldom been so combative.