Translated material
I have contact
A reaction has occurred. If not positive, then at least correct - depending on what level of relationship we are talking about. Having met, we talked about business and the main thing. On the matter, the parties remained at their own agreement, but about the main thing they disagreed in complete agreement and agreeableness.
The tail wags the dog
Since the main intrigue of the summit lay not in the business field, but in the field of subtle matters of human relations, one of its funniest parts is the ritual tip of the diplomatic iceberg - a reflection of the bizarre laws of state vanity. In this part, in an ideal world, everything works exactly the same as in funny Hollywood films. Each of the leaders of both the current and former superpowers came to the meeting with their own set of simple tricks, with home preparations, insidious psychological techniques and other things. For example, George Bush, having barely shaken Vladimir Putin’s hand for the first time, immediately defiantly thanked the Russian president for not being too lazy to travel “such a long way” to meet him. And subsequently he always tried to use simple methods to indicate his “master” status. Everywhere he let Putin forward, made inviting gestures and carefully pushed Putin’s back into the doorways. In general, Bush has developed an attractive style, which the Americans call “body-language,” and to which they attach great importance, persistently training their officials. For example, Clinton’s famous handshake was almost erotic in nature - with one hand squeezing the interlocutor’s hand, with the other he tightly squeezed his forearm, approaching him with his body and face and looking languidly only into his eyes for a long time - Bush’s style is different. He stood sideways and, shaking hands, patted him firmly on the back with the other, between the shoulder blades. Putin, who obviously shies away from such almost Soviet tenderness, looks appropriately patted.
But Putin has his own preparations. Firstly, by his own admission, on the way from Shanghai, in addition to other documents for the Ljubljana meeting, he also studied a whole video about Bush. And then he shone with his knowledge of the childhood and youth of the American president, his school hobbies. A hit, of course, was the story about the daughters of the American president, whom the prudent Putin knew! - Bush Jr. named after his mother and mother-in-law. Like Putin - which is typical. Having learned about this, Bush could not recover from joy for a long time and get rid of the feeling of community with the Russian. In addition, Putin chatted casually (at least outwardly) with Bush in English. To which the Americans did not have a symmetrical answer, unless, of course, you count the fact that the gloomy Condoleezza Rice, without closing her mouth, talked in Russian with her counterpart Vladimir Rushailo, who, it seems, could not answer her in the same way. However, the game of politicians is not only made up of such gambling trifles. And among the little things there are serious ones. Kind of like a goat face. The temptation to put his “multipolar” point in the dialogue with Bush turned out to be so strong that, not limiting himself to a visit to Belgrade, Vladimir Putin also rushed to Pristina, to the Slatina airport, the grave significance of which for Russian-American relations is difficult to overestimate (details in material “Throw on Slatina”) .
ABM as an excuse
As for the most fashionable geopolitical topic, we were, of course, talking about missile defense. But if we approach this discussion formally, it did not end in anything. The bottom line of the discussion on this topic, in fact, was formulated even before the summit in both Washington and Moscow. According to Vladimir Putin, “the President of the United States and I agreed to give instructions to the ministers of defense, ministers of foreign affairs, and experts to continue this discussion without pause.” However, according to a senior Russian source, Vladimir Putin managed to impress Bush with his logic regarding missile defense. Russia’s position, as is known, boils down to the fact that even if the attitude of the United States and Russia to the so-called “new threats” emanating from “rogue countries” is consistent, the need for NMD to repel these threats has not been proven from the Russian point of view. The Russian military insists that the 1972 treaty, which is absolutely unshakable for Russia in principle, nevertheless contains the possibility of significant modifications. Putin is much more fluent than Bush in using numbers, flanks, technical characteristics of missiles and other strange concepts necessary for a thoughtful conversation about air defense. He can prove with his fingers that North Korea is not able to pose a threat for purely technical reasons, that the projected NMD will not be able to hit modern targets, etc. The Americans, of course, either dismiss this evidence as insufficient or do not consider it at all for political reasons . However, according to a well-informed Kremlin source, in Ljubljana Putin managed to convince Bush that Russia and the United States should at least conduct a joint inventory of these “new threats” and sort them according to all possible criteria. So that, according to the same source, “maybe even deal with them together.”
The main order of the president to the relevant specialists, according to Vladimir Putin, was the order to find out what exactly is preventing the use of existing capabilities to repel “new threats”.
Although the “Bush aides”, demonized by the press, categorically refused one-on-one negotiations on such a serious topic and supported their president with Condoleezza Rice (which automatically entailed Vladimir Rushailo), some advantage in this dialogue, apparently, remained with Putin . At a minimum, because Russia, although it will obviously never be able to “abolish” the missile defense system, was nevertheless able to take a pause in order to play for time and bargain. On a wide variety of economic and political issues.
About NATO
The situation with NATO is still clearer for the two leaders than with missile defense. George Bush is pleased with the expansion of the North Atlantic alliance, but Vladimir Putin is saddened by this matter. Bush makes general arguments: any country can want to join anything - even Russia, even NATO. Putin does not provide any arguments. Apart from, again, the demonstratively homemade preparation of “declassifying a note from the USSR government,” sent to NATO headquarters in Brussels in 1954: “the Soviet government expresses its readiness to consider, together with interested governments, the issue of USSR participation in the North Atlantic Treaty.”
By the way, Russian diplomats said that of the entire list of reasons for the non-admission of the USSR to NATO in 1954, not a single one is valid in relation to modern Russia. But Putin, admittedly, has finally formulated the main question. Russia's main question to its friends from Brussels: NATO - “is it a military organization or not? Military. Don't they want to see us there? They don't want to. Is it heading towards our borders? Moving. For what?" High-ranking Russian sources claim that Moscow intends to adhere to this almost “everyday” logic regarding NATO from now on.
About other geopolitics
The presidents, of course, exchanged widely. No surprises. They tell us about Chechnya, we tell them about terrorists, they tell us about Georgia, we tell them about Macedonia. The exchange went well, in a warm, friendly atmosphere. Apart from Putin’s home preparation in the form of a stern rebuke to “those who” encourage regional conflicts: “In some countries of the former Soviet Union... we believe human rights are being violated... In Latvia, for example, 40% of the Russian-speaking population ... We don’t send weapons there. We do not support or develop terrorism there.” It turned out quite transparent. Almost like a direct accusation against the United States of financing bad things. They talked about Iran and agreed that a non-peaceful atom should not be given into its hands. As a high-ranking Kremlin source explained, the matter is becoming purely Moscow-Tehran: close military-technical cooperation has not been canceled.
Putin and Bush talked about the money that needs to be urgently and massively invested in the Russian economy in the sense that it needs to be invested. It was decided not to create a commission in this case. Bush will simply give an “impetus” to his businessmen and send a representative business delegation to Moscow for reconnaissance, and Putin will try to convincingly accept it. The topic of the WTO is also a pressing issue for Russia. George Bush assured that the United States has finally become convinced that Russia must be admitted to the WTO.
Russia's debts were touched upon in passing. The issue of write-off was not discussed. The Russian side reacted to this philosophically, although Moscow certainly did not forget a single promise of the G7 in this regard.
About two guys
The main goal of the meeting - establishing human contact between the leaders of Russia and the United States - turned out to be surprisingly easy to achieve. The contact took place and both liked it. Putin began the press conference by saying that “reality has exceeded expectations.” Meeting with Russian journalists in the evening, Vladimir Putin said that he was in some ways pleasantly surprised, since he expected to find a much more formal partner in Bush. The American president turned out to be a “comfortable interlocutor” who “listens and hears.”
As for Bush, he called Putin a "wonderful leader" three times during the press conference. George W. Bush came to the defense of Vladimir Putin, who was furious at the boorish question about whether he, Putin, could be trusted, and in his defense went so far as to say: he would never have invited Putin to his ranch if he had not trusted to him.