Over the past eight years, Putin's foreign policies have been largely a reaction to Washington's winner-take-all approach to Moscow, which resulted from a revised U.S. view of how the Cold War ended. In this triumphalist narrative, America "won" the 40-year conflict and post-Soviet Russia was a defeated nation analogous to post-World War II Germany and Japan - a nation without full sovereignty at home or autonomous national interests abroad. The policy implications of that bipartisan triumphalism, which persists today, have been clear - certainly to Moscow. It meant the United States had the right to oversee Russia's post-Communist political and economic development, as it tried to do in the 1990s, while demanding that Moscow yield to U.S. international interests. It meant Washington could break strategic promises to Russia, as when the Clinton administration began NATO's eastward expansion, and disregard extraordinary Kremlin overtures, as when the Bush administration unilaterally withdrew from the ABM Treaty and moved NATO even closer to Russia despite Putin's crucial assistance to the U.S. war effort in Afghanistan after Sept. 11.

In the early 1990s optimism was understandable. In a globalised economy, it was widely believed, nations had no choice but to liberalise, first economically, then politically, if they wanted to compete and survive. Their citizens would seek prosperity and comfort and abandon the atavistic passions, the struggles for honour and glory, and the tribal hatreds that had produced conflict throughout history. In the battle of ideas, liberalism had triumphed. As Francis Fukuyama famously put it: “At the end of history, there are no serious ideological competitors left to liberal democracy.” The world was not witnessing a transformation, however, merely a pause in the endless competition of nations and peoples. Nationalism, far from being weakened by globalisation, has now returned with a vengeance. Furthermore, growing national wealth and autocracy have proven compatible, after all. Autocrats learn and adjust. The autocracies of Russia and China have figured out how to permit open economic activity while suppressing political activity. They have seen that people making money will keep their noses out of politics, especially if they know their noses will be cut off.

There is no doubt that Putin continues to seek to be viewed that same way today, even if the characteristic is rather self-serving. Public informality has been limited to those carefully set up photos last year of him standing bare-chested fishing in a stream. Perhaps the most telling aspect of Putin's personality is his continued commitment to judo and its Russian version, sambo. He obviously enjoys the physical contact as well as the quick reflex aspect of the sport. As leverage is also one of the principal elements in judo, this seems to parallel his own method of persuasion. Despite his oft grim visage, Putin is a person quite secure in his own existence. He has no trouble being himself, nor has he ever. His new jobs of prime minister and chairman of the dominant party, United Russia, however, will test his personal political skills.

In the aftermath of World War II, statesmen on both sides of the Atlantic recognized that the defense of freedom would require the active engagement of a new generation of leaders. The result was the Atlantic alliance. In the six decades that followed, this alliance helped the West prevail against Soviet communism and ensured the advance of democracy from the Atlantic to the Urals. Nowhere is this crisis of confidence more apparent than in the failure of nerve we see in Afghanistan. After the attack of September 11, it was clear that America and its allies needed to deprive al Qaeda of its safe haven. It was also clear that we needed to help the Afghan people replace the Taliban with a free government that would build a more hopeful future.

We have sent invitations to McCain and Obama as the more likely candidates for the two parties. Obama’s people promptly sent back a polite reply saying that he would be engaged elsewhere on that day. As for the McCain office, it is still keeping silent. This is a good sign, for it implies that he and his advisors are thinking the matter over. The Forum will take place at the Hart Senate Office Building, practically next door to McCain’s office, so he will not have to go too far. We have assembled quite an impressive group of U.S. and Russian experts ready to have an honest and earnest talk with McCain if he shows up, of course. McCain proved to be a good soldier on the battlefield. Let us see how he does in the battle of ideas.

The unipolar era, a time of un­precedented American dominion, is over. It lasted some two decades, little more than a moment in historical terms. Why did it end? One explanation is history. States get better at generating and piecing together the human, financial and technological resources that lead to productivity and prosperity. The same holds for companies and other organisations. The rise of new powers cannot be stopped. The result is an ever larger number of actors able to exert influence regionally or globally. It is not that the US has grown weaker, but that many other entities have grown much stronger. A second reason unipolarity has ended is US policy. By both what it has done and what it has failed to do, the US has accelerated the emergence of new power centres and has weakened its own position relative to them.

Another trend observed in the former Soviet Union is sure to weaken Russia's ability to put pressure on its NATO-eager neighbors. The southern flank of the CIS, which Moscow still regards as its outpost, is starting to look to the West. This applies to President Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan, whom the West has already forgiven for the Andijan incident; and President Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov of Turkmenistan, who is already considering the possibility of hosting a stopover base for NATO's troops in Afghanistan. The CIS Collective Defense Treaty Organization (CSTO), now portrayed as a counterweight to NATO, will become increasingly meaningless, crumbling from within. And the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is China's turf, to be honest. In Moscow's bargaining with NATO, the CSTO-SCO card won't be much more effective than the Ukrainian separatism card. Thus, Moscow has only one option: improving relations with its neighbors and with NATO, rather than an all-out fight with them. Then the Euro-Atlantic integration of Kiev and Tbilisi will no longer be perceived as a tragedy in Moscow.

One of the most noteworthy and dangerous trends in today's world is the remilitarization of international relations. After the real reduction of military expenditures in the 1990s, they are rising quickly again. Today the United States, which accounts for 57 percent of all of the defense spending in the world, is spending 25 times as much as Russia, and NATO is spending 40
times as much as Russia. For the first time in its history, the United States is fighting two major wars at once (although without any particular success). The arms control system that took so much effort to establish in the last decades of the 20th century is in danger of falling apart. I agree completely with Vladimir
Putin: "Under these conditions, it is important to stay firm and to practice restraint, never allowing ourselves to be drawn into wasteful confrontations." Under normal conditions, our defense spending should not exceed 3 percent of our rapidly growing GDP. The rule of adequate security should lie at the basis of our defense policy -- guaranteeing the ability of the Armed Forces to repulse any type of internal or external threat.

Who won and who lost by the summit in Bucharest? Definitely, those have lost who were scampering to NATO despite the step’s possible consequences. And the consequences are obvious: society’s split in Ukraine, and aggravation in Ukraine’s and Georgia’s relations with Russia. At the same time, I would not state that Russia has won. On the one hand, the events showed that Russia’s opinion is taken into account. That can be considered a significant achievement for Russia, which strives to be a full-right player on the international arena. On the other hand, we should have no illusions: the events in Bucharest do not put the kybosh on Georgia’s and Ukraine’s aspiration to NATO.

In a universe run on fact-based pragmatism, not ideology, Bush would use his visit to Russia to accept the offer Putin put forward last summer: to open up an American-European-Russian dialogue about missile defense, one that might include intelligence sharing, technological cooperation and jointly operated missile defense installations -- some in locations offered by Moscow. We'd gain Russian goodwill and retain the freedom to try to develop missile defense systems that actually work. Russia would gain reassurance that no U.S. missiles are pointed its way -- and lose an excuse for bullying its neighbors. It's no panacea, but in the context of a genuine commitment to treating Russia as a partner and reinvigorating stalled talks on a broad range of nuclear issues, this would change the atmosphere. In the longer run, it would make it possible to meaningfully reengage Russia on vital issues ranging from nuclear nonproliferation to climate change and public health.