Eight years of Putin in the Russian Presidency: A balance

Relations with the United States got worse, but despite everything they were maintained relatively well thanks to the empathy between Putin and George W. Bush. When the terrorist attacks took place against the USA in September of 2001, Putin was the first foreign leader to bring his condolences to the North American president and offer help in the war against terrorism, and Bush never forgot this.

	Eight years of Putin in the Russian Presidency: A balance
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Up to today the personal declarations of the North American president on his strong Russian colleague is nearly always enthusiastic. The Russian offer was not disinterested, since Putin thought not only about benefiting from closer ties with the USA, but also legitimizing the Chechnya campaign as part of the worldwide war against the terrorism. On the basis of this new alliance, Russia had a very important participation in the downfall of the Taliban (the Islamic radical Afghan movement that controlled the country and was giving shelter to Osama Bin Laden, intellectual author of the terrorist attacks in the USA) in Afghanistan, sending arms, food, medicine and clothes to the collapsed Northern Alliance (the opposing movement to the Taliban that was controlling a small fraction of the north of Afghanistan in 2001, and the one in some months managed to conquer almost the whole country with help of Russia and of NATO). But disagreement appeared when, in the end of 2002, the USA decided to invade Iraq, and Russia was one of the strongest opponents, together with Germany and France.

Another source of conflict was the campaign begun by Washington to attract the countries of the CIS, up to that time under Russian economic and political influence. Everything indicates that the USA wants these countries also to join NATO, whose expansion appears aimed at the old members of the Warsaw Pact (initiated at the end of the Bill Clinton administration) which already reached ex-USSR countries (Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia are already members). Following this, last year the USA announced its intention to build an anti-missile defense system in Europe, more specifically in Poland and the Czech Republic, and although the North American authorities try to persuade Moscow that this system does not look to alter the strategic balance in Europe, the Russians are not convinced (any declarations of the old Czech and Polish prime ministers only confirm Moscow's suspicions, while affirming openly that this system in fact serves to protect them against a supposed Russian threat).

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