In wishing Bush well, Putin has message for Obama

I love how Putin deals with obama. This is not a Bush bashing post. So no need to start that on this post.

Twana

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MOSCOW | Thu Aug 8, 2013 10:07am EDT

(Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a telegram on Thursday to his old sparring partner, former U.S. President George W. Bush, wishing him a quick recovery from heart surgery.

It may have been coincidence that the Kremlin released details of the telegram a day after Barack Obama pulled out of a planned summit with Putin, but little is left to chance in Russian politics.

The warm words to the man who once said he looked Putin in the eye and got a "sense of his soul" highlighted how different the relationship is between the leaders in the Kremlin and the White House now.

Bush described Putin years later as cold blooded, and ties soured over the war between Russia and Georgia which began five years ago this week, but there was respect and camaraderie on display when they first met as presidents in June 2001.

At Obama's most recent meeting with Putin during a G8 summit in Northern Ireland in June, the Russian president scowled, lectured and fidgeted. At times he glowered.

Would a better relationship with Putin have made Obama take a different decision on attending the September talks in Moscow? Perhaps not, but a stronger rapport might have helped them avoid a situation where such a decision was even considered.

"Sometimes, at times of crisis, when diplomats fail to reach a compromise, personal relationships can be important, as a last resort ... There is a lack of personal chemistry between Obama and Putin," said Maria Lipman, a Russian analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center think tank.

BAD START AT PUTIN'S DACHA

Bush's good start with Putin at talks in the Slovenian capital, Ljubljana, followed four months later by a meeting at Bush's Texas ranch, stands in contrast to the difficult beginning of the Obama-Putin relationship.

When Obama came to Russia in July 2009, Putin was prime minister but still the dominant figure in Russia under the presidency of his protege Dmitry Medvedev, and the former KGB spy invited Obama to his dacha, or country house.

"We may not end up agreeing on everything, but I think that we can have a tone of mutual respect and consultation that will serve both the American people and the Russian people well," Obama told Putin.

Diplomatic sources said that despite this, Putin went on to give Obama a political lecture and they failed to break the ice. Russian officials, however, say Obama was frosty and has always been high-handed.

The relationship has never developed into a friendship, with Obama appearing to find more in common with the relatively liberal Medvedev. During Putin's re-election campaign in 2012, he accused the United States of funding his opponents.

The relationship is also a far cry from the back-slapping bonhomie between Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s, when their rapport survived their countries' differences during crises such as the collapse of former Yugoslavia into war.

There is also none of the obvious warmth that Putin has shown over the years to the former Italian and German leaders, Silvio Berlusconi and Gerhard Schroeder. Schroeder called Putin a "flawless democrat" and took a post as chairman of the board of a Russian-German gas pipeline project after leaving office.

At least the Putin-Obama relationship has not been marred by incidents such as the one in 2007 when diplomats say Putin used his big black dog to intimidate German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a meeting at his dacha.

GROWING FRUSTRATION

While Putin stakes a lot on personal relationships, Obama likes to focus more on the business at hand, diplomats say. But Obama eventually became frustrated with the lack of progress in Russian-U.S. ties and the failure to build a more constructive relationship.

With differences piling up on problems from Syria to human rights and democracy, Obama vented his frustration on Tuesday after Russia refused to hand over former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden and granted him a year's asylum.

Obama said on NBC's "The Tonight Show" with host Jay Leno that Moscow sometimes slipped back into a Cold War mentality, although it is now more than two decades since the Soviet Union's collapse, and made clear he saw Putin's hand in this.

"What I say to President Putin is, that's the past and ... we've got to think about the future," he said.

There appears little hope now that relations will improve during Obama's second presidential term. One of the main foreign policy goals of his first term - the "reset" in relations with Moscow - has now unwound.

Each side blames the other. Moscow's position is that the United States has sided with Putin's opponents, harmed trade and political ties by picking fights over human rights issues and tried to lecture Russia on how to behave.

Washington's view is that it has made countless policy proposals that have gone unanswered, most notably on reducing nuclear arms, and that the ball is now in Moscow's court. U.S. officials are not holding their breath.

(Editing by Jason Bush and Janet McBride)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/08/us-russia-usa-presidents-idUSBRE9770OE20130808

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  • This is only my opinion, but I believe that Obama has thrown some high placed people under the bus,  they will get him. Obama is only supporting the Muslims.

    • Debrajoe, I cannot wait, let's hope you are correct.

  • the military industrial gov complex is after him

  • Obama does not have a grain of diplomatic sense nor is he mature enough to consider common-sense...it's one thing for a president to be strong for America(not that Obama is) but it's entirely another to act stupid and use child-like, ignorant public description of the leader of  Russia.

    Barack Obama is going to raise his chin, elevate his nose in arrogant fashion once too often.......he is likely to get it stuffed and it won't be with pot.

  • Obama is a puerile little twit. He whines and blames others when the spoiled brat cannot have his way, never accepts responsibility or accountability for ANYTHING, is a wastrel and a weasel and is neither qualified nor competent for the office he occupies. Most Americans  now think his election in both 2008 and 1012 were the result of massive election fraud but, the question is: what will congress DO about the mounting evidence? That answer  is very disturbing to most of us because it is not certain that these effete elitist parasites will act, AT ALL! If they haven't up to now with all the scandals and cover ups ongoing, even the most optimistic are facing the reality that if change is to be implemented; it will have, of necessity, to come from the PEOPLE of this country; as it will NEVER come from the criminally complicit, effete elites of the Congress. As long as this situation obtains, we will  have ever decreasing credibility and the loss of evermore of our
    constitutional freedoms and the right to CHOOSE what is best for ourselves and our families. Obama is nothing more than a means to an end for those who placed him in power. When he has expended his usefulness, they will make sure he is expendable.

    • Brian, brillant analysis.

  • Putin is sure he is a man, and he knows what we have for a Leader............Russia must be celebrating in the streets.  So sad, but God forbid that we object, because that would be racial, not really common sense.

  • We aren't in Chicago anymore, Barry.

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