President Vladimir Putin of Russia at the 43rd Conference on Security Policy in Munich, Germany, in 2007. Putin's speech at the conference marked a shift in Russian foreign policy away from alignment with the West.

One of the arguments made by American politicians and analysts favoring a settlement of the conflict in Ukraine along lines favorable to Russia is that the war in Ukraine is limited to Ukraine and that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions in Ukraine and elsewhere do not threaten the United States. This assessment does not conform to the private sentiments expressed by Putin to me years before he became a figure on the Russian national political scene.

I was posted to St. Petersburg, Russia, in the early 1990s as a senior representative of the United States. Vladimir Putin was my designated counterpart in the city government.

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As is often the case in such situations, our relationship extended well beyond our official interactions, and over a period........

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