In the long term Mr Putin’s refusal to modernise his country will weaken Russia. Yet the place Mr Obama has to deal with now is still a potent force. The largest country on earth, Russia stretches from Europe to China. It is the world’s biggest producer of oil and gas. It has a seat on the UN Security Council and of course that nuclear arsenal. Above all it has the capacity to do both great harm and some good.

Vlad the invader

Recently, the harm has been more noticeable. Last year’s invasion of Georgia, followed by Russia’s decision to recognise South Ossetia and Abkhazia, was the clearest sign that Mr Putin has given up any hope of joining the West. Since then he has slammed the door on the World Trade Organisation, opting instead for a no-doubt-mighty customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan. Russia has long criticised the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe for daring to highlight election malpractice. Now Mr Medvedev is promoting a European security structure that would in effect give Russia a veto over any expansion of NATO. Countries such as Ukraine, in what Russia regards as its sphere of influence, are nervous. At the UN Russia has dragged its feet on sanctions against Iran and autocrats pretty much everywhere.

And yet Iran is also one of many examples of how Russian and American interests should coincide. Neither Mr Obama nor Mr Putin wants to see Iran emerge as a nuclear power, setting off a destabilising arms race in the Middle East. Both also want a stable Afghanistan, with al-Qaeda pushed out of sanctuaries there and in Pakistan: Russia has been a useful conduit for Western supplies and troops. Both have worked to safeguard nuclear and other weapons materials in the old Soviet Union and are co-operating usefully in other countries.

... contd.