“When Kissinger flew into Petersburg for a visit, it was Vladimir Putin who met him at the airport and took him to the mayor’s residence, chatting about his KGB past. “All decent people got their start in intelligence,” Kissinger told… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“Vladimir Putin portrayed himself as an avowed democrat. And yet even then, at the dawn of democracy in Russia, he warned that the imperative of the strong state—and the people’s willingness to accept, even desire it—remained part of the collective… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“Bush pledged friendship and cooperation, but Putin also heard the voices of others in Washington, liberals and conservatives, who criticized Russia and seemed intent on keeping it in its weakened post-Soviet state.” — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share
“I can distinctly hear the beatings of the wings of the angel of death,” it went, in improbably elegant English, which Litvinenko had barely learned to speak during his years in exile. “I may be able to give him the slip, but I have to say my legs do not run as fast as I would like. I think, therefore,… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share
“I want to step down this year, Vladimir Vladimirovich,” Yeltsin said he told him. “This year. That’s very important. The new century must begin… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“Putin coined a slogan for his vision of a new, rule-abiding Russia that was secure and prosperous. It embodied the internal contradictions of his… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“Authority in Russia had always been transferred through natural death, conspiracy or revolution,” — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“When Kissinger flew into Petersburg for a visit, it was Vladimir Putin who met him at the airport and took him to the mayor’s… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“So stagnant was life in the Soviet Union then that even a sclerotic socialist system like East Germany’s seemed prosperous by comparison,” — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“Vladimir Putin portrayed himself as an avowed democrat. And yet even then, at the dawn of democracy in Russia, he warned that the imperative… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
“The Soviet officers and soldiers deployed to Germany scavenged whatever they could acquire—blue jeans, pornography, and even weapons—to sell or barter on the black… — Steven Lee Myers Copy Share Image
