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Analysis: Putin reclaims Russian clout.
BERLIN, Feb. 13 (UPI) -- The anti-U.S., anti-NATO speech by Russian President Vladimir Putin has unsettled European officials. But observers should not be surprised; his words come as part of a deliberate effort to reclaim lost Russian clout, in light of the country's recent rise as an energy superpower and the West's failure to resolve crises in the Middle East.
It was 10:37 a.m., Saturday morning in Bavaria. The who's who of the global security scene, including U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, had gathered to listen to the first-ever speech of a Russian president at the Munich Conference on Security.
Pleased to be able to "avoid excessive politeness and the need to speak in roundabout, pleasant but empty diplomatic terms," Putin attacked the United States (a "unipolar" power) and NATO on most of its fronts, namely NATO's eastward expansion, U.S. unilateralism, failure in the Middle East and Washington's plan to place anti-missile systems in Eastern Europe.
Placing those systems in Poland and the Czech Republic would trigger "an inevitable arms race," Putin said. "I don't want to accuse anyone of being aggressive," Putin said, but threatened he is considering an unspecified "asymmetric" response, evoking memories of distant Cold War days.
NATO's eastward expansion, he said, "represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust." Putin quoted former NATO Secretary-General Manfred Woerner, who promised in 1990 that NATO wouldn't station its troops eastward of Germany to give Russia a security guarantee.
"Where are these guarantees?" Putin asked, adding that Russia's troops were leaving Georgia, while at the same time NATO was stationing 5,000 soldiers in Bulgaria and Romania. In a comparison that may have reminded Merkel of the Berlin Wall, Putin said the West was trying to impose "new boundaries and walls."
While Gates followed with a somber and ironic rebuttal ("As an old Cold Warrior, one of yesterday's speeches almost filled me with nostalgia for a less complex time," Gates joked. "Almost."), the White House said it was "surprised and disappointed" by Putin's speech, but added it will continue to work with Moscow in key security areas. "We certainly disagree ...
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