Putin’s Advice

Whatever you may think of today’s Russia and its president, Vladimir V. Putin, his recent advice to the United States and the Bush administration is worth considering. In an interview with The New York Times last week, he warned that the United States now faces in Iraq the possibility of a prolonged, violent and ultimately futile war like the one that mired the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.

Calling the Bush administration’s decision to invade Iraq simply “an error,” President Putin warned that it could “become a new center, a new magnet for all destructive elements.” Without naming them, he added that “a great number of terrorist organizations” had been drawn into Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein. He said they came “from all the Muslim world.”

He could have gone on with the analogy. During the Soviet Union’s decade-long struggle in Afghanistan in the 1980s, the United States helped finance and train and arm a guerrilla resistance from all the Muslim world. Out of that army grew the Taliban and Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida, which now are using largely U.S. weapons to fight the United States.

What to do about Iraq right now? Mr. Putin said the Bush administration should move quickly to restore sovereignty to the Iraqis and secure a new United Nations resolution that would clearly define how long international forces remain there. He suggested that further hostility to the United States was inevitable unless its occupation received international legitimacy.

He ruled out, for the present, sending Russian troops to Iraq. He included a somewhat cryptic warning against relying on military forces from other countries. He described the foreign troops as a “motley” group and, without naming them, said that some of them “abuse alcohol,” “begin to sell weapons,” and think about “fleeing as soon as possible.”

For the first time, Mr. Putin said that Russia was prepared to offer partial relief on the $8 billion it is owed by Iraq, but only if other major creditors chipped in.

The Russian president seemed to be trying to use the nearly three-hour interview to present a softer, more congenial image. The Times suggested that it was a deliberate part of the scene when his black Labrador, Koni, bounded in and Mr. Putin affectionately stroked him. But he sharply defended his country’s policies and his own background against frequent criticism. He asked why Islamic fighters in Chechnya were called democrats while those in Afghanistan and Iran were viewed as criminals. He asked why terrorism in Chechnya should provoke any lesser response in Russia than America’s response if the same problems arose in Texas. He asked why his wide use of security services was any different from the creation of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. And he asked why his former role as a KGB agent should prompt concern when the first President Bush once headed the CIA.

The interview, conducted a week after his four-day visit to the United States and overnight stay with President Bush at Camp David, could help solidify a new international partnership that seems to have room for frank disagreement. (A lengthy transcript is online at nytimes.com/world.)

We can hope that Mr. Bush listens more to Russia than it does to France, which has aroused administration hatred with its more pointed differences.