President Barack Obama should have three central goals in mind when he meets Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin next week: first, to advance US-Russian co-operation in areas where our interests coincide; second, to emphasise the mutual benefits in handling disagreements between the two countries within internationally respected “rules of the game”; and third, to help shape a geopolitical context in which Russia becomes increasingly conscious of its own interest in eventually becoming a genuinely post-imperial partner of the Euro-Atlantic community.

Of the three, the first is the easiest; the second is sensitive but needs to be faced, lest there be repetitions of what happened last August, when Russian troops invaded Georgia ; and the third can only be sought indirectly – but the effort has to be strategically deliberate. In any case, it is evident that both countries would benefit from better relations. Fortunately, the financial crisis has made the Russian elite aware that, for the first time in its history, Russia’s well-being depends on the well-being of the outside world and especially of America. That reality of inter-dependence creates a felicitous setting for the summit.