No deal on missile defense

SOCHI, Russia — President Bush today touched down here for the last time as commander-in-chief, as the White House backed off its predictions that a deal on missile defense might be reached this weekend during a 24-hour stay to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and his handpicked successor.

Mr. Bush and first lady Laura Bush sat down with Mr. Putin and President-elect Dmitry Medvedev for three-hour private dinner Saturday at his summer home in this Black Sea resort town.

Mr. Putin also gave Mr. Bush a tour of the grounds and showed him a model of the 2014 Olympics, which will be held here.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Bush celebrated Croatias invitation to NATO this week with a speech in the capital city of Zagreb heralding the spread of democracies further into Eastern Europe.

Mr. Putin has not looked kindly on NATOs efforts to expand, and scored a major victory this week at the alliances summit in Bucharest when two former Soviet blocs Ukraine and Georgia were denied an invitation to join NATOs membership action plan (MAP).

Those two issues of missile defense and NATO expansion, along with a “strategic framework” for U.S.-Russia relations, will dominate the talks tomorrow between Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin, who have had a high profile relationship that has grown bumpy over the last few years as Russia has grown more powerful.

Mr. Putin alluded to this yesterday during a press conference in Bucharest, saying that his eight years as president “were years of the rebirth of Russia as a powerful and independent state with its own views and the dialogue was and is not easy.”

Mr. Bush will also meet tomorrow with Mr. Medvedev, who is expected to name Mr. Putin as prime minister and allow him to continue wielding significant power over the government.

On Air Force One en route to Russia from Croatia, White House press secretary Dana Perino played down any talk that a final deal on the U.S.-backed missile defense plan for Eastern Europe would be finalized tomorrow.

“We’re going to have to do more work after Sochi,” Mrs. Perino said, calling talk of a final deal premature.

Bush administration officials had expressed cautious hopes in the last two weeks that Russian objections to the missile defense system might be weakening, and that a final agreement might be reached this weekend.

In addition, Mr. Bush received a boost from the NATO summit when the 26 member nations endorsed the U.S. plan and the Czech Republic agreed to host radar systems on their soil to be linked with missile interceptors in Poland, which the Poles have still not agreed to.

But Mrs. Perino said a final deal with the Russians had never been a certainty.

“No one has said that everything would be finalized and everyone would be satisfied with all the preparations because we haven’t even started to work on the technical aspects of the system,” she said.

“But we think the dialogue is headed in the right direction and that this meeting will be able to push that along even further, she said.

Mr. Putin yesterday said that the U.S. and Russia were still far apart on missile defense, but said that our concerns on our security have nevertheless been heard.

During his speech in Zagreb, Mr. Bush hailed the growth of Croatias democracy over the last two decades as a hopeful example for nations in the Middle East.

Mr. Bush delivered his speech to about 6,000 people in St. Marks Square outside the Croatian Parliament, where the regions leaders have been inaugurated for the last 700 years.

Mr. Bush said Europes growing peacefulness, represented by Croatias emergence from a bloody war with Serbia in the early-1990s, should serve as a model for fledgling democracies like Iraq and Afghanistan.

It is only a matter of time before freedom takes root across that troubled region, Mr. Bush said, in remarks translated to the crowd packed the square. And when it does, millions will remember the people of your nation stood with them in their hour of need, the president said. Mr. Bushs speech was met with enthusiastic applause and cheering but not the adulation Mr. Bush has experienced in previous trips to the region, in Georgia and Albania. Afterward, Mr. Bush met with leaders from Croatia, Albania, and Macedonia to discuss NATO membership. Croatia and Albania were invited this week to join the alliance at the NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania, but Macedonia, who had hoped for an invitation, was blocked by the Greeks. NATO operates by consensus, and the Greeks object to the use of the name Macedonia because they have a region in their country by that name. Mr. Bush expressed regret over that delay, and said Macedonia should take its place in NATO as soon as possible. He also thanked Croatia, Albania and Macedonia in his speech for their troop commitments in Afghanistan, and the Albanians and Macedonians for their troops in Iraq. Mr. Bush promised the Croatians that should any danger threaten your people, America and the NATO alliance with stand with you, and nobody will be able to take your freedom away. Mr. Bush did not mention NATOs rejection of Ukraine and Georgia, who had hoped to enter the MAP process but were given only promises that one day, maybe in December, they will be allowed to join the alliance. Russia vigorously opposes Ukraine and Georgias entry into MAP, and Mr. Putin yesterday called NATO expansion closer to Russias border a direct threat to his countrys security.