 Good morning and welcome to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. I'm Andrew Schwartz, Senior Vice President at CSIS, and I have the pleasure of presiding over this briefing today with two of my favorite colleagues, soon to be three of my favorite colleagues, one of whom is stuck in traffic. We're going to be talking about the President's trip to the G20 Summit, and we will go through this from a couple different angles. But first I'd like to introduce Heather Conley, Senior Fellow and Director of the Europe Program at CSIS. Prior to working at CSIS, Heather served in a variety of positions including Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Europe. And with that, I'll let Heather take it. Thank you, Andrew. Good morning. Well, it's hard to believe that Matt and I, two and a half months ago, were sitting before you doing a briefing before the President traveled to Laker in Ireland and the G8 Summit, and we questioned how much Syria would overwhelm the G8 Summit. Here we are two months later, and we're now following the President as he makes his way on route to St. Petersburg for the G20 Summit and wondering how much, of course, how much will Syria dominate the corridor conversations. I guess you could summarize the President's unanticipated stop in Stockholm as Russia's loss and Sweden's gain. After President Obama canceled his bilateral summit with President Putin, a stop needed to be added to the itinerary, and looking around the flight path, certainly the Nordic countries came to mind. But of course, President Obama had already been to Copenhagen in 2009 for the UN Climate Conference. He had been to Oslo, Norway, to accept his Nobel Prize. He is welcoming the three Presidents of the Baltic States on Friday in the Oval Office, so that canceled out any of the three Baltic States. So Sweden and Finland were certainly the most logical choices, and Stockholm won that choice. This is, in fact, the first time a President has visited Sweden in a bilateral capacity. President Bush was the first President to visit Sweden, I believe, in 2009 in Jotunberg, Sweden, for a U.S.-EU summit. But this is the first time that we'll have a President visit the capital. President Obama arrives in Sweden and will be greeted by Prime Minister Friedrich Reinfeldt. He has led a center-right government for the last seven years. He will face elections next year. Certainly Sweden has experienced some unsettled times in its own challenges dealing with integration of immigrants, if you'll recall in May, about six days of riots in the suburbs of Stockholm, dealing with a police shooting, and continues to be a very great topic of conversation with that immigration aspect. So certainly that will be part of the domestic conversation. Prime Minister Reinfeldt has been very gracious in gathering his four other Nordic colleagues to join with President Obama in a dinner the evening after he arrives. And I would sense the conversation will be quite robust about the region. And certainly, I hope, and CSAS has been engaged in a four-year study on the Arctic. I think President May hear quite a bit about the Arctic from his Swedish and Nordic counterparts. I think President Reuchere, as you will recall, was just in Sweden, northern Sweden in mid-May, to attend the Arctic Council Ministerial, where a historic decision was made to welcome several Asian countries as permanent observers to the Arctic Council. We have a Chinese cargo ship now passing through the northern sea route. So as the opening of the Arctic happens, the geopolitical dynamics are changing, and I'm sure the President will hear from his colleagues about that. And finally, one word on the bilateral discussion between President Obama and the Swedish Prime Minister. Sweden has been an extraordinary ally across a range of issues. They have troop personnel in Afghanistan, approximately 600. They were on standby for operations in Libya. They've contributed over 100 troops in Mali. For a neutral country, this is a robust level of engagement. And I think we have certainly appreciated that great solidarity. The breadth of the conversation, clearly Prime Minister Reinfeldt will want to provide President Obama with an update on the European debt crisis, although that has certainly faded from the top of the agenda. This is going to be the first time that the President returns to Europe after his visit following the G8 and then to his visit to Berlin. I'm sure he'll hear from his European colleagues about the ramification of the NSA prism issue, because that continues to be a topic of concern in Europe. Russia will clearly be a topic. And of course, Syria, Egypt, the Middle East, and the unrest there. So I believe you'll see a very fulsome bilateral conversation, a more dynamic regional conversation with the Nordic states. And I think it's an excellent preparation to get the President ready as he travels to St. Petersburg to meet with his G8, G20, excuse me, colleagues. I'll let you take the baton. Let me introduce Matt real quick, really quickly. Matt Goodman here at CSIS holds our William Simon chair in political economy. The Simon chair examines current issues in international economic policy with a particular focus on the Asia Pacific. But I should also say that Matt previously served as the White House coordinator for the East Asia Summit for the Asia Pacific Summit, but he also served as director for international economics on the NSC staff and was responsible for the G20, G8 and other international forums. And with that, I'd like to introduce my colleague Matt Goodman. Okay, thank you, Andrew. Thank you, Heather. So the President will be participating in the eighth G20 summit on September 5th and 6th at the Konstantin Palace in Strelna outside St. Petersburg. When Andy gets here, he can tell us how to actually pronounce Strelna, and not to mention St. Petersburg. The G20, as you know, just a recap, is a gathering of leaders of 19 individual countries and the European Union, which has its own seat. And then another five invited guests, including Spain, Singapore, and a couple of African countries that I've forgotten at the moment, Tanzania, I think, Ethiopia, and one other. And then a number of international institutions, the UN, the IMF, the OECD, and others will be in attendance as well. The schedule begins actually with SHERPA meetings. That is the leaders, senior economic advisors will meet starting September 2nd together with the finance deputies because the G20 is really built on a finance minister's process, as you know. And so the SHERPAs and finance deputies will meet in parallel and then together in the days leading up to the arrival of the leaders on the 5th in order to hammer out the communique and the deliverables, as it were, such as they are. Incidentally, this will be the first summit attended by the new U.S. SHERPA Caroline Atkinson, who replaced Mike Froman when he moved over to USTR. And Mike has been at all the other Obama G20 summits. There will probably be, well, let me quickly go through what we understand the schedule to be. This hasn't been formally published, but the leader, the formal summit plenary sessions will begin after lunch on September 5th and go through dinner that night. The next morning, there will be a continuation of discussions, but interrupted, this is a small innovation by the Russians. They are going to have an interaction with business leaders during the morning, the so-called B20. There's a proliferation of alphabet groups that have the 20 after their name, and the B20 is the business grouping. And there will be an interaction that morning. And as I understand it, some separate bilateral time as well for leaders. And then the meeting will continue through lunch into the sort of mid to late afternoon and end with a press conference on September 6th, this is. There will undoubtedly be bilaterals on the side President Obama will be involved in. Those have not been announced yet. When Andy gets here, I think he'll tell you that it's unlikely that President Obama and President Putin will have a bilateral, which is the normal practice that happens at these summits. But N1 can speculate that there will probably be a summit with the Chinese President Xi and Japanese Prime Minister Abe, but none of that has been, as far as I know, has been made public. In terms of the agenda, the Russians have laid out three, well, one sort of big theme, which is sustainable, inclusive, and balanced growth and creating jobs. And specifically, they have three specific priorities, growth through quality jobs and investment, growth through trust and transparency, and growth through effective regulation. Those are all sort of ways of reorganizing and capturing the longstanding G20 agenda, which really covers and they list the eight areas that have traditionally been covered under summit. So those include strong, sustainable, balanced growth, jobs, international financial institution reform, strengthening financial regulation, energy sustainability, development, trade, and anti-corruption. So all of those things will be on the formal agenda. Not all those things will be talked about by the leaders. And at the end of this, there will be a probably lengthy communique and then attached documents. It would be probably unreasonable to expect that this communique is going to be significantly shorter than the Los Cabos communique, which is the last G20 leaders statement, which was ranked 85 paragraphs. I would be surprised if it was significantly shorter than that because it has to cover all of the topics I mentioned. What the leaders will really talk about probably will revolve around, in addition to Syria, which will not be on the formal agenda. This grouping, unlike the G8, really does not have a formal place for discussion of broad geopolitical issues. But, of course, inevitably it is going to dominate the corridor conversations. In the actual sessions among leaders, the agenda, the formal agenda, will cover economic and economic related issues. And I would say probably three or four big topics. Obviously the global economy will dominate. You'll have some European, and here's Andy joining us. Great. Good timing. I'm stalling here, Andy, just to make it. Dr. Andy Cudgins, ladies and gentlemen. So the Europeans will obviously probably crow a little bit about their second quarter GDP numbers, which were positive for the first time in eight or nine quarters, I think. The U.S. will probably still express concern about the fact that while the U.S. economy is doing better, it cannot be the only engine of growth in the global economy, and it will express concern about the risks and the imbalances which remain in the global economy. Emerging markets are probably going to talk about the financial market volatility, which they attribute in large part to the concerns about tapering by the U.S. Fed and other monetary authorities from this extraordinary period of monetary easing, which they also were uncomfortable with precisely because it created these sorts of financial risks. The advanced countries will probably push back that those things, those reactions in the markets are first of all a natural consequence of strategies by these countries, the U.S. and Japan and European countries, to keep the economies growing, and inevitably these policies are going to have to end. They will also argue that a lot of the problems in emerging markets are homegrown. So the problems in India or Brazil or other countries are homegrown. This issue is not going to be resolved, but I'd say on balance, and I think it's fair to say also that there is, as that little discussion has just revealed, that there is not the same sort of sense of consensus and shared sense of crisis in the group, although I think the sense of crisis generally may be starting to pick up again, but not everybody agrees on what the causes or solutions that those issues are. But overall, I think it will be largely a conversation about those issues. There will also probably be a significant amount of discussion of international tax cooperation, both to deal with tax evasion and tax avoidance. This was a major theme at the G8 summit, and certainly the G8 members are going to be interested in talking about those issues. And potentially there won't be any kind of breakthrough agreements, but there could be a reinforcement of some of the work that was agreed to in the G8 OECD work on tax sharing, information sharing, and so forth. And then a third area would be trade. I think that there will be a fairly robust discussion of trade. The G20 has several times now laid down a commitment, a standstill against protectionist measures, which they've most recently extended through 2014, and they may and likely to re-up that. Of course, this commitment has been honored in the breach, but they will probably make a strong stand. They will also talk about the Doha round. I think at this point the main focus is on the Bali ministerial in December, which is the last real chance, I think, to potentially save a Doha round, but most people I think in the trade world don't think that that's likely to happen, that there may be a more focused look at what the G20 can do to push forward specific agreements in Bali, say, on trade facilitation, for example. But whether that's going to progress or not remains to be seen. And then there may be just some discussion about development issues, food security, infrastructure investment, and so forth. And finally, I'll wrap up and let Andy talk about the interesting stuff in Russia. But I would just say, I think that the White House certainly still feels the G20 is an important forum. It's the only forum in which the leaders of what group of countries that represent 85% of the global economy can get together and talk about the both the short-term risks to global growth and the longer-term challenges of sustained and balanced growth. And it is an opportunity to sort of broadly set the agenda for the global economy. And finally to build habits of cooperation among the members of the group that have not had the same experience that the G8 countries in particular have had in guiding these issues. So I think broadly, this is still a trip that the Syria notwithstanding that the President looks forward to as an opportunity to engage on this set of issues. So I'll stop there and turn it to Andy. Dr. Kutchins is the director of our Russia and Eurasia program, and he will put forth what's going on with the Russians. Thanks, Andrew, and my apologies for being late. Unlike Mr. Putin last year in deciding not to come to the G8 and unlike Mr. Obama deciding not to meet Mr. Putin in Moscow, I did decide to come to the press briefing today. It's kind of an odd role. You know, in Russian literature, there's a tradition of the Lišni Čilovjek, the superfluous man. And in some ways, I feel a bit like a superfluous man talking about a meeting that is not going to happen. But in a relationship which, frankly, is not in a good place, how's that for an exciting quote? Some might call it a train wreck. It's been like watching a slow-moving train wreck for nearly two years right now. What's the good news? Well, the good news is that this is not the Cuban Missile Crisis. The good news is that this is not even the Georgia war of five years ago, in which one could have imagined the possibility of U.S. and Russian military forces perhaps by accident coming into conflict with each other in the Black Sea. But one thing is clear to me that this is the worst personal relationship between U.S. and Russian, perhaps even U.S. and Soviet leaders in history. And one has to kind of think about what does that mean? What does that hurt in the relationship? I really think these two guys, Mr. Putin and Mr. Obama, don't like each other at all. I think there's a deep degree of disrespect. I think when our president says something like comparing Mr. Putin to the kid in the back of the classroom kind of slouching, not really interested in things, well, you've taken the relationship to a personal level. Even more so, I think, than the comment he made, which I think was a mistake four years ago, that Mr. Putin had one foot in the Cold War and one foot in the future. Mr. Putin is not a person that forgets I think any personal insults, and certainly has not played well in the relationship. But it's something to think about. I mean, really, I don't think there's been a case even in the Soviet period. Obviously, Mr. Lenin didn't meet with any American leaders that I know of. We know about the relationship between Uncle Joe and FDR. But clearly to me, this is the worst personal relationship of a U.S. and Russian leader in history. And I think that's obviously not a good thing. Let's look at a little bit more at the recent history. Now, the Obama administration made an effort in the spring and early summer to engage Russia to try to put the relationship that was obviously for a number of reasons that I think are clear to everyone in this room that was on the rocks and getting worse. But basically, Mr. Putin was not interested in what the Obama administration was trying to sell him. And I think essentially what the effort to engage Mr. Putin was principally around the issue of further cuts in offensive nuclear arms tied to some kind of agreement about the remoteness of Evende on missile defense. And that was a deal that Mr. Putin had decided he just was not particularly interested in. I think that is what the effort begun with the trip of former National Security Advisor Tom Donilon to Moscow in the spring was about mainly. And that's what this effort to bring the two sides together. Now, I mean, it was pretty clear from the G8 meeting just looking at the body posture as to how much that can actually tell us, we don't know. But it was a pretty powerful statement. But you have to wonder what was the thinking of the administration at the time that gave them some degree of hope and optimism that there would be enough to agree on at a meeting to justify a summit meeting in September. You know, I don't know exactly, but it looks to have been a miscalculation. And then of course we have to factor in just how much of an effect the Snowden Affair had on the decision to cancel the summit. Now, the Snowden Affair, you know, I was not particularly impressed with the way it was handled on our side to be frank. I think there was far too much so-called public diplomacy if you want to call public demands diplomacy. And I don't think there was adequate behind-the-scenes backdoor communication between the administrations at a high enough level to make some kind of face-saving deal possible if indeed that were possible in the first place. You know, I think to me, I constantly ask myself the question, let's imagine that Edward Snowdenoff arrived in Dallas Airport with the same kind of information about the domestic and foreign surveillance system that the Russian Federation was using. You know, would we have extradited him back to Russia? I think it's almost impossible to imagine that we would have done that. And so it does make me wonder, why did we think that the Russians would do it in this case? I think, I don't know this for sure, but my sense is that the administration thought that they were making progress in these discussions through law enforcement channels. But frankly, you know, this was a case where I think if there was an opportunity to resolve this, the only way that you could have done it, I think, was for Mr. Obama to pick up the telephone and have some very, you know, frank conversations with Mr. Putin and try to work it through a personal relationship and try to find some kind of face-saving solution. But I won't beat that... Oh, the horse is not quite dead yet, but I won't belabor that point any longer, because frankly, you know, we don't know whether there would have been a summit if there hadn't been a Snowden affair. You know, if in fact it was the decision that there wasn't adequate progress on key issues in the bilateral relationship. We don't know and we're not likely to find out for quite a long time. Where do we go from here? Gosh, it's pretty tough to find a way in which or find a reason for which either leadership is going to, you know, want to find or see the incentives for themselves to resurrect the relationship. I think it's very likely that we could see this relationship muddle along at this very, very kind of unpleasant level for the next three years, you know, until we're looking at a new administration in the United States. And who knows how long we're going to be looking at the same administration in Moscow. So just to cut it short, I always try to find some kind of silver lining in this one. Well, okay, here, I'll just pull one out of left field for you, okay? Because it's not really about the U.S.-Russian relationship. There are some interesting things going actually in the Russo-Japanese relationship. And, you know, I thought that one of the reasons why Mr. Putin and the Russians had some incentive to try to improve their ties with the United States going back four years ago, was their concern about the growing power of China and that they would like to have a more balanced foreign policy? Well, it looks like I think Mr. Putin is trying to address, you know, his concerns about the possibility of being over-leveraged to China in other ways. And I think the Russo-Japanese relationship is number one on the list. Now, I'm not going to make the prediction that the Northern Territory issue is going to be resolved, but I would say I think that the possibility of resolution of this long-standing issue, now 68 years, is greater than I've seen at any time in the last 25 years or so that I've been following it. You have two leaderships in both countries that are relatively strong domestically, which I think is necessary. And I think both have the outside factor of their concern increasing about Chinese activities. And we may see this finally in the next year or so lead to a breakthrough in that relationship, which would frankly be good for the U.S.-Russia relationship as well. So with that note from left field, trying to bring some optimism to the discussion, let me finish my prepared remarks. Thanks. We're going to open it up to questions in just a second. If you could identify yourself, and if you're at the table, please speak into the microphone. This briefing will be available in transcript form later today. I'll mail it out. I'm going to assure you that we still do have a Board of Trustees. As many of you know, Dr. Brzezinski is around, Dr. Kissinger is around. We're moving our office in a couple of weeks, so that's why we have such sort of emptiness here. Our new building will be at 1616 Rhode Island Avenue, and you can follow us on Twitter at CSIS for more updates about that. But it's an exciting moment in the 50-year history of CSIS, and we're looking forward to it. This will be the last press briefing we do in this old building. So thank you again for being here. With that, I'd like to open it up for questions. Right here. Dmitry Kirosanov with RTAS. I would like to ask the members of the panel to put a little more meat on the issue of what's going to happen next in the bilateral relationship. And since Mr. Goodman mentioned that probably there will be no bilateral meeting between presidents. Well, I would like to hear that. Is there any chances that this summit might be a warming off point or none at all? Thanks, Dmitry, for the question. I was thinking this morning it could be a statesman-like move on the part of President Obama in particular since it was the United States that canceled the summit meeting to request a one-on-one bilateral meeting with President Putin. But I think the chances of that happening are less than 5 percent, slim to none. I think there's a high degree of anger on the part of the Obama administration about relations with Russia. And I think about Mr. Obama in particular in his personal regard for Mr. Putin. And I think that's what that comment, the personal comment about the slouching kid at the back of the room, seems with that it's harder to imagine that you could see them pivot and kind of walk back and make the decision, well, in fact, we would like to meet with you. There would have, you know, maybe the situation in Syria, which is extremely grave and dangerous, could justify that. Questions? Roger? Yeah. Roger Runig and Bloomberg News. What are going to be the deliverables for any of you? You know, on the Stockholm stop, I'm not sure there's really going to be a deliverable other than an underscoring of both the strong bilateral ties as well as our regional engagement. I mean, for the President to visit with the Nordic colleagues as well as to see the Baltic Presidents in the span of a week really speaks to, I think, a deeper regional engagement, which is very welcome. I think there will be an opportunity to, for the Stockholm stop, to really hear from five European leaders, some within the EU, some just within NATO, their concerns, obviously about Syria and the regional issues. I think there will be an extraordinary amount of outreach in the corridors of the G20 summit with David Cameron, with Francois Hollande, with the European colleagues as this gets closer. We just saw reports this morning that Prime Minister Cameron has recalled the British Parliament back in session on Thursday to discuss this. So this tells me we're going to see a very intense dialogue, and in some ways that Stockholm visit is a good preview of those issues. And to sort of tap on the first question, certainly it's not just U.S.-Russian bilateral relations that are undergoing some reassessment. European-Russian relations also. There have been challenges both with visa liberalization questions, energy issues, and I think the Europeans themselves are deeply examining what the health and future state of Russian democracy, human rights, civil society, and what it means for their relationship. So it's an important moment for consultation transatlantically about Russia as well. And I would suspect you'll hear, with the exception of Norway, which is not a member of the EU, another strong statement for the transatlantic trade and investment partnership that will echo the theme of trade for the G20. And I think you'll hear certainly from the Swedish side how critical that will be for U.S.-transatlantic relations. Well, as I implied, but I guess I didn't state explicitly, so thanks for the question. I wouldn't expect some major headline deliverables out of the G20 summit. I think that has not been the pattern in the recent past. And so certainly if you're looking for large headline numbers or initiatives, I wouldn't expect that. But as I say, in an 85-plus paragraph of communique, there will be a lot of hordatory language about growth and the importance of... And I would say a tilt towards growth versus austerity. That tilt has been happening in the last few meetings of G20 folks at the leader finance ministry level. And that will... You'll see that I think again here. But of course talk about the other aspects of the global economy I mentioned. An affirmation of all the things that the finance ministers have been doing on financial regulation, which I didn't really harp on, but because the leaders won't probably talk about that stuff in the room. But there'll be paragraphs about progress on Basel III and OTC derivatives regulation and the tax pieces, the tax avoidance and tax evasion issues I think will be featured. And for the specifics on that, I'd refer you actually on all of this, go back to the finance ministers communique of July 20th or something, which I think is really what you'll find the leaders embracing and endorsing mostly across the board. So I don't think I'd be surprised if there were any dramatic breakthroughs on that. Again, a lot of this is about the conversation and trying to get people on the same page and moving in the same direction on global economic and financial issues. No meeting. No deliverables. I would just add... Simple and sweet. We have to kind of wonder about the likelihood of US military strike on Syria has obviously increased very significantly. And imagine the G20 meeting taking place right after that, perhaps. So the mood of the principal players the Europeans, the United States, the Russians, and Chinese is going to... would have to think it would be very, very sour. And I can't think that's going to help just the G20 itself. Questions? Yes, right here. Paul Lewis from The Guardian Newspaper. Andrew, if you could follow up on that. Two things. One, you said that it wasn't clear to you that the Snowden Affair was... The bilateral summit would have occurred had it not been for the Snowden Affair. But all of the noises you heard from the White House in the run-up to was only after Russia agreed to give them temporary sanctuary that the meeting was cancelled. So what else could account for the cancellation of that bilateral meeting? And another question for Matthew is could you talk to us a bit more about how corridor conversations about Syria may impact the more formal meetings? I think the administration faced a dilemma in trying to factor out that the Snowden Affair and that the principal proposals that they've been making to the Russians on not just security issues and principally the nuclear offensive reductions, missile defences, cheating stability set of issues, which I think is the foremost area they wanted to make progress on. This is the area that Mr. Obama just made the Berlin speech Russians beyond and there was no response to those proposals that Mr. Donilon brought in and from what administration officials told me there have been no responses to other things that we've been proposing including in the area of economic cooperation and trade where at least there rhetorically for the last year or so the two administrations have been singing virtually from the same song sheet that we want to have a broader economic relationship as this would provide some ballast for the bilateral relationship in Rocky provide more constituencies in each country to support the relationship but my sense was that the administration was kind of getting no response really across the board so you know Snowden doesn't happen certainly they would have made every effort I think to try to try to carry on and have the meeting but it's it's just you have to ask yourself well what's the point we don't really need a photo opportunity and you look at where we are on a whole set of issues Syria obviously Iran it's very clear that the Russians don't want to go any further with sanctions on Iran the area that we have the most common interest Afghanistan well the problem there is that we still don't have a bilateral security agreement with the Afghans so we can't really talk to the Russians about you know what we envision to be the future potential for cooperation and kind of a multilateral context you know what one of the disadvantages of being a world leader and maybe a journalist as well as that you have to walk and chew gum at the same time you have to be able to cover a wide range of issues and I think in this case in a formal sense as I said the G20 is not about geopolitical issues and so Syria will not be on the formal agenda I would be very I mean it's possible but very unlikely that the Russians would introduce it into the agenda of the formal meetings or that some member would raise their hand and say I want to talk about Syria all of that said all of that said of course it is going to be it's going to have a huge impact in terms of again what's being talked about in the corridors which I expect it would be the dominant topic and as Andy said I think it will affect the kind of mood in the room I don't think there will be a sense of great camaraderie and let's get stuff done together because on the global economy and even on these other issues so I think it will have a it will have an effect but in a formal sense it won't be part of the the G20 deliberations well Matt I'm reminded that the G20 in September of 2009 in Pittsburgh that the G20 was used as a backdrop for then Gordon Brown and Nicholas Sarkozy and President Obama to announce about the Iranian disclosures so it can be used obviously with the media watching a platform to advance so I'm wondering if we'll see a lot of perhaps some press conferences that will so it can be used on occasion one of the advantages of being a specialist I do the G20 so I don't have to worry about important things like Russia and Syria so much I totally agree with that I mean I think that they're very well maybe things on the margins where people pull aside certainly to talk but possibly to say things announce things but I just in a formal G20 sense there won't I don't think it will be in the communique my image for this summit is kind of the hold your nose for a lot of the participants that's the headline baton death march questions Scott actually I disagree with the assessment as well but I think the larger mistake was to say it publicly and I think that I think it was a little bit too maybe a cavalier assumption that Mr. Putin was not as significant of a policy maker as he actually was and or the possibility that Mr. Putin would return as a future de facto and de jure leader of the Russian Federation on my view on Putin it's not so much that he has a foot in the cold war I think that he's been more affected by what he's seen with US behavior after the cold war and in the 1990s I think he reflects a very broad kind of consensus in Russia that the United States in particular the West more broadly taking advantage of Russia during a period of historical weakness and a lot of the developments in the particularly in the international security system sort of NATO expansion being a big one and the experience of the Serbia war in particular with the US in their Russia's view operating outside of international law had a deep impact on Putin and then subsequently I think maybe even a deeper impact was you know after 9-11 when the Russians worked closely with us and others to take out the Taliban in Afghanistan and there was a sense that this was a high point in US-Russia relations probably in the last 20 years even talk of possible alliance and such I think Mr. Putin felt that the Bush Administration subsequently really didn't reciprocate or didn't really kind of acknowledge Russian interests on a whole series of issues particularly walking away from the ABM Treaty and Missile Defense and again NATO expansion and other things and so it's that sense of grievances that built up in Putin that I think are actually much more significant than the impact of the Cold War Questions Josh Will Obama in sideline conversations have to be reassuring or apologizing or lowering tensions on some of those concerns? Well I think he will certainly hear concerns expressed in his conversations in Stockholm both bilaterally as well as with the dinner with the Nordic heads of government clearly I think the focal point within Europe is Germany and this has had significant ramifications both prior to the German election, national elections on September the 22nd but also I think it goes much deeper and I think initially as the documents were released there was a sense for the administration of just sort of being dismissive about it that everyone engages in this practice this emotionalism hysteria that was coming just needed to be downplayed well actually it's now taken deep root and it's impacting the transatlantic relationship particularly again the transatlantic trade and investment partnership TTIP where you now have statements certainly again being most forcefully expressed by Berlin both opposition as well as government official saying we can't move forward with this trade until we get much more rigorous both transparency on the NSA programs but in the case of Germany a new agreement that the U.S. will not spy on Germany so this is not going away it's not even going away after the German election quite frankly it will continue it needs to be taken very seriously there is now a real breach in confidence and trust that we have to manage and work through so we can get back to working on the bilateral engagement and agenda and first and foremost is that TTIP is that trade investment that allows this issue to sideline that and right now it has the potential to do that so he certainly will hear it and he may if he has an opportunity to have a sideline discussion which I assume he will with Chancellor Merkel in the quarters of the G20 he may hear additional words on that well the revelations of the program are I think are hard to underestimate as a blow to his credibility as a moral leader in many places and it plays in perfectly into the hands of the Russians and to the Chinese I think just the fact that and even in the United States I mean Edward Snowden is viewed by a very significant part of the population as a is doing the right thing and so you can imagine what the view is in other countries and so in other countries in which we repeatedly are very watching very carefully their violations of human rights it's a big PR public relations gift I think and the irony that Mr. Snowden goes to China and Russia which are certainly I think taking more intrusive measures to surveil their own citizens the irony is kind of staggering Questions? Paul Just a follow up question on that one of the significant disclosures from Snowden has been the extent and depth of surveillance at these summits the Germans at least appeared to be genuinely surprised at the NSA which supposedly deals with terrorism is spying on its diplomats what impact will that have on this summit and both the practicalities and the way in which leaders will approach it Interesting I mean I think that's another data point in the whole that broader conversation and I assume to your point about practical issues that every delegations security team and IT team will be vigilant I don't really know how to answer the question because I think it's part of the broader conversation and the tensions that Heather and Andy have talked about I don't think it as I sit here trying to answer your question I don't see any kind of profound impact on the G20 conversation itself but it's an issue among the members who are there and so they'll be part of that conversation yes right over here unless Japan wants it to be mentioned as a specific example of how Japan is taking on its fiscal challenges it will almost certainly not be mentioned this is this decision that Prime Minister Abe has to make about whether to increase as planned and legislated an increase in their value added tax the so-called consumption tax which he may, a decision he may make well he probably won't make it before that summit but he may make it in September and so I mean I think there will be a broader what countries are doing to consolidate their fiscal positions and the timing and sequencing and pacing of that those moves but not a specific conversation in the G20 about that issue if Prime Minister Abe meets with President Obama no doubt Prime Minister Abe is going to talk about that but again I don't think it would be part of the formal output of even a bilateral meeting between the two great right and back I think in some ways as Matt reflected this will be one of the first G20 conversations where the euro crisis is not very much front and center of the conversation of how Europe is addressing this this has been a I would argue a pause in the crisis hopefully we're seeing some early signs of healing but I think we are far from over and that's certainly been part of the conversation in recent days with the Minister who was suggesting that the Greek package will have to be reassessed and obviously some continued concerns about the health of the French economy so the euro crisis is taking a pause but it will return back to the conversation it is a legitimate question what certainly a reoccurring theme since 2009 has been this rebalancing initiative of the current accounts surplus countries versus the deficit countries and that certainly puts Germany and China squarely in that the surplus camp is going to find that rebalancing I would argue in looking at the CDU platform we are seeing a bit of stimulus in the German perspective of encouraging additional spending but this is certainly not going to address the concerns of the enormous current accounts surplus that the Germany currently holds I would not suspect what I guess I'm watching very closely is how Syria could potentially impact the German elections in that conversation as the Merkel spokesman yesterday came out with a very strong statement of support that action must be taken and that was a firmly supportive so I'm wondering how that issue may or may not play in but this has been a very quiet and subdued German election with very few issues other than the NSA prism issue being first and foremost so I don't anticipate extraordinary volatility leading up to September 22nd just very quickly I just say I think Heather's right I think that the Euro crisis is no longer front and center as the main issue for the G20 leaders to discuss at this summit but elements of well A I guess I'd first say I think certainly the U.S. and probably others are not going to be quite as comforted by one quarters modestly positive growth in thinking that the overall crisis is solved and second I think there will be elements of the Euro situation including Germany's six seven percent of GDP current account surplus that will appear and the rebalancing conversation or banking union will will be something that people will be interested in and the progress on that in the financial discussion so it will it will emerge but it won't be the central theme I think of the of the conversation I think my name is Igarashi from I just wanted to ask you about fiscal consolidation too I think you know G20 company countries are expected to set some kind of targets for their government debts after 2016 so how much do you think how much dominant will this discussion on fiscal policy I mean fiscal consolidation well again I mean fiscal consolidation has been part of the G20 since I mean in some sense since the beginning but certainly since the Toronto summit in 2010 where there were those commitments to reducing fiscal deficits and debt that were that were laid out I mean that was partly because I think there was a little bit more optimism at that point in 2010 that the worst of the crisis was over and that things were beginning to pull back up and so it was time to start but I think everyone agrees is a critical medium term challenge for many countries in the G20 but I think the debate has shifted over time partly because growth has not performed as well as people hoped in the first part of 2010 partly because I think the impact of some of the more austere policies that some members of the G20 have pursued have ended up you know fairly you know ostensibly hurting growth and I think there have been domestic debates that have shifted and so I think the conversation is a little different now and it's more about yes we need to do medium term consolidation but in the short term the priority and I expect the first sentence of the communique will be we met in Strelna in outside St. Petersburg the second paragraph will be growth and jobs are our top priority and that's a subtle shift from earlier well it's again been in the last couple of communiques but I think that's going to be the focus growth and jobs versus immediate fiscal consolidation or austerity I was personally tickled we've now rebranded it growth friendly fiscal consolidation so I think we're seeing that sensitivity of balance but again just in the European context we have the fiscal compact treaty where that breaks our constitutional requirements for balanced budgets will start coming into play in 2016 again that will in some ways impact the leeway for stimulus spending and it cements legally fiscal consolidation additional questions with that I'd like to thank everybody for coming to our briefing this morning again follow us on twitter at CSIS for updates on when the transcript will be available should be available later today we'll be mailing it out to all of you thank you again and we'll see you soon