But it does not follow that Russia is fading as a foreign policy actor. It is worth recalling that in the Brezhnevite precedent, Russia, under a regime far more authoritarian and economically misguided than Putin's, ruled half of Europe and was second only to the US in global influence. While, as Putin well knows, those superpower days are gone forever, Russia still has huge assets. Its geographical extent and resource base remain of primordial global importance. It is the world's second nuclear power. It is included as a matter of course in the inner groups dealing with key international problems ranging from the Middle East through Iran to North Korea. Its armed forces have recovered from their post-Yeltsin low and are now being re-equipped and modernised. And while Russia may not have many friends to the west, it still has close and valuable links in the east and south, notably (as noted) with China, but also in Central Asia and the Caucasus. Above all, this is a country which has grown used over hundreds of years of history to playing a leading role in world affairs-even at some domestic cost-and is not about to abandon that position now.

So, like it or not, we have to do with a Russia that is not in the foreseeable future going to converge with the West. (I remain optimistic for the longer term; but that is a different subject.) Nor will Russia conveniently disappear as a major foreign policy actor. The examples of Ukraine and Syria illustrate the challenges this poses.  Ukraine, with its large Russian-speaking population and dependence on subsidised Russian gas, shows that there are issues which are literally insoluble without Russian involvement. And Syria shows us a world where the West, whose relative global weight is already falling and whose appetite for overseas intervention has tangibly waned, will increasingly need the support of other influential nations if it is to achieve its international objectives.

It follows that the dismissal of Russia as a fading power whose instincts we abhor is becoming a luxury we can diminishingly afford. Certainly Russia's instincts are different from ours. It has no time for the "values-based" foreign policy on which we pride ourselves. Its repressive style of internal governance remains an offence to European standards. And, as I know from personal experience, it is an extraordinarily difficult international interlocutor: suspicious, narrowly nationalistic and unyielding. But in extremis it has proved possible for the West to do useful business with it — over nuclear arms control, support for our operations in Afghanistan, and Iran's nuclear ambitions. And, values aside, there are clear areas of shared interest, notably over Islamic extremism, and indeed Ukrainian stability. We manage to maintain businesslike relationships with, for example, one-party China, fundamentalist Saudi Arabia, and increasingly illiberal Turkey. It is odd, and ultimately damaging, that we cannot do the same with Russia. The Chinese leader Xi Jinping was at Sochi. Our leaders should have been there too.