Bruce Anderson: Mr Bush finds Mr Putin a man he can deal with

'George Bush is a firm believer in the bureaucratic virtues. Mr Putin has the soul of a staff officer '

Old fashioned diplomacy still works. Over the past few days, there has been a rapprochement between America and Russia, which could have long-term consequences. This has been made possible by good personal relations between Presidents Bush and Putin.

Six months ago, it was all very different. The earliest and most vigorous foreign policy pronouncements from the Bush administration tended to come from those with a Reagan-era mindset. Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and others, who had been contemptuous of Bill Clinton's flip-flop foreign policy, were determined to emphasise the new administration's tough-mindedness.

The Clintonites had usually been unwilling to talk in terms of an American victory in the Cold War; they did not believe that the US should glorify itself in that way. The former Reaganites had no such inhibitions. They were happy to remind the world who won the Cold War – and who lost it.

To the victor, the spoils. In those days, a number of Bush advisers were keen to tell the Russians that they did not matter, in order to disabuse them of any notion that they might have a veto on American initiatives. The Russian economy was about the same size as Portugal's, so why should the USA pay any more attention to Russia's views on national missile defence than to Portugal's?

This American negativity found an echo in Moscow. A lot of older Russian foreign policy makers still believe that anything the Americans want must work to Russia's disadvantage. There was a further generational problem. The older Russian officials spent long years in the service of the Soviet Union, which inevitably colours their attitudes. Even those who are intellectually persuaded of the need for change still find it hard to come to terms with the emotional consequences and to accept that they wasted the best years of their working lives trying to sustain the unsustainable. They would still like to find some justification for their earlier existence. Equally, even among those who were most intellectually persuaded of the need for change, the chaos of recent years has led to bouts of nostalgia for the old order.

So it is easy to understand why the Bush Administration's earlier pronouncements caused dismay in Moscow. Super-power status and rocket science were the last surviving glories of the Soviet era, yet now the Americans were preparing to sweep them too into redundancy.

That was Phase 1, but it was brief. It took only a few weeks for both sides to move towards more sophisticated positions. In Washington, new and younger voices began to be heard, especially the National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. Miss Rice had studied Russia. She was also prepared to take her elders' Cold War logic a little further. America had indeed won, so there was no need to behave as if the outcome was still in doubt. It was not possible to create a new post-Cold War relationship with the Russians.

Equally, Russia was not Portugal. Portugal does not cross 11 time zones, many of them spanning some of the World's most troubled regions. Nor does it possess vast resources of vital raw materials: still less, a nuclear arsenal. Superpower or not, the Russians still had a formidable capacity to influence events. Russia did matter.

President Bush did not appear to have started with strong views of his own on Russo-US relations, and was instinctively drawn to an America-centric view of foreign affairs. But he was rapidly persuaded that he could do business with the Russians, because he was rapidly persuaded that he could do business with Mr Putin.

Initially, it seemed an unlikely partnership; there was a widespread belief that the two men would have nothing in common. But that proved not to be the case. Given, or perhaps because of, his colourful personal background, George Bush has one unexpected quality. He is a firm, even intolerant believer in the bureaucratic virtues. He insists on tidy offices, prompt meetings and decorum, habits which were reinforced by his disgust at the chaos and sleaze of the Clinton White House. The new President will neither unscrew the fixtures and fittings, nor screw the interns.

Mr Putin's traits are less well known, but he does have a most un-Russian belief in office routine. Vladimir Putin has the soul of a staff officer. In an unexpected way, this helped to create mutual sympathy, as did Mr Putin's commitment to the free market. It is still not clear to what extent he understands liberal capitalism, and he has little taste for its socially disruptive consequences (then again, neither did Margaret Thatcher) but he knows that the old Soviet system did not work; he has absolutely no nostalgia for Comecon, the old Communist common market.

By now, Mr Putin is also aware that the Americans are determined to press ahead with a nuclear missile defence. But he also knows that in any foreseeable future, NMD is unlikely to pose a threat to the Russian inter-continental ballistic missile fleet. The Americans have made it clear that their primary objective is to defend against ICBMs in the possession of rogue states.

In private, indeed, the Americans have tried to persuade the Russians that they should welcome moves against rogue states. To be effective, any such system would have to shoot down missiles first, and ask questions later. Given the Russian paranoia about the Islamic World – they often talk as if there were a crescent of terrorism stretching from Kosovo to the Philippines – they ought to welcome an American missile defence which would also protect them.

Whether or not they accept that argument, the Russians have changed tack. They now seem more concerned to win diplomatic advantages than to indulge in diplomatic confrontation. Though they will not make an overt linkage between the two issues, we can expect the Russians to lobby against the inclusion of the Baltic states in Nato, as a tacit quid pro quo for the acquiesence in NMD. As many Westerners who are firmly committed to Nato also believe that including the Balts would merely diminish that alliance's credibility, the Russians should be able to find allies.

While Miss Rice was having her talks in the Kremlin, Kim Jong Il was setting off by train on an 11-day journey from North Korea to Moscow; the Dear Leader has a fear of flying. There are a few officials in the Russian Foreign Ministry who would feel happier to welcome visitors from North Korea than from the United States. But those few survivors from the old order have no purchase on the future.

As Messrs Bush and Putin have enjoyed their summits, there are likely to be more meetings at regular intervals. Over the years, several American presidents have tried to create good relations with Russia. In view of his supposed ultra right wing background, it would be an irony if George Bush succeeded where most of his predecessors mostly failed. At present, it is a most plausible irony.