If you want Russia to be a real fully developed partner, then America should invest in Russia and activate Russia as a strong nation.

With Yeltsin, the Soviet Union broke apart, the country was totally mismanaged, the constitution was not respected by the regions of Russia. The army, education and health systems collapsed. People in the West quietly applauded, dancing with and around Yeltsin. I conclude therefore that we should not pay too much attention to what the West is saying.

In Russia, there are those who make their money in criminal ways, but I earn everything myself.

We could still have continued the arms race, but the arms race was pointless, and it was another reason we decided to start perestroika. It was senseless to continue to accumulate weapons. We had enough weapons to destroy life on Earth 1,000 times, and therefore it was very clear to us that the arms race could spiral out of control. A conflict could have started, as both the Americans and the Soviets realized, not out of a wrong political decision but because of a failure in the command-and-control systems.

It is really important to solve the problem of rational utilization and distribution of wate supplies. I dare say, the shortage of fresh water is the major ecological problem of this moment.

Globalization was supposed to break down barriers between continents and bring all peoples together. But what kind of globalization do we have with over one billion people on the planet not having safe water to drink?

One of the reasons why this country undertook military action in Iraq was that there are quite a few problems here, and perhaps attention needed to be deflected from those problems. It sometimes seems that the U.S. economy works successfully only if it gets a stimulus from the defense industry. So perhaps in addition to showing the power and the might of the United States internationally, another reason was to help the defense industry and to help the U.S. economy recover.