Free Republic

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered what was perhaps his most important speech, and definitely his most direct criticism of the West, at the Valdai Conference in Sochi on October 24. One independent analyst called it “the most important political speech since Churchill’s ‘Iron Curtain’ speech of March 5, 1946.” Another called it “epochal,” and a “marker of the end of the U.S.’s brief period as the one big, unchallenged bully on the block.” Another labeled the speech “a precursor to World War iii.” Yet the mainstream Western media largely ignored the speech, instead focusing that day on America’s midterm elections,...

Most people in the English-speaking parts of the world missed Putin's speech at the Valdai conference in Sochi a few days ago, and, chances are, those of you who have heard of the speech didn't get a chance to read it, and missed its importance. (For your convenience, I am pasting in the full transcript of his speech below.) Western media did their best to ignore it or to twist its meaning. Regardless of what you think or don't think of Putin (like the sun and the moon, he does not exist for you to cultivate an opinion) this is...