Apossibly apocryphal story has it that, in the 1980s, Soviet troops in East Germany had to attend sessions of political instruction. Insubordinate air-force officers would skip the indoctrination and congregate at the buffet, where an ingratiating KGB man would try to wheedle them back in. The officers called him the "head of the club". His name was Vladimir Putin. Twenty-odd years later, the KGB-man-turned-president is head of another club: the G8 group of rich countries, whose presidency Russia assumed at the start of the year. Not so long ago, the idea of Mr Putin presiding over a gathering of free-market democracies might have seemed optimistic, but not altogether implausible. Yet, even before the gas-to-Ukraine squabble that marked the start of the year, Russia's membership of the G8 was looking hard to reconcile with its trajectory under Mr Putin. Russia's relationship with the West has changed, incrementally but surely, for the worse. Why?
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