WASHINGTON, July 10. /TASS/. The American authorities thought that NATO would have an easier time expanding after Vladimir Putin came to power as compared to under his predecessor Boris Yeltsin, according to declassified US government documents, published by the National Security Archive.

The organization published a report on ex-US deputy secretary of state Strobe Talbott’s trip to London for a meeting with British diplomat David Manning who was appointed the UK’s permanent representative to NATO shortly thereafter. "Turning to Putin, Talbott suggested that ‘the next round of NATO enlargement might be easier under Putin’ compared to the experience they had with the Yeltsin administration," the document reads. "In his view, ‘while the former Russian president saw NATO in symbolic, even emotional terms, the current president appears to think more in terms of a hard-headed concept of Russia’s principal threats, namely Islamic extremism and the Chinese," the document added.

Meanwhile, during the meeting Talbott emphasized that the West may end up "paying a price for seven years of successfully turning Yeltsin’s big 'Nyet’s' into grudging OK’s," noting that the West has managed to achieve many of its goals under the first Russian president. But Putin has distanced himself from Yeltsin and is therefore much more cautious about saying "yes" to the West, the document says.