Leaders Honor WWII Vets In Russia

Parade In Red Square Marks 60th Anniversary Of Allied Victory

(CBS/AP) 
The lavish events were very different from the solemn V-E Day commemoration Mr. Bush observed the day before. Accompanied by few dignitaries and little pomp, he spoke briefly Sunday at a cemetery of American war dead in the Netherlands.

President Bush said he decided to attend to honor the war's staggering human cost in the Soviet Union. That toll has been estimated at anywhere from 20-27 million soldiers and civilians before victory was secured.

"The people of Russia suffered incredible hardship, and yet the Russian spirit never died out," said Mr. Bush.

Though the triumph over Hitler is treasured here as an unvarnished achievement, others see it differently. President Bush has been trying to get Putin to acknowledge some of the darker wartime actions by the Soviet Union, such as its postwar occupation of the neighboring Baltic nations. Before coming to Moscow, President Bush traveled to Latvia to deliver that message pointedly and in person.

"What President Bush has said in Latvia and elsewhere is that it's in the interest of the Russian people to have strong democratic countries on her borders because strong democratic countries are peaceful countries," Bartlett told Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith. "These are important, universal principles that President Bush has shared privately as well as publicly."

Putin echoed the friendship between the two presidents in an exclusive interview with Mike Wallace on CBS News 60 Minutes.

"When he [Mr. Bush] looked into your eyes and saw your soul. What about you?" Wallace asked. "Did you see his?"

"He impressed me as a reliable person," says Putin, who adds that he still feels that way. "You know that we have different views on some things, but my first impression was correct. He is a truly reliable person who does what he says he will do."

Putin, however, has disagreed with Mr. Bush about his decision to go into Iraq. "I thought that was a mistake and told him so," says Putin. "But he is the president of the United States, and he’s the one who makes the decision."

In Mr. Bush’s defense, Putin said everyone believed Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Nonetheless, Putin still thinks the Iraq war may have been Mr. Bush’s biggest blunder.

"Democracy cannot be exported to some other place. This must be a product of internal domestic development in a society," says Putin. "But if the U.S. were to leave and abandon Iraq without establishing the grounds for a united country, that would definitely be a second mistake."

Mr. Bush next heads to Georgia, a trip which the White House says is a chance to praise rising pro-democracy sentiment in the former Soviet sphere — a movement that Georgians proudly claim to have started with their peaceful 2003 Rose Revolution that brought the pro-Western Saakashvili to power.