Yesterday, the answer was five. I flew home with President Bush from Russia along with Peter Baker of the Washington Post, Steven Lee Myers of the New York Times, John McKinnon of the Wall Street Journal and Jim Gerstenzang of the Los Angeles Times.

I don't know if five newspaper reporters have ever flown on Air Force One at the same time, or if they have, when that last happened. But usually, there's only one newspaper reporter on board the big bird with the president. (When I say newspaper reporters, I'm not including wire reporters whose stories are printed in newspapers: Terrence Hunt from the AP, Matt Spetalnik from Reuters and Roger Runningen of Bloomberg were also on board.)

Yesterday, however, there were empty seats on the plane because there was no magazine (e.g. Time or Newsweek) reporter or photographer on the trip. The other three seats that opened up are usually occupied by a radio reporter and photographers. Only three photographers flew on Air Force One yesterday.

So there were nine reporters, including ABC producer Jennifer Duck, when National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley came back to brief us. And he had a hard sell. As I wrote in my piece today, the White House was heralding a major "breakthrough" in negotiations with the Russians over missile defense, even though the most substantive thing we could see in the 109-word text was a promise to "intensify dialogue."

Here is the text of the agreement on missile defense, which is part of a larger "strategic framework" that the U.S. and Russia agreed to as guidance for the next administrations.

We discussed the issue of missile defense. Both sides expressed their interest in creating a system for responding to potential missile threats in which Russia and the United States and Europe will participate as equal partners.

The Russian side has made clear that it does not agree with the decision to establish sites in Poland and the Czech Republic and reiterated its proposed alternative. Yet, it appreciates the measures that the U.S. has proposed and declared that if agreed and implemented such measures will be important and useful in assuaging Russian concerns.

We agreed to intensify our dialogue after Sochi on issues concerning MD cooperation both bilaterally and multilaterally.

All in all, administration officials (some of it was off the record) came back to make their case four separate times.

Because of space reasons, a lot of details about Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin's relationship, and what they said about it at their last public appearance together, didn't get into the article. So I've pasted it below.

Afghanistan troop levels was the only one of Mr. Bush's three targets for this trip that was not complicated by Russian objections. The president's difficulty in making any progress on missile defense or NATO expansion demonstrated Russia's growing heft as a world power.

Russia succeeded in pressuring NATO countries to block former Soviet blocs Ukraine and Georgia from the alliance's membership action plan (MAP).

But the personal relationship between Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin was as warm as ever.

The two leaders reflected on their time in office and their own friendship, which was highlighted again Saturday night when they spent three hours together at a private dinner here, along with first lady Laura Bush and Russian President-elect Dmitry Medvedev.

Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin joked with each other and danced together with a Russian troupe.

"It won't be our last meeting as people, but it will be our last meeting as presidents of our country," Mr. Bush said. "And it's a little bit nostalgic. … It just proves life moves on."

Mr. Putin said he "always found it rewarding and interesting to deal with the U.S. president."

"I have always appreciated his honesty and his openness, his willingness to listen to his counterpart," he said. "This is precious."

Mr. Bush defended his initial assessment of Mr. Putin in 2001 at the first meeting, when Mr. Bush said he saw into Mr. Putin's soul and found him a "trustworthy" ally.

"I thought he'd be the kind of person who would tell me what's on his mind," Mr. Bush said. "He's been very truthful."

Bush and Putin at their last press conference, in Sochi, Russia (photo by Jon Ward, The Washington Times).

— Jon Ward, White House correspondent, The Washington Times