President Clinton and President Yeltsin have agreed that Russia must continue its economic reforms. Yet, even as they spoke, the political crisis blocking these measures worsened.
The Russian parliament, the Duma, called for the withdrawal of Mr Yeltsin's choice to lead the next government, Mr Viktor Chernomyrdin, who was rejected by a large majority in the parliament on Monday, mainly through the opposition of the communists.
At the post-summit press conference in the Kremlin yesterday, the Russian leader gave an evasive answer when asked what would happen if Mr Chernomyrdin is rejected again. If this happens three times, the Duma has to be dissolved and elections called.
The Duma yesterday voted for Mr Chernomyrdin to withdraw voluntarily, saying this would "strongly ease the situation and start the quest for compromise". The Duma resolution said the attempt to push through Mr Chernomyrdin was "doomed".
The vote on Mr Chernomyrdin has now been brought forward to tomorrow. The former paratroop general, Mr Alexander Lebed, who is a contender to replace Mr Yeltsin, warned that Mr Yeltsin would be "committing hara-kiri if he dissolves the Duma".
Using alarmist language, Mr Lebed said after a meeting with Mr Clinton that he told him the situation in Russia was "catastrophic". It was worse than before the Bolshevik revolution in 1917 as Russia now had stockpiles of poorly-guarded weapons.
At their joint press conference in the Catherine Hall of the Kremlin, the two Presidents at times seemed ill at ease as they faced questions from the Russian media and White House travelling press corps. However, they insisted that the summit had been "a success".
The success seemed to be limited to verbal agreement that the right way forward for Russia was to stick with economic reforms even if they have helped to precipitate the present crisis.
However, Mr Yeltsin warned: "We shall have to suffer through much blood, sweat and tears before new forms of business co-operation worthy of our two great powers are found."
Mr Clinton insisted on the importance of Russia playing by the rules of the global economy if investors were to continue to have confidence. If the reform process could be completed, "then I for one would be strongly supportive of greater assistance to Russia from the US and the other big economic powers".
Mr Yeltsin said there had been differences on some foreign policy questions. Russia did not accept "military solutions, be it in Kosovo or around Iraq or Afghanistan or others". This was seen as a reference to the US bombing of camps in Afghanistan and a chemical factory in Khartoum, Sudan, which Mr Yeltsin has criticised.
Mr Yeltsin also made it clear that Russia objected to NATO expansion as part of the "new European security architecture" but said the exchanges led to "greater mutual understanding".
On Iraq, the two leaders agreed that Baghdad must comply with UN resolutions on arms inspections and allow them to resume as soon as possible. US officials said later that Mr Yeltsin told Mr Clinton that he had been unpleasantly surprised by President Saddam Hussein's decision to suspend the inspections and that "it contradicted assurances that Saddam had given him".
On the positive side, both leaders pointed to an agreement to co-operate on early warning systems on missile launches. Mr Yeltsin said a joint centre to monitor missile launches would be set up in Russia.
The two countries also agreed to remove 100 tonnes of plutonium from their nuclear weapons programmes so that it could not be used for that purpose.
There were also joint statements on Kosovo and on "common security challenges at the threshold of the 21st century".
After the summit, Mr Clinton met Duma and regional leaders at Spaso House, the residence of the US ambassador. The aim of the meeting was to impress on these political figures the necessity of sticking with the economic reform programme.
While telling the politicians that only Russia could define its economic and political system, "I do not believe you can find one country in the world that is economically successful that has completely ignored the ground rules of the global economy". They could no more defy these rules than he could "defy the law of gravity by stepping off the top floor of Spaso House".