Scott Lucas in The Guardian: Obama Administration's Battle over Iran and Israel

Since I wrote this for The Guardian, there have been further developments, notably Israel's stepped-up campaign to bump Washington into a hard-line Iran-first policy. The efforts have been more political than military, notably Tel Aviv's threat that it will not enter meaningful negotiations over Palestine unless the US commits to further pressure upon Tehran.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton struck back yesterday, telling Israel to back off on the threat. That indicates that the Obama line of engagement is still prevailing within the Administration, as does the silence of Petraeus and Mullen over the last two weeks.

Forgive the somewhat dramatic headline, which led to a lot of irrelevant comments. The issue is not whether the US backs an Israeli airstrike but whether it suspends the gradual but clear move towards discussions with Iran.

To bomb, or not to bomb, Iran

Just over a month ago, President Barack Obama broke a 30-year embargo on US relations with Iran: he offered goodwill not only to "Iranians" but to the country's government. Speaking on the occasion of Nowruz, the Iranian New Year, he said:

"I want you, the people and leaders of Iran, to understand the future that we seek. It's a future with renewed exchanges among our people, and greater opportunities for partnership and commerce. It's a future where the old divisions are overcome, where you and all of your neighbours and the wider world can live in greater security and greater peace."

It's no surprise that this message, given a generation of tension between Washington and Tehran, has been challenged in the US. What's more interesting is that the greatest threat to Obama's engagement comes not from media sceptics from Fox News to the Wall Street Journal or the foundations now packed with refugees from the Bush administration or even the Middle Eastern institutes putting a priority on Israeli security. No, Obama's most daunting opponents are within his own administration.

Less than two weeks after the Nowruz address, General David Petraeus, the head of the US military command overseeing Iran and the Persian Gulf, offered a far different portrayal of Iran to a Senate committee:

Iranian activities and policies constitute the major state-based threat to regional stability. … Iran is assessed by many to be continuing its pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, which would destabilise the region and likely spur a regional arms race.

The next day Petraeus's boss, Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, visited the offices of the Wall Street Journal, which has taken a consistent editorial line against dialogue with the Iranian government. Far from supporting his president, Mullen told the newspaper: "I think we've got a problem now. ... I think the Iranians are on a path to building nuclear weapons." Not even past enemies were as menacing: "Even in the darkest days of the cold war we talked to the Soviets. … [But now] we don't have a lot of time."

What's going on here? There are clear political goals behind Obama's approach of dialogue rather than confrontation. The hope is that Iran will not challenge the US approach to Middle Easten issues, in particular Israel-Palestine and Israel-Syria talks, through its connections with Hamas and Hezbollah. An easing of political tensions in turn may remove the motive for Tehran to reverse its suspension of research and development for a nuclear weapons – as opposed to civilian nuclear energy – programme.

Yet there are also military benefits from a US-Iran rapprochement. As Obama's envoy Richard Holbrooke has made clear, a partnership with Tehran could ease the American burden in Afghanistan, especially as the troop surge is being implemented. Better relations could assist with the political transition in Iraq as the US draws down its overt military presence. Eventually, an Iranian renunciation of nuclear weapons would finally remove a significant strategic question mark in the region.

In part, the calculation of Petraeus and Mullen is that Iran cannot be trusted in these areas. For years, US commanders in Iraq have alleged that Iran has been backing the insurgency, and Petraeus has also claimed that Tehran has supported the Taliban in Afghanistan. In his testimony to the Senate committee, the general expanded this into a grand nefarious Iranian scheme:

Iran employs surrogates and violent proxies to weaken competitor states, perpetuate conflict with Israel, gain regional influence and obstruct the Middle East peace process. Iran also uses some of these groups to train and equip militants in direct conflict with US forces. Syria, Iran's key ally, facilitates the Iranian regime's reach into the Levant and the Arab world by serving as the key link in an Iran-Syria-Hezbollah-Hamas alliance and allows extremists (albeit in smaller numbers than in the past) to operate in Damascus and to facilitate travel into Iraq.

Still, in their public opposition to Obama's Iran policy, the military commanders are playing one card before all others: Israel.

Petraeus's threat to the congressmen was far from subtle: "The Israeli government may ultimately see itself so threatened by the prospect of an Iranian nuclear weapon that it would take pre-emptive military action to derail or delay it." Mullen told the Wall Street Journal: "There is a leadership in Israel that is not going to tolerate" a nuclear Iran. This was a "life or death" matter in which "the operative word is 'existential'".

Are they bluffing? If so, it's a bluff that has been coordinated with Tel Aviv. Last summer, Israel asked for but did not get George Bush's support for an airstrike on Iran. It took only six weeks for the Israelis to revive the topic with the new Obama administration: the commander of the Israeli armed forces, General Gabi Ashkenazi, visited Washington with the message "that an Israeli military strike was a 'serious' option".

While Ashkenazi was told by Obama's political advisers to put his fighter planes away, the story of Israeli military plans continues to be circulated. Only last weekend, Sheera Frenkel of The Times was fed the story: "The Israeli military is preparing itself to launch a massive aerial assault on Iran's nuclear facilities within days of being given the go-ahead by its new government."

High-level Obama officials are fighting back. Aware that a frontal assault on the popular Petraeus would be politically dangerous, they have tried to curb the "Israel will strike" campaign. Vice-president Joe Biden told CNN that new Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "would be ill-advised to do that". Perhaps more importantly, secretary of defence Robert Gates said last week that an Israeli attack would have "dangerous consequences". Reading that signal, Israeli President Shimon Peres backed away from earlier tough talk and assured: "All the talk about a possible attack by Israel on Iran is not true. The solution in Iran is not military."

So, for this moment, Petraeus and Mullen appear to have been checked. However, they and their military allies, such as General Raymond Odierno in Iraq, have been persistent in challenging Obama over strategy from Kabul to Baghdad to Jerusalem. It is their manoeuvring, rather than Tehran's jailing of an Iranian-American journalist like Roxana Saberi or even Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speeches at UN conferences, that is Barack Obama's greatest foe.

Enduring America: Your #1 Site for Republican Teabagging (with Updates!)

Latest Post: Tea Parties, Violence, and Politics (And, Yes, This is a Serious Post)

Related Post: A Grand Republican Teabagging - The Day After
Related Post: Republican Teabagging - What It REALLY Means
Related Post: Republican Teabagging Revolution Begins

LIBERAL TEABAGGING SABOTAGE UPDATE (10 p.m. British Teabag Time): Enduring America regrets to confirm that liberal saboteurs have out-Teabagged our Republican friends, forcing the end of the Washington DC protest:

Secret Service officers were scurrying to close the North Lawn of the White House Wednesday afternoon because of a suspicious package and it appeared that trouble was brewing.

But it turned out that nothing more was brewing than an innocent little box of, yes, tea bags.

Journalists were quickly banned from moving outside of the press briefing room, and hundreds of protesters gathered for a "Tax Day Tea Party" were quickly shooed out of Lafayette Park as a security robot inspected the package closely.

After about a half hour of high alert, a Secret Service official told CNN the "suspicious package" was merely some tea bags. So the threat was over, and so was the anti-Obama protest.

We fear that we may have may have misunderestimated our liberal/radical/taxifying opponents' expertise and experience with Teabagging. Next time we must ensure that we, and not they, are the ones who "Teabag Obama".

TERRORIST TEABAGGER UPDATE (7:20 p.m.): Police have cleared Lafayette Park after a liberal/radical/taxifying agent provocateur threw teabags over the White House fence.

It is clear that the Terrorist Teabagger is an infiltrator, since Republicans would never try Teabagging through wire mesh.


NOT A DOUBLE-ENTENDRE UPDATE (6:30 p.m. British Teabag Time): "Joe the Plumber" Wurzelbacher, reporting for Pajamas TV, gets a scoop: a protestor asks if "he would like to waterboard Obama".

We do hope that this is a genuine Teabagger advocating torture of the President, and not a devious liberal trying to slip in a sexual allusion.


MEGA-URGENT UPDATE (6:05 p.m. British Teabag Time): And we're off! More than 300 Teabagging Parties have begun across the United States. The biggest mass Teabagging is in Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. with a million teabags involved.

But we assure you that sutiable Teabagging precautions are being taken: "Organisers promised to put the bags on tarps and clean up afterward so as not to make a mess."

SUPER-URGENT UPDATE (15 April in Teabagging Britain): We're #2! Enduring America has vanquished the villainous Rachel Maddow, despatching her to Google limbo. Now to topple "The Young Turks" to claim our rightful status as Top Republican Teabagging Party Site....

URGENT UPDATE (7:25 p.m. British Teabag Time): For you first-time Teabaggers, Republican National Committee Michael Steele is ready to help. Half-politician, all-man, Steele has not two but four virtual teabags you can lay on your Teabag-ee of choice: President Obama, Vice President Biden, Senate Leader Harry Reid, or Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

Actually we're #3 on Google for "Republican teabagging" behind the YouTube videos of "The Young Turks" and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, but we're hoping to become the #1 legitimate site by the time of the Teabagging Parties on Tax Day tomorrow. This is because:

1. We do not think the Young Turk and Ms Maddow are Republicans.
2. We are certain that the Young Turk is not from America, which of course is where Teabagging protest was established.
3. There is a possibility that Ms Maddow is a lesbian, which should disqualify her from any comment on the morality and good sense behind Teabagging.

Indeed, the latest video from Ms Maddow is a shameful slur on Teabagging Parties:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNXuSJwDwco[/youtube]

We are horrified by Ms Maddow's claim that Teabagging is a creation of FreedomWorks, funded by right-wing billionaires and led by the former Republican Senator Dick Armey, when our protest is that Teabagging is for everyone.

And Ms Maddow is clearly trying to tarnish us when she (and her guest Anamarie Cox, who we also think might be suspect) implies that we have naively claimed Teabagging --- in contrast to the non-Teabag legitimacy of the libertarians behind Representative Ron Paul --- as a shallow political swipe at President Obama.

We dissent. There is nothing naive about Enduring America's promotion of Teabagging. We do not believe it should be shallow: our Teabagging protest is full-throated.

This is our battle cry: when you Teabag tomorrow, do it for and with Enduring America.

The Engagement is Official: US, Iran in Nuclear Talks

Related Post: A Beginners' Guide to Engagement with Iran

The  initial news last night was that Undersecretary of State William Burns was in London in  "5+1" talks with Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and China on Iran's nuclear programme. Then came the revelation. Iran will soon be there as well: Washington is dropping its policy of no direct discussions with Tehran. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made the brief announcement, "There's nothing more important than trying to convince Iran to cease its efforts to obtain a nuclear weapon." You can choose the political spin on this from different newspapers. For both The New York Times and The Washington Post, "U.S. to Join Iran Talks Over Nuclear Program". For The Daily Telegraph, desperate to prove Tehran is giving way, "Iran Offered New Nuclear Talks". So let's leave it to a State Department official to make the concise summary, "It was kind of silly that we had to walk out of the room" whenever Iranians were nearby.

While Iranian media have highlighted the US change in position, there has been no official Iranian reaction to the news. However, the 5+1 meeting and Clinton's statement follow contact between US and the Iran at The Hague conference on Afghanistan. Ensuing signals indicated that Iran was happy to take up engagement: last week President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tehran will shake an "honest hand".

This American decision confirms a significant break from the Bush Administration's attempt to isolate Iran. First, Bush officials broke off direct contact with Tehran in May 2003, rejecting an Iranian letter which offered detailed talks. A double game followed: Washington would push for more economic sanctions against Iran while European countries persisted in negotations. When those negotiations were close to a breakthrough, the US Government would pull back from any agreement, and the finger-wagging --- from both the US and Iran --- would resume.

Perhaps more importantly, the offer of direct talks may put Obama's military commanders in their place. Last week both Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, pointedly warned that Israel would be attacking an operating Iranian nuclear facility. Vice President Joe Biden finally stepped in publicly, telling CNN that Israel "would be ill-advised" to carry out an airstrike.

The Obama Administration has also made this move despite (possibly because of) reports that President Ahmadinejad will today announce that the nuclear plant at Bushehr is now active. And it has done so despite yesterday's news that Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, detained in Iran since January, has been charged with espionage.

This is the clearest signal that Obama, in contrast to his predecessor, has decided that it is better to live with an Iran with a nuclear programme rather than to pursue confrontation. Doing so, Washington hopes to reap the benefit of Iranian assistance --- or non-interference --- with American initiatives from Afghanistan to the Middle East.

Pakistan: Who’s Calling Who A Failed State?

"Collateral Damage"

A disturbing picture is emerging of one of the countries at the center of the Global War on Terror, a terrifying confluence of events which constitutes a “perfect storm” of instability. This country, which President Bush formerly praised as a “leader” in the fight against militant Islamism in Central Asia, now appears to be increasingly ungovernable, what we in the West commonly refer to as a “Failed State.”

A porous border facilitates the funneling of arms and resources to a booming narco-insurgency next-door, an insurgency which takes the lives of innocent civilians, militants, soldiers and police on a daily basis. In the halls of power and government, corrupt western-educated oligarchs continue to, in the midst of catastrophic economic collapse, wildly pillage the state treasuries while their rural fundamentalist constituencies, and the militant industries they patronize, fuel money and weapons to the neighboring insurgency, often with the explicit help of state intelligence services. And yet even though the citizens have recently achieved some modest democratic gains, the central government seems oblivious to their cries for justice against members of the criminal ex-regime. Meanwhile, a brutal domestic terrorist outbreak, flush with recently unemployed recruits, continues without mercy, killing over 50 civilians and security services in a series of suicide attacks over the last month.

This is not Pakistan.

It’s the United States.

The narco-insurgency? It’s not the Taliban in Afghanistan, it’s the drug cartels in Mexico. And those corrupt western-educated oligarchs aren’t the bumbling US allies in Islamabad, it’s the elites calling the shots in Washington, DC. I’ll let you do the rest of the math on your own, but the last figure commands special attention. The Associated Press reports, “A string of shootings in the US in the last month alone has claimed the lives of 53 people” starting with a gunman in Samson, Alabama who killed 11 people including himself and ending in Graham, Washington with a man who massacred his 5 children before finally killing himself.

So is this to say that America is really some kind of “Failed State?” Absolutely not. Rather this semantic bait and switch is intended to serve as a catalyst for western experts, analysts, and academics, those typically thought of as foreign policy elites, to rethink their perceptions of Pakistan and the role it is playing in the War on Terror. In particular, this is an antidote to the endemic tendency to paint Pakistan as weak, corrupt, and ungovernable, also known as a failed state. Far from being a dangerous, failed state, Pakistan is actually a thriving democracy with more in common with its allies in the West than either party would be comfortable admitting to presently.

I don’t expect this change of perspective to be simple. Western elites have a long history of despising democratic governments while at the same time enabling the militant and authoritarian undercurrents of society within the countries they govern. The names are well known: Vietnam, Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran, Panama, Iraq.  All of these places at one point in time had democratic governments, albeit messy and tumultuous ones. Western expertscharacterized them as weak, corrupt, and ungovernable, however, and used this rhetoric as a jumping off point for violent intervention. The reward was a foreign policy timeline punctuated with the blowback of war, mass killings, and terrorism.

Pakistan, one of the largest Muslim democracies on the planet, doesn’t have to be next.

Take for example the recent public demonstrations in Pakistan over the disqualification of the Sharif brothers from politics. Nawaz Sharif, placed under house arrest by the government, defied his detention and marched with thousands of people in the streets, eventually forcing President Zardari to reinstate the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. That Supreme Court then agreed to hear an appeal of the political disqualifications. In the west, this was seen as a horrifying example of Pakistan’s  weakness, corruption, and inability to be governed. Thomas Friedman seemed on the verge of soiling himself when he breathlessly exclaimed on the CBS political talk show, Face the Nation, “they’re rioting in Pakistan!”

The western narrative is that Nawaz Sharif, agent of Saudi Arabia and staunch ally of the Islamic political parties, led an angry mob in the streets to de-stabilize the weak US-backed President and threaten the US campaign against al-Qa'eda in Afghanistan and Pakistan. A more reasonable view would be that Nawaz Sharif, a typically-corrupt religious politician, the Pakistani parallel of Newt Gingrich or Tom DeLay, led a grassroots public protest against the lame duck, unpopular (think low approval ratings) President, forcing him to restore the power of the judiciary as a check and balance against legislative power, not to mention the Pakistani military. What elites in the west saw as an angry mob destabilizing a weak, corrupt government was actually a shining moment for democracy, more akin to a Pakistani version of Marbury v Madison than anything else.

"Rioting Mobs"

When mass public demonstrations are called “destabilizing” and  “riots,” the west undermines the confidence and ability of the population to determine its own government, which in Pakistan hampers their ability to strengthen the judicial system to the point where it can hold the civilian and military leadership accountable, and in effect discredits the entire democratic political philosophy. The result is that terrorist elements are legitimized and authoritarian elements in the government are forced to crack down on the population.

That Pakistan's government is becoming more responsive to the demands of its citizens should not be called weakness, but rather it's an amazingly positive sign that the concept of law and order is alive and well in Pakistani society. Indeed it is this concept that fuels a great majority of Pakistani protests against the ongoing US drone attacks inside Pakistani territory. While classified in the west as strikes against “high value” terrorist targets, they are nevertheless strikes against Pakistani citizens who have their constitutional rights violated every time the US extra-judiciously executes them for crimes they’ve never been accused of, tried, and convicted for in Pakistani courts.

And even this war crime doesn’t factor in the extreme human cost, those innocent civilians who are slaughtered as “collateral damage.” That the Pakistani government approves of these extra-judicial killings, in fact providing the US full basing rights to conduct its military campaign, doesn’t make it any less illegal. Certainly in the light of elected representatives allowing such cruel and unusual capital punishments, Pakistan’s democratic battle for the credibility of its legal system takes on a whole new urgency.

Of course the analysts, experts and academics who conduct the foreign policy assessments in the west aren’t directly responsible for these crimes, but they did ask for them. Indeed, President Obama’s “AfPak” strategy is nothing so much as a regurgitation of foreign policy conventional wisdom from the last few years.

"Corrupt civilian government"

The vast majority of this strategy was laid out during Vice President Joe Biden's Democratic primary run in a speech on November 15, 2007 at Saint Anselm College. In addition to calling for a “surge” of the troops and advisors, the plan called for tripling US aid to Pakistan to $1.5 billion, for the US to condition its military aid to Pakistan on benchmarks measuring success or failure in quelling the insurgency (as opposed to spending it all in an arm's race with India) and for broader diplomatic engagement with regional players such as Iran, Azerbaijan, and India.

These ideas didn’t come to Biden in a stroke of genius, they came from a politician’s typical pedestrian reading of contemporary foreign policy publications. One part of the plan in particular, calling for an influx of 4,000 advisory troops, seems to be lifted directly from a June 2007 paper John Nagl wrote for the Center for a New American Security, an elite foreign policy think tank, titled Institutionalizing Adaptation: It's Time for an Army Advisor Corps.

President Obama first called for the extra-judicial killings of Pakistani citizens in a speech on August 1, 2007 at The Woodrow Wilson Center. Citing the danger posed by al-Qa’eda safe havens in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan, Obama said, “If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and [the Pakistani government] won’t act, we will.”

Again this was a standard action called for in foreign policy publications. President Bush was consistently attacked in the press for appeasing the Musharraf regime, who was seen as too hesitant to strike terrorists inside Pakistani territory. Naturally, the response from elites was to urge the use of military violence. As far back as 2003 analysts for Jane’s Defense Weekly and Newsmax were lamenting the inability of the US to strike al-Qa’eda targets in Pakistan.

Clearly the narratives of Pakistan created by foreign policy elites have real world consequences, and thus there is a responsibility to ensure that any analysis offered into the debate should be reasonable and accurate, and not grounded in western fallacies of weak, corrupt, and ungovernable failed states. When experts called for strikes against al-Qa’eda in Pakistan, they weren’t offering realistic counterterrorism solutions, they were calling for the equivalent of Canada dropping 500lb bombs on criminals in Detroit, Michigan. They were advocating illegal vigilante justice.

"Collateral Damage"

Now the foreign policy debate has turned to even greater existential questions about the fate of Pakistan. Experts casually run the cost-benefit analysis of wider military action against Pakistani criminals, while at the same time using frequent instances of mass killings and terrorism as impetus to question the very governability of Pakistani citizens. However, these questions could be answered, presumably without such depraved and violent solutions, by simply accepting the perspective that Pakistan and the West are far more similar than they are different. Quite simply, follow the golden rule, and treat others the way you would expect to be treated.

Remember the suicide attacks in the United States, those that have killed 53 Americans in a single month? The reactions from citizens have been confused, hurt, and frightened. There is a general difficulty comprehending the purpose of so much tragedy and bloodshed. In response to one of the attacks in Binghamton, New York, a local resident told WIVB-TV, “This is crazy - 13, 14 people dead. I never dreamed I'd wake up to see this, to hear this, you know?"

Similarly, in response to a recent string of violent attacks, Adil Najam wrote in the Pakistaniat, “For the life of me I cannot understand how the US thinks it will root out terror by lobbing bombs at Pakistani women and children. Nor how these militants think they are helping Islam or fighting America by killing Muslims and Pakistanis, bombing girls schools, or terrorizing civilian populations…All we know for sure is that innocent Pakistanis are dying. For what? For whom? Why?”

Pakistan is not a failed state, it is a vibrant democracy, and it is not weak and ungovernable, it is a fellow law abiding member of the international community. Until pundits, analysts, and academics in the foreign policy establishment, and those in the halls of power who feed off their conventional wisdom, can break with their western superstitions about the weakness, corruption, and chaos of developing democratic countries, they will be incapable of providing any answer to these questions. If the foreign policy elites wish to engage in Pakistani politics and tackle issues of counterterrorism, they should do so in a manner that acknowledges the democratic and legal values of the Pakistani citizens.

When we call a country a failed state, it leads to extra-judicial killings and exorbitant numbers of civilian casualties. This illegal violence undermines the democratic institutions, strengthens the militant and authoritarian factions within society, and like so many times in the history of western civilization, leads to the blowback of violent, extremist terrorism. Quite frankly, the next time a Pakistani gazes upon the scenes of carnage from a US drone strike and asks “why,” we’d better have a damn good reason.

Playing for Time: Clinton-Obama and the Hague Conference on Afghanistan

Related Post: Text of Clinton Remarks to Hague Conference on Afghanistan

Lots of sound and not much substance (yet). That's the quick summary of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's address to the international conference on Afghanistan at The Hague yesterday.

First and very much foremost, the American priority was tipped off in the final paragraphs of Clinton's statement:

Now the principal focus of our discussions today is on Afghanistan, but we cannot hope to succeed if those who seek to reestablish a haven for violence and extremism operate from sanctuaries just across the border. For this reason, our partnership with Pakistan is critical. Together, we all must give Pakistan the tools it needs to fight extremists within its borders.

As for the continuing vagueness of "What Is to Be Done?" on Afghanistan, CNN's headline grab is a tip-off: "Clinton Backs Talks With Moderate Taliban".

At a superficial glance, that seems dramatic. The US talking to the same people who sheltered Al Qa'eda, who held Afghanistan under a reign of terror until they were toppled at the end of 2001? Here is how Clinton framed the call:

We must...support efforts by the Government of Afghanistan to separate the extremists of al-Qaida and the Taliban from those who joined their ranks not out of conviction, but out of desperation. This is, in fact, the case for a majority of those fighting with the Taliban. They should be offered an honorable form of reconciliation and reintegration into a peaceful society if they are willing to abandon violence, break with al-Qaida, and support the constitution.

All well and good, but who gets approached? Vice President Joe Biden is spreading the good news that 75 percent of Taliban members, with no incentive other than "desperation", can be stripped away from the organisation, but it is unclear how the US or the Afghan Government gets to those members.

In practice, if General Petraeus's model for Iraq is used, the manoeuvres will be with local commanders and leaders who may be persuaded --- by kind words or by lots of money --- to join the right side. In the Petraeus model, however, those former Sunni enemies of the US were already in powers in villages and towns. Is Washington considering a similar offer of political influence to ex-Taliban?

And who is to make the approach? Clinton's statement indicates that this will be "the Government of Afghanistan", and she none-too-subtly opened her remarks with an acknowledgement of "President Karzai, who fills a critical leadership role in his nation, and whose government helped to shape the shared comprehensive and workable strategy that we are discussing today".

Yet only weeks ago, some US officials were putting about the story that Karzai was to be curbed or even removed from power, and Washington was desperate not to let the President call a quick election for April. So is Clinton now signalling --- from reconciliation or from a lack of other options --- that the US will now accept Karzai's lead or equal participation in the political strategy?

Beyond the politics, Clinton offered the reconstruction approach of "the raw material of progress – roads, public institutions, schools, hospitals, irrigation, and agriculture". Again, nothing unexpected in the rhetoric. And again no specifics: earlier this year, the US Government was thinking that European and NATO partners could take the burden of non-military projects but President Obama's declaration last Friday of an expanded US civilian corps indicated that Washington may take the lead.

Clinton's statement tilted towards the former option: "We hope that others gathered here will heed the United Nations’ and Afghan Government’s call for help throughout the country with job creation, technical expertise, vocational training, and investments in roads, electrical transmission lines, education, healthcare, and so much else." At the same time, in another indication that Washington --- for all the charges of corruption leveled at the Karzai Government --- is having to put up with Kabul, Clinton supported "the Government of Afghanistan’s National Development Strategy, the National Solidarity Program, and other initiatives".

There was, however, a possible sting in the tail in Clinton's statement. Having set out a political, security, and economic approach which seemed to be premised on co-operation with the current Afghan Government, she declared:

To earn the trust of the Afghan people, the Afghan Government must be legitimate and respected. This requires a successful election in August – one that is open, free, and fair. That can only happen with strong support from the international community. I am, therefore, pleased to announce today that to advance that goal, the United States is committing $40 million to help fund Afghanistan’s upcoming elections.

Clinton's reference to "open, free, and fair" is jarring, to say the least: were previous Afghan elections --- and thus the rule of Hamid Karzai --- illegitimate? Washington's private assessment has been that the President is likely to win re-election in the summer. So is the US bowing to his continued presence, attempting (rather crudely) to put on a bit of pressure, or still pursuing an alternative leadership?

I don't have an answer. Nor, in my reading, does Washington. The more that one parses the Obama speech of last Friday and the Clinton statement yesterday, the more that it appears that the major objective for the Administration was to have something, anything, before next week's NATO gathering. The US is now clearly on its own militarily, and President Obama, for all that charm, will struggle in getting an expanded non-military commitment from European partners outside Kabul.

This is a "hold the line" approach, trying to ensure that the Taliban does not expand its hold on territory, until the right partnership with the right Government in Kabul can be foreseen. More importantly, the line is to be held until the US can resolve its core problem, which lies not in Afghanistan but across the border in northwest Pakistan.

And those prospects are no closer or clearer from last week's events and announcements.