– Michael O’Hanlon is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. The views expressed are his own. –

It’s no great surprise in American politics these days, but already a great partisan debate has broken out about President Obama’s foreign policy effectiveness to date. For his enthusiasts, the United States has hit the “reset” button and is reclaiming its place as not only a strong country, but a respected leader among nations. For his detractors, Obama is making the world dangerous by apologizing for America’s alleged misdeeds of the past, naively talking with dictators, and cutting the defense budget.

And as usual, the truth is neither of these polar positions. But as a past critic of Obama, especially during his days of promising a rapid and unconditional exit from Iraq during the presidential campaign, I would nonetheless argue that he has done a good job overall, and that his supporters have the stronger case to date. Still, making too much of provisionally good decisions in the first 100 days verges on playing a silly game of Potomac Jeopardy that only the evening talk shows and political junkies really care about. The bottom line is that Obama is just getting started. But he is off to a more solid start than almost any of his recent predecessors.

Consider the policy towards five key nations. And start with the wars. These are Category A problems. Obama has inherited a more difficult hand than any president since Nixon in terms of active, ongoing conflicts. Already we have lost almost as many American troops in our two wars on Obama’s watch as died in the first year of all of Obama’s predecessors going back to Carter combined.

But that is not a slight on the president, only a reminder of the difficult world that confronts him. And in dealing with these challenges, to date Obama has wisely listened to the counsel of his commanders and other experts on Iraq and Afghanistan. Our drawdown in the former place, while still rapid, will retain up to 50,000 U.S. troops even after it’s over. That is a lot of combat capability, and as such a departure from what Obama promised last year, and a relief to those of us still nervous about Iraq.

In Afghanistan, Obama will roughly double the American troop presence there in his first year in office. That will finally give commanders the wherewithal (or at least most of the wherewithal) to carry out a proper counterinsurgency strategy–with its twin goals of protecting the civilian population and building up Afghan institutions so they can increasingly do the job on their own.

The other crucial set of problems might be described as the nuclear hot spots–Iran, North Korea, Pakistan. On these, Obama’s record is less impressive to date. That is not, however, because he has done anything particularly wrong. Rather, the problems are extremely nettlesome. If Obama deserves any criticism, it is simply that his campaign rhetoric implied these would be far easier problems once George Bush was out of the White House and a new president was ensconced on Pennsylvania Avenue. In fact, the main reason these problems are hard is because of who we are dealing with in each case, and not because of George Bush or any other American leader. Since Obama is the one who raised expectations, he deserves to take a bit of a hit perhaps for not quickly fulfilling them–but otherwise his hand seems rather steady on the tiller.

Indeed, President Obama’s Pakistan policy is already an improvement over Bush’s in its emphasis on more military and economic aid, the naming of a special envoy, and related efforts. These steps finally begin to recognize our stakes in this crucial part of the world. Still, to call anybody’s policy towards Pakistan a solid one at a time when that country is practically crumbling before our eyes would go too far. Again, his policy is more “incomplete” than anything else. Which is exactly what you’d expect after 100 days.

– Willis Sparks is a Global Macro analyst at the political risk consulting firm Eurasia Group. The views expressed are his own. –

Few things in life amused my dad more than a good karate movie. I once asked what he found so funny about Bruce Lee’s jaw-dropping display of poise and power. “Nice of the bad guys to attack him one at a time,” he said. In the real world, threats don’t arrive single-file, like jets lining up for takeoff.

President Barack Obama’s toughest foreign-policy challenge will be in managing the sheer number of complex problems he’s inherited and their refusal to arrive in orderly fashion. In addition, the still-metastasizing global financial crisis will exacerbate several of these problems, by depriving a number of governments of the funding they need to maintain social stability and to meet internal and external threats to their security.

AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN

There is clearly a risk of collision at the intersection of Afghanistan and Pakistan, both of them plagued with floundering elected governments and deteriorating security environments. In Afghanistan, once Obama keeps his promise to provide thousands more U.S. troops, he must decide whether his team can afford to work around President Hamid Karzai (who may win reelection in August) and more directly engage tribal leaders and willing members of the Taliban to restore stability.

But Afghanistan’s security continues to depend on the ability of U.S. forces to stem the flow of militants and supplies into the country from tribal areas in Pakistan. Aware that Pakistan’s armed forces are neither reliably willing nor able to help, the Obama team must find a way to neutralize Pakistani militants without arousing broad public anger across the country and destabilizing its cash-strapped government.

IRAN

The new president also inherits a central role in the international conflict over Iran’s nuclear program. Publicly committed to warnings that a nuclear Iran is “unacceptable,” some within the Obama team say the steep recent drop in oil prices fueled by the financial crisis will further hobble Iran’s already unsteady economy, adding bite to U.S. sanctions and raising hopes that direct engagement might bear fruit.

But however sharp the sticks or sweet the carrots, a broad consensus has developed within Iran in favor of the nuclear program, one that has so far proven immune to external pressure. Obama will eventually face a tough choice: He can accept the need for military action against Iranian nuclear sites or tacitly accept that no one can prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power.

IRAQ

Across the border in Iraq, recent local election results generally bolstered moderates at the expense of radicals. But the inability of Iraqi lawmakers to forge durable compromises on the equitable distribution of political power and oil revenue, on the disputed status of energy-rich Kirkuk, and on the balance of power between federal and provincial governments leave Obama in a tough spot. He can hold to campaign promises of a near-term withdrawal of all U.S. combat troops or accept the political fallout that comes with approving Pentagon requests for a go-slow approach meant to protect recent security gains.

RUSSIA

There are plenty more potential flashpoints, but the most important international relationships Obama must cultivate are those with newly insecure Russia and increasingly self-confident China. Some within the Kremlin fear that U.S. influence in Russia’s neighborhood threatens the country’s long-term security, even as the global recession thins its (still considerable) financial reserves. A series of recent confrontations—over Kosovo, U.S. missile defense systems in Central Europe, Russia’s war with Georgia—have allowed Russian officials to capitalize on domestic anti-American sentiment and have pushed U.S. policymakers in search of a new approach.

But willingness to “press the reset button,” as Vice President Biden recently suggested, might breed misunderstanding. If Russians believe this signals that Obama will turn a blind eye toward Kremlin bullying at home or abroad, a luxury the new U.S. president cannot afford, his administration may have to reboot again—and sooner rather than later.

CHINA

The Bush administration’s first international test came in April 2001, when a U.S. spy plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet, killing the Chinese pilot and provoking a diplomatic standoff over detention of the U.S. flight crew. But China has become a status-quo power in recent years, as the leadership’s reliance on strong growth to bolster its domestic political capital has given Beijing a growing stake in global stability. Over time, the Bush team helped cultivate steady and predictable bilateral ties with China by focusing negotiations on subjects its leaders are willing to talk about—currency conflicts rather than human rights.

Obama says he means to broaden the conversation—a shift that will require plenty of patience on both sides. The stakes are high, particularly as the global financial crisis provokes anxiety in both capitals. This is the world’s most important bilateral relationship. Investing it with predictability and mutual trust will take considerable time and care.

So far, the new president has been lucky. He’s been able to devote time and energy to the stimulus package and financial rescue plan that he hopes will help refloat the U.S. economy. But the administration should recognize that this same financial crisis will add to the complexity of the foreign-policy challenges it faces—challenges that won’t come one at a time.

– Paul Taylor is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own –

An American president vowing to cooperate with the rest of the world would barely be news if it did not follow eight years’ of George W. Bush’s tenure in the White House.

Barack Obama’s inauguration address was thin on foreign policy specifics, but his pledge to work with allies and adversaries on global problems from nuclear weapons to climate change was a message many have waited impatiently to hear.

In a few phrases, Obama sought to close the chapter on the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the Guantanamo Bay prisoner camp and the use of torture, denial of global warming and heavy-handed attempts to promote democracy across the Middle East.

His affirmation that “we are ready to lead once more” was tempered by commitments to the rule of law, human rights, military restraint and diplomatic alliances.

In one sentence, he set himself apart from Bush’s muscular unilateralism without renouncing force. “Our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please.”

Obama enunciated modest objectives for extricating the United States from the two wars he inherits from Bush — leaving Iraq responsibly to its people, and forging a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. No talk of victory or of “mission accomplished”.

His vow to defeat terrorism was coupled with a promise to seek a new way forward with the Muslim world, where Washington’s image suffered the most damage during the Bush years.

Where Bush made the “global war on terrorism” the central paradigm of his national security strategy, Obama set a broader and more inclusive agenda including areas disdained by his predecessor such as arms control and green energy.

Where Bush, right up to his final address, divided the world into good and evil, the new president offered to work with non-democracies and what used to be called “rogue states”.

“To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist,” he said.

Obama did not mention the flashpoints of recent weeks — the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Russia’s use of its energy resources, or tension between India and Pakistan.

The guns fell silent in Gaza and the gas taps reopened at the Russia-Ukraine border just before he took office. No one wanted to be the first international problem for a president who warned that leaders would be judged by “what you can build, not what you destroy”.

Obama omitted any mention of free trade, amid rising protectionist pressure among his own electorate heightened by the global economic crisis.

Nor did he commit the United States in his first address to a reform of global governance to give more say to emerging powers such as China, India, Brazil or South Africa.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy used the U.S. leadership vacuum during Bush’s lame-duck period to press for expanding the Group of Eight industrialized powers and reforming the IMF, the World Bank and the U.N. Security Council.

Obama acknowledged that globalization and new threats such as nuclear proliferation and global warming would require “even greater cooperation and understanding between nations”.

His administration will have to turn that philosophy into practical policy before the G20 summit of nations representing 90 percent of global economic output meet in London in April.

Obama faces some other tough early choices.

He must arbitrate between those who argue that resolving the Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Syrian conflicts holds the key to Middle East stability, and those who say conditions are not ripe for peace and he should focus on Iran’s nuclear program.

He will have to choose between seeking Russia’s cooperation to reduce nuclear arsenals and combat the spread of nuclear weapons and continuing Bush’s divisive drive to bring former Soviet republics Georgia and Ukraine into NATO.

And he must decide whether to pursue a deal in world trade talks that could avert beggar-thy-neighbor protectionism in the economic crisis, or to assuage his voters by embracing “buy
American” measures and taking a tougher line on imports from low-cost producers such as China.

– Bernd Debusmann is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own. –

What do Pakistan and Mexico have in common? They figure in the nightmares of U.S. military planners trying to peer into the future and identify the next big threats.

The two countries are mentioned in the same breath in a just-published study by the United States Joint Forces Command, whose jobs include providing an annual look into the future to prevent the U.S. military from being caught off guard by unexpected developments.

“In terms of worst-case scenarios for the Joint Force and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico,” says the study - Joint Operating Environment 2008 - in a chapter on “weak and failing states.” Such states, it says, usually pose chronic, long-term problems that can be managed over time.

But the little-studied phenomenon of “rapid collapse,” according to the study, “usually comes as a surprise, has a rapid onset, and poses acute problems.” Think Yugoslavia and its 1990 disintegration into a chaotic tangle of warring nationalities and bloodshed on a horrific scale.

Nuclear-armed Pakistan, where al-Qaeda has established safe havens in the rugged regions bordering on Afghanistan, is a regular feature in dire warnings. Thomas Fingar, who retired as the U.S.’s chief intelligence analyst in December, termed Pakistan “one of the single most challenging places on the planet.”

This is fairly routine language for Pakistan, but not for Mexico, which shares a 2,000-mile border with the United States.

Mexico’s mention beside Pakistan in a study by an organization as weighty as the Joint Forces Command (which controls almost all conventional forces based in the continental U.S.) speaks volumes about growing concern over what’s happening south of the U.S. border.

Vicious and widening violence pitting drug cartels against each other and against the Mexican state have left more than 8,000 Mexicans dead over the past two years. Kidnappings have become a routine part of Mexican daily life. Common crime is widespread. Pervasive corruption has hollowed out the state.

In November, in a case that shocked even those (on both sides of the border) who consider corruption endemic in Mexico, former drug czar Noe Ramirez was charged with accepting at least $450,000 a month in bribes from a drug cartel in exchange for information about police and anti-narcotics operations.

A month later, a Mexican army major, Arturo Gonzalez, was arrested on suspicion he sold information about President Felipe Calderon’s movements for $100,000 a month. Gonzalez belonged to a special unit responsible for protecting the president.

DESCENT INTO CHAOS?

Depending on one’s view, the arrests are successes in a publicly-declared anti-corruption drive or evidence of how deeply criminal mafias have penetrated the organs of the state.

According to the Joint Forces study, the possibility of a sudden collapse in Mexico is less likely than in Pakistan “but the government, its politicians, police, and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and pressure by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state.”

It added: “Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the serious implications for homeland security alone.”

What form such a response might take is anyone’s guess and the study does not spell it out, nor does it address the economic implications of its worst-case scenario. Mexico is the third biggest trade partner of the United States (after Canada and China) and its third-biggest supplier of oil (after Canada and Saudi Arabia).

No such ties bind the United States and Pakistan but the study sees a collapse there not only as more likely but also as more catastrophic.

It would bring “the likelihood of a sustained violent and bloody civil and sectarian war, an even bigger haven for violent extremists, and the question of what would happen to its nuclear weapons. That ‘perfect storm’ of uncertainty alone might require the engagement of U.S. and coalition forces into a situation of immense complexity and danger … and with the real possibility that nuclear weapons might be used.”

It is not clear where on the long list of actual and potential crises around the world Mexico and Pakistan will rank once Barack Obama takes office as U.S. president on Jan. 20. During the election campaign, Obama repeatedly criticized Pakistan for not cracking down hard enough on terrorists inside its borders.

Since then a new Pakistani president came to power. Not long after, tensions between Pakistan and India, also a nuclear power, rose sharply after gunmen attacked two luxury hotels and other sites in Mumbai, India’s commercial capital, and killed 179 people. India described the attack as a conspiracy hatched in Pakistan and carried out by Pakistanis.

Closer to home, the U.S. economic crisis looks likely to slow down a $1.4 billion assistance program (military equipment, training, technology) to help the Mexican government gain the upper hand over the drug cartels and re-establish control over what some have called “failed cities” along the border, places where shootouts, beheadings and kidnappings have become routine.

It would take a very rosy outlook on the future to expect rapid progress.

For previous columns by Bernd Debusmann, click here. You can contact the author at Debusmann@reuters.com.

– Preston Keat is director of research at Eurasia Group, a global political risk consultancy, and author of the forthcoming book “The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge for Strategic Investors” (with Ian Bremmer). Any views expressed are his own. For the related story, click here.

There are a number of macro risks that will continue to grab headlines in 2009, including the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, cross-border tensions and state instability in Pakistan, and Iran’s 
ongoing quest to develop advanced nuclear technologies.

These risks are real, and will not be resolved easily or quickly. But there are two other general groups of political risks that could be defining both for investors and policy makers: first, the prospect of a number of interrelated market risks in developed and emerging Europe, and second, the challenges faced by the United States regarding multilateral leadership (particularly in the area of financial regulatory reform).

Political risks have historically mattered much more in emerging markets, but political risk in the developed, industrial democracies is rising more quickly than anyone would have predicted a year ago.

Europe

Political-market risk in emerging Europe is significantly higher now than any time in the past decade. Russia and Ukraine, and even recent star “emerging Europe” performers such as Turkey, Hungary, and Romania face serious vulnerabilities in the coming 
year. In addition, western financial institutions based in countries
 like Germany, Italy and Austria are particularly vulnerable to a credit 
crisis in Eastern Europe, where they have large loan exposures. Russia’s growing anti-westernism, its state intervention in strategic
 economic sectors, and its assertive posture regarding Georgia have been widely discussed, and will remain concerns in
 2009.

This also plays into one of the most problematic country risk 
stories right now: Ukraine. Its steel-centric economy is in free
 fall due to dramatically reduced global demand, many of its companies
 have large foreign debt financing needs that they will struggle to meet, 
 and its domestic politics are gridlocked and bordering on 
dysfunctional.

Add serious ongoing tensions with Russia to the list, and 
the situation looks bad from almost every angle. The year has
 already started badly, with Gazprom cutting gas supplies 
to Ukraine, and the
 standoff highlights the growing animosity between Moscow and Kiev.

The global financial and credit crises, combined with recession in
 Western Europe, have exposed several other countries in emerging Europe 
to serious financial market risks. In Hungary, the IMF and the 
EU needed to step in with a dramatic aid package in order to head off a potential currency and bond market collapse. And in Romania, there are
 growing concerns about a real estate bubble, rapidly declining economic
 growth, and the evaporation of repatriation cash flows from Romanians 
living in Italy and Spain.

Both the Hungary and Romania stories highlight the increasing 
interconnectedness of political and market risk in the EU. The newer
 member states can no longer be considered in relative isolation from the
 core, Western European countries.

The most notable example is the 
exposure of Western banks to credit risk in Eastern Europe. In recent
 years western banks have made substantial home mortgage, consumer, and
 business loans to eastern Europeans that were denominated in western 
currencies. The borrowers were
 exposed to local currency risks that the often did not fully understand
.

Italy, 
 Austria, and Germany had the largest exposures. Now these western
 governments may need to step in to assist with the solution. In fact, if
 the EU and European Central Bank had not intervened in dramatic fashion 
in Hungary, a number of western-European banks and pension funds would
 have been in very serious trouble. The problem is that this may only be 
the beginning of a crisis that could involve dozens of countries in both 
the East and the West.

The U.S. and Multilateralism

In the past several years the dynamics of “multilateralism” have evolved 
fairly dramatically. Two central developments this year:

1.  A number of
 additional players such as India, China, and Brazil are actively
 seeking to play a larger role in multilateral negotiations and 
institutions.

2.  The U.S. is in the process of a presidential 
leadership transition, with an expectation that the new administration
 will address these issues differently than its predecessor.

This new environment presents both challenges and opportunities. A 
larger number of “key” players at the table means that policy 
coordination could be much more difficult - a classic collective action
 problem. At the same time, engaging newer, emerging-market countries may 
make sustainable “breakthrough” outcomes more plausible, as these 
countries will be central to tackling complex issues such as climate 
change and global trade.

Prior to September of 2008, the central challenges of 
multilateral cooperation were in areas such as energy/climate change, 
 trade, and security. Then the global financial and credit crisis offered 
an almost perfect experiment. How would the world’s leading 
countries, along with those who aspired to positions of greater 
leadership (e.g. China, India, Brazil) manage this systemic crisis?

When it comes to a new financial regulatory architecture, the U.S. is 
likely to find support for its agenda in the UK and China, who will
 share the its general aversion to giving meaningful regulatory authority 
to multilateral institutions such as the IMF. As long as these three key
 players can agree on general principles for market regulation, power 
will remain in the hands of national governments rather than any
 multilateral organization.

But this 
is where a key, lurking political risk comes into play - can the U.S.
 actually take the lead in developing a coherent approach to new 
regulation of capital markets?

Congress will probably feel that it needs to act in a dramatic
 fashion and enact new legislation. The Treasury and the Federal Reserve 
will also have serious, and potentially conflicting agendas. So even if
 the multilateral dimension looks manageable, the domestic and
 bureaucratic politics of new regulation present a substantial new risk.

President-elect Barack Obama has been getting a lot of advice these days on how to deal with Muslims and Islam. He invited it by saying during his campaign that he either wanted to convene a conference with leaders of Muslim countries or deliver a major speech in a Muslim country "to reboot America’s image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular”. But where? when? why? how? Early this month, I chimed in with a pitch for a speech in Turkey or Indonesia.  Some quite interesting comments have come in since then.

(Photo: Obama image in Jakarta, 25 Oct 2008/Dadang Tri)

Two French academics, Islam expert Olivier Roy and political scientist Justin Vaisse argued in a New York Times op-ed piece on Sunday that Obama's premise of trying to reconcile the West and Islam is flawed:

Such an initiative would reinforce the all-too-accepted but false notion that “Islam” and “the West” are distinct entities with utterly different values. Those who want to promote dialogue and peace between “civilizations” or “cultures” concede at least one crucial point to those who, like Osama bin Laden, promote a clash of civilizations: that separate civilizations do exist. They seek to reverse the polarity, replacing hostility with sympathy, but they are still following Osama bin Laden’s narrative.

Instead, Mr. Obama, the first “post-racial” president, can do better. He can use his power to transform perceptions to the long-term advantage of the United States and become a “post-civilizational” president. The page he should try to turn is not that of a supposed war between America and Islam, but the misconception of a monolithic Islam being the source of the main problems on the planet: terrorism, wars, nuclear proliferation, insurgencies and the like.

Also on Sunday, the Istanbul newspaper Sunday's Zaman ran a piece by sociologist Dogu Ergil who spelled out what he thought "moderate Muslims" expected of Obama.

(Photo: Blue Mosque in Istanbul, 9 Dec 2008/Tan Shung Sin)

Moderate or non-ideological Muslims expect Mr. Obama to support democratic trends in their countries, but not to push them from above using ruling elites that will never adopt a democratic agenda but rather will simply play for time, making only cosmetic changes. This will, in turn, further reinforce the power of autocratic regimes that are threatened by genuine democracy.

Muslim moderates look at religion as a cultural affair, wanting to render it autonomous of politics so that it will be protected from political power and in the same way, preventing it from seeking political power. So they want the Obama administration to press their governments to enact reforms that will pave the way to democratic politics and legal changes that will allow for more individual freedoms. They do not want a hypocritical stance from an America which advocates democracy but supports the most authoritarian regimes in the Arab world for the sake of oil deals and other strategic ends. The Bush administration set a very bad example of paying lip service to democracy, which, in fact, worked as a vehicle to blackmail Arab regimes and served America's strategic interests.

Michael Fullilove at the Brookings Institution made a pitch for an Obama speech in Indonesia in the New York Times while several Moroccan blogs have been running a campaign (including a petition with a long list of reasons) to have him speak there. Saad Eddin Ibrahim, an exiled Egyptian sociologist and human rights who is a visiting professor at Harvard and Indiana universities, made the case for Indonesia or Turkey in the Washington Post.

Maleeha Lodhi, a former Pakistani ambassador in the United States and Britain, has a long list of suggestions for a reformed U.S. policy towards the Muslim world in the Harvard International Review.  The list is fairly extensive, although it would have been even more informative if it had included suggestions for what should change in the Muslim world.

(Photo: Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, Pakistan, 21 Dec 2007/Mohsin Raza)

How Obama manages issues in the Muslim world will determine the success or failure of his foreign policy...

In the Muslim world ... perceptions have been shaped by decades of uneven handed policies and by US double standards that placed the security of Israel and the need for cheap oil above considerations of international law and justice for the Palestinians. In essence, Muslims regard US policies as responsible for the trust gap between the United States and the Islamic world. In the West, opinions concerning the cause for the gap with the Muslim world are more mixed. The most common view attributes this rift in relations not only to US policies but also to factors internal to the Muslim world-- to the weakness and contradictions in those societies and particularly to the democratic deficit, which allows radicals to build support for their cause. This, in fact, inspires the idea that the United States should lead efforts to restructure the Muslim world. Irrespective of the reality, both perspectives urge the need to review and recast US foreign policy.

My vote for the most interesting argument goes to Roy and Vaisse, who ask the basic question of what role religion actually plays in the big issues facing Obama.

The truth is, Islam explains very little. There are as many bloody conflicts outside of regions where Islam has a role as inside them. There are more Muslims living under democracies than autocracies. There is no less or no more economic development in Muslim countries than in their equivalent non-Muslim neighbors. And, more important, there exist as many varieties of Muslims as there are adherents of other religions. This is why Mr. Obama should not give credence to the existence of an Islam that could supposedly be represented by its “leaders”.

(Photo: Olivier Roy, 4 Dec 2007/Charles Platiau)

Who are these leaders that President Obama would convene anyway? If he picks heads of state, he will effectively concede Osama bin Laden’s point that Islam is a political reality. If he picks clerics, he will put himself in the awkward position of implicitly representing Christianity — or maybe secularism. In any case, he would meet only self-appointed representatives, most of them probably coming from the Arab world, where a minority of Muslims live.

Do you think Obama should launch a special initiative aimed at the Muslim world, or, as Roy and Vaisse argue, assert that "American values are universal and do not suffer any kind of double standard, and that they could be shared by atheists, Christians, Muslims and others"?

The United States is aiming to send 20,000 to 30,000 extra troops to Afghanistan by the beginning of next summer, according to the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff.  The plan is not unexpected, and from a military point of view is meant to allow U.S. and NATO troops not just to clear out Taliban insurgents but also to bring enough stability to allow economic development, as highlighted in this analysis by Reuters Kabul correspondent Jon Hemming.

But does it still make sense after the Mumbai attacks -- intentionally or otherwise -- sabotaged the peace process between India and Pakistan?

As discussed many times on this blog, most recently here, a crucial element of President-elect Barack Obama's Afghan strategy was to combine sending extra troops with a new diplomatic approach looking at the Afghanistan-Pakistan-India region as a whole. The argument was that Pakistan would never fully turn its back on Islamist militants as long as it felt threatened by India on its eastern border and by growing Indian influence in Afghanistan on its western border.  India and Pakistan, so the argument went, should therefore be encouraged to make peace over Kashmir, to reduce tensions in Afghanistan and pave the way for a successful operation by the extra U.S. troops.

Where does that plan stand now? India-Pakistan relations are extremely strained and vulnerable to any second militant attack on India. It's hard to imagine the two countries sitting down any time soon for serious peace talks, and certainly not at the United States' behest, given that outside interference on Kashmir has always been anathema to India.

Yet as the Soviet Union discovered during its failed occupation of Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989, no matter how many troops you send in, you can't win there as long as the Islamist mujahideen have sanctuary in Pakistan.  The United States knows this too having backed the mujahideen against the Soviets (this being a war that America has fought on both sides), which is presumably why it had begun to look at Afghanistan in a broader regional context.

So have the Americans reverted to a piecemeal approach with this plan to send in the extra troops? Are they just pushing on regardless and hoping for the best, perhaps thinking they have no other choice? Or should they have gone back to the drawing-board post-Mumbai and come up with a different plan?

In the immediate aftermath of the Mumbai attacks, India's response has been to look to the United States to lean on Pakistan, which it blames for spawning Islamist militancy across the region, rather than launching any military retaliation of its own. So after U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice's trip to India and Pakistan last week, have the Americans done enough for now?

According to Pakistan's Dawn newspaper, Rice told Pakistan there was "irrefutable evidence" that elements within the country were involved in the Mumbai attacks. And it quotes unnamed sources as saying that behind-the-scenes she “pushed the Pakistani leaders to take care of the perpetrators, otherwise the U.S. will act”.

India's Business Standard said the Indian government was pleased with the U.S. warning. "This is exactly what India wanted," the newspaper said.

The Times of India, however, fretted the U.S. action against Pakistan appeared to be "turning tepid", in public at least. It attributed the U.S. approach to the perceived need to avoid backing the civilian government led by President Asif Ali Zardari into a corner. (India has specifically not accused the Pakistan government of involvement in the Mumbai attacks, pointing instead to militant groups supported by Pakistan's powerful spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI.) It also said the United States was wary of destabilising a partner on which it depends crucially as a transit route for supplies to Afghanistan, while also being hobbled by the change of administration in Washington.

So which way is the pendulum swinging -- towards firm U.S. action that will allow Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to say he was right to put his faith in American diplomacy, or a lukewarm response that will either force India to act alone or leave its Congress-led government looking on in helpless frustration as it heads into a general election due by next May?

U.S. pressure has succeeded in pulling India and Pakistan back from the brink in the past.  When fighting erupted between the two newly declared nuclear-armed powers in the Kargil war in 1999, U.S. President Bill Clinton persuaded then Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to pull Pakistani troops back. (Sharif paid a high price. Later in the year he was overthrown by then General Pervez Musharraf, a lesson unlikely to be lost on the current civilian government which is seen as wary of making too many concessions to India for fear of alienating the powerful Pakistan Army.)

Then after an attack on India's parliament in December 2001 triggered the mobilisation of close to a million men along the two countries' borders, the United States dived into another round of frantic diplomacy to persuade Pakistan to crack down on Kashmiri militant groups and the Indians to stand down.  Much of that diplomacy went on behind-the-scenes, though for an interesting Pakistani view of how close the two countries came to war in 2002, here is a link to an article written in January that year by the current Pakistan High Commissioner to Britain.

So what are the prospects in the current crisis?

Unlike in previous years, the Americans have become much more forthright about the extent to which they are willing to support Indian assertions that the roots of Islamist militancy lie in Pakistan.  When the Indians blamed the ISI for bombing its embassy in Kabul in July -- a charge Pakistan denied -- the Americans delivered by leaking reports of ISI involvement to U.S. newspapers, as I discussed in an earlier post.

After the Mumbai attacks, the New York Times has brushed off Pakistani denials of involvement with an op-ed boldly headlined The Pakistan Connection.

Bruce Riedel at the Brookings Institution has argued that "the most dangerous terrorist menace (to India) comes from groups with intimate connections to the global jihadist network centered around Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda and its allies in the Pakistani jihadist culture."  Exploring links between the ISI and militant groups he says it nurtured to fight India in Kashmir, he says that Zardari's ability to get control of the ISI "is still very much in doubt."

At the other side of the world, The Australian has challenged what it calls "The dangerous illusion of independent terrorists" -- the misconceived notion, it says, that perpetrators of attacks are non-state actors operating beyond the control of governments. "The radical increase in the lethality, range, political consequence and strategic influence of terrorists comes not from their being non-state actors at all. Instead it comes from their being sponsored by states," it says.  Then in language that could have come straight from the Indian government, it says: "Pakistan has for many years been a significant state sponsor of terrorism."

All that sounds like the kind of response the Indian prime minister was looking for when he said that "We expect the world community to recognise that the territory of the neighbouring country has been used for perpetrating this crime."

But how will it play inside Pakistan, where a weak civilian government is delicately balanced against a powerful army that has run the country for much of its life, and which in turn is battling militants on its border with Afghanistan? And what too will it mean for the ordinary people of Pakistan, caught in the middle?

Wow, Thomas Friedman writing in the New York Times let fly with a zinger with his opinion piece “Calling all Pakistanis“, presumably aimed at stirring compassion in Pakistani hearts over last week’s horrifying attack in Mumbai.

Pakistanis were ready enough to take to the streets to vent their anger and indignation over cartoons in Denmark, why can’t they demonstrate a shared sense of outrage over the cold-blooded killing of 171 people in the country next door, asks Friedman.

Of course, anyone would like to see spontaneous public displays of grief and empathy for the people of Mumbai. Can it happen in Pakistan, a country that has fought three wars against India? The army doesn’t trust India and the people have been fed an anti-India diet by governments and media since 1947.

I think we can understand why it won’t happen in Peshawar, or faraway Quetta — cities where conservative, religious forces have a lot of influence.

But why not Karachi, Mumbai’s twin across the Arabian Sea, or Lahore, Pakistan’s cultural capital? After all they host the most progressive, liberal sections of Pakistan’s deeply fissured society. A few bravehearts from that tiny minority might risk some candle-lit vigils.

The trouble is that they also have a strong Islamist presence, which is why thousands of people turned out to protest against the cartoons in both cities.

Even remembering the genuine warmth that was shown to Indian visitors during the heady days of cricket diplomacy in spring of 2004, expecting a sudden, collective outpouring of sympathy from ordinary Pakistanis is probably expecting too much.

What people looking from a distance don’t understand, and I’ll risk including faraway news editors in this, is that reactions in Pakistan are often politically engineered, and delayed rather than spontaneous.

It probably has something to do with the fatalism of people who’ve seen generals overthrow their governments, who’ve been brutalised by bombs and suicide attacks in their own towns, who are so confused by their own powerlessness that they readily believe the most outlandish conspiracy theories.

Look at those cartoon protests in 2006. Yes they were big.

Indeed the protest in Lahore, to the shock of most Lahoris, turned violent and destructive along the city’s famous Mall road.

But it took weeks for the Islamist parties, some say egged on by rogue anti-Musharraf agent provocateurs in the agencies, to mobilise their cadres in Karachi and Lahore.

The demonstrations in Pakistan were bigger than elsewhere in the Islamic world, but came far later and appeared contrived.

In contrast, the displays of public support in 2007 for the Supreme Court Chief Justice who Musharraf dismissed were genuinely impressive as he criss-crossed the country addressing bar associations.

Yes, the lawyers and Sharif’s party, and to some extent Bhutto’s People’s Party, organised these too.

But they generated a groundswell of public support in a way that cartoon issue never really did — look how Islamist parties were wiped out in February’s election.

So Pakistanis clearly respond to injustice, if someone gets them going.

Which political party is going to risk filling them with compassion for Mumbai, given India’s suspicions that the killers were trained by the Pakistani military.

Remember the politicians are in the middle of a transition from military rule, that the army chief has himself supported.

Still, perhaps the politicians should risk getting people involved. After all, it would fit nicely into the government’s avowed campaign to turn people against militancy and religious extremism.

Perhaps that was Friedman’s purpose.

Because otherwise an article that only a few well-read people in Karachi and Lahore are likely to see could simply play to the anti-Pakistan gallery, and harden attitudes of ordinary good-hearted Pakistanis who feel outsiders take cheap shots to malign them.

Let’s see, maybe the President Zardari’s Pakistan People’s Party will recognise this is an opportunity to reach out to India in a common war against jihadis who’d like to take over Pakistan and break up the Indian federation.

Maybe Kayani could lay a wreath.

Maybe that would give people confidence to show their true feelings of horror an sympathy for what happened in Mumbai.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

PHOTO: Peace activists hold placards as they demonstrate for peace between Pakistan and India in Lahore December 5, 2008. REUTERS/Mohsin Raza (PAKISTAN)