U.S. Foreign Policy

By Dan Blumenthal

Overall, Obama's Asia policy has been largely driven by events and domestic priorities rather than by an overarching strategic vision. The Obama team had to closely coordinate with China on financial matters in response to the financial crisis. Passing a cap and trade bill at home means that we need China to sign up to a global climate change pact; Americans will chafe at a costly bill if the world's largest carbon emitters do not agree to carbon reductions.

The Obama team attempted a new policy on Burma. The idea is to find a way to engage the military junta which would strengthen relations with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of which Burma is a member. But the policy change has been overtaken by events.

Aung San Suu Kyi was unfairly punished when an American swam across a lake to her residence. And the junta began a new round of repression, as its leaders jail and harass political opponents in the run up to their 2010 "elections." Obama could not radically shift Burma policy. Rather, adjustments to our relations with ASEAN and Burma have been only marginal. There has been some more contact with the junta. And as part of the broader attempt to build stronger relations with Southeast Asia, the administration signed the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC). These and visits to Southeast Asia by Secretary Clinton and her deputy, Jim Steinberg, demonstrate a desire to deepen American engagement with that region. It is unlikely that engaging Burma or signing the TAC will increase America's regional influence.

Surprise?

There are several Obama Asia policies that have been surprising. On a positive note, the Obama team has given much greater attention to the Japan alliance than I had expected. Secretary Clinton's first stop in Asia was in Tokyo, which eased Japanese concerns that they were in for another round of "Japan passing." Since the Democratic Party of Japan took over last September, Obama officials have visited Japan frequently to get a sense of how to deal with a party that has never before governed. The Obama team should be commended for trying to find its way with this inexperienced and eclectic ruling coalition.

Constructive Criticism?

Other policies should give us pause. For example, Obama is sticking to his campaign promises on trade, which means we have no trade policy. The Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement has been collecting dust in the Congress. The rest of the region, however, is not standing still. China seems to sign a trade agreement a minute and South Korea is moving forward on an FTA with the EU. If this continues, not only will our economy be disadvantaged, but our regional leadership will also suffer. While the Obama administration has done a fine job showing up to Asian multilateral meetings, without new trade proposals it has shown up empty handed.

A second troubling policy is the absence of any agenda on Taiwan. The Obama team was effusive in its praise of President Ma when he was elected in March 2008 and they applaud his attempts to ease tensions with the Mainland. The Taiwan president is doing what he thinks Washington wants - easing cross Strait tensions. But there was an implicit bargain with Taiwan that we are not upholding. We were supposed to strengthen Ma's hand by strengthening our ties to Taiwan. The Obama team is not helping Ma.  We have not sold any arms to Taiwan even as China has continued its arms buildup across the Strait. And Obama has no plans of yet to deepen economic ties as Taiwan goes forward with a China FTA.

Third, the bluntness with which the team has downplayed China's miserable human rights record is an unfortunate break with past administrations' practices. Secretary Clinton announced that she would deemphasize human rights concerns on her first trip to China. This was followed by the president's refusal to meet with the Dalai Lama when the Tibetan spiritual leader was in Washington last month. The administration has also been silent on Uighur repression and will not meet with Uighur leader Rebiya Kadeer. It does not help either country for us to pretend that we are indifferent about Chinese respect for human rights, when in reality we have a huge stake in China's political liberalization.

Overall, despite a regular barrage of criticism by Candidate Obama directed at President Bush for his supposed neglect of Asia (never a fair criticism), the Obama team has not wowed the region with new ideas or lavished it with attention. During Bush's first year, his administration had offered the largest arms package ever to Taiwan, was well on its way to substantially upgrading ties with Japan, and was negotiating a diplomatic breakthrough with India of historical significance. Then-U.S. Trade Representative Bob Zoellick was negotiating free trade agreements with Singapore, Australia, and Korea.

The criticism of the Bush administration was that it was "distracted" by the war on terror. The Obama team is learning that fighting a war saps a nation's energy and attention. Now in office, the Obama team can see that the threat from Islamic extremism is very real. The Obama team may have really believed that they could "fix" Afghanistan, disengage from Iraq, and then move on to "re-engaging" the rest of the world.

As Obama is learning, it is not so easy to "move on" when you are at war. No president can disconnect a major foreign policy issue such as war from other foreign policy issues. Asians have a stake in America's Afghanistan policy. A loss in Afghanistan would have stark consequences, as friend and foe alike would question our resolve, and Islamic extremism would rear its head again in Southeast Asia.

Prediction?

Obama's Asia team must be finding that during wartime, presidential attention is the scarcest of commodities. Obama has no choice but to focus on "the wars we are in," often at the expense of the Obama team's hopes for a grand "re-engagement" with Asia.

Win McNamee/Getty Images

By Phil Levy

Surprises?

I have been most surprised by President Obama's policy toward China. Trade with China was a major concern of labor groups in the election and then-Senator Obama signed pledges about the aggressive approach he would take. This included a commitment to find that China was a currency manipulator -- a stance reiterated by Treasury Secretary Geithner in his confirmation testimony. If anything, the facts shifted in favor of a currency finding against China: the exchange rate has not moved in over a year and the United States is borrowing less from abroad (suggesting less dependence).

Praiseworthy?

However, in April and October, the Obama Treasury repeated the finding of the Bush Treasury, that there were no currency manipulators worth mentioning. If you combine this with the docile stance on human rights that my Shadow Government colleagues have already mentioned, it might be explained as a surprising but consistent attempt to engage China as an important economic player. Yet the administration also chose to confront the Chinese with a weak decision on low-cost tires.

Constructive Criticism?

For constructive criticism, I would turn to the administration's broader trade policy. President Obama has attempted to warm international relations while chilling commercial relations. In China, Colombia, S. Korea, Brazil, India, and the European Union, there is growing aggravation at the administration's lack of a trade policy. It is high time that the president deliver his long-promised speech and resolve the conflicts within his party on trade. That could clear the way for reengagement with the rest of the world.

Prediction?

Finally, as a prediction for one year hence, I forecast serious international rancor over the environment. President Obama is in a bind. If there is no U.S. action on climate change, there will be sharp condemnation and disillusionment from abroad. If there is action, it seems likely to entail border measures (tariffs) that could threaten the global trading system. It is hard to see how this ends well.

PHILIPPE WOJAZER/AFP/Getty Images

After my previous posts in this series grappled with the likely plight of the falling dollar and some of the economic implications of its privileged status in the global economy, this concluding post will consider the question:

What do the dollar's role and value mean for U.S. foreign policy?

There is a macho tinge to the U.S. Treasury mantra that a strong dollar is in the U.S. interest. After all, isn't it always better to be strong than weak? There is a suggestion that at $1 to the euro, we are virile and able to bend other nations to our will, while at $2 to the euro, we will be feeble and submissive.

It is not obvious why that should be so. There are a couple upsides to a weaker dollar. Fred Bergsten, in a new Foreign Affairs analysis, argues that "the United States itself would benefit from a reduction in the international role of the dollar." In Bergsten's view, the easy credit that has accompanied dollar primacy has tempted the country into misguided policies. He writes: "Unless the United States quickly achieves and maintains a sustainable economic position, its ability to pursue autonomous economic and foreign policies will become increasingly compromised." A falling dollar is thus a mechanism whereby excessive U.S. borrowing from abroad can be rolled back. To the extent a weakened dollar would bring about such global rebalancing, it would help to meet a stated goal of world leaders in recent G-20 meetings.

Beyond this indirect gain, the most direct effect of a weakened dollar would be to hike the cost of goods imported into the United States and make American goods appear cheaper to the rest of the world. This, over time, would likely ease the pressures for trade protectionism that have increasingly strained U.S. relations with countries like China, Canada, Mexico, and the members of the European Union.

Each of those benefits to a diminished dollar shares a similar quality. Under a strong dollar, the argument goes, we cannot resist the temptation to sin. We know that excessive borrowing is a bad idea, but we just can't help ourselves. We know that trade protection is ill-advised, but who can resist the political pressure?

As soon as we move away from introspection, we see some of the foreign policy downsides to a weaker dollar. The first and most direct are the economic impacts. With a weaker dollar, all U.S. ventures abroad become more expensive. During the period of the dollar's decline, the United States becomes less attractive as an investment destination, since foreign investors would expect to recoup fewer yen, yuan, or euros when they cash out. Future financial crises - and they are sure to come -- will be much more painful if global investors do not rush to the dollar as a safe haven.

An even greater difficulty, from a foreign policy standpoint, could be a sense among allies that the United States is an unreliable partner. As the provider of the world's reserve currency, America has had both special rights and special obligations. The rights have included the ability to print money to pay for whatever we liked (technical term: seigniorage). The obligation has been to keep the value of the dollar relatively stable. From the reactions to the dollar's recent slide, we can anticipate the sort of discord that might accompany a more significant move. From Thursday's Washington Post:

The weak dollar is becoming a source of international tension, particularly in U.S.-European relations. Officials in the 16 countries that use the euro warn a continued slide of the dollar may pose long-term structural problems for Europe, forcing down wages and hurting employment in the months and years ahead. This week, a top aide to French President Nicolas Sarkozy called the value of the dollar "a disaster" for Europe, warning of dire consequences to the global economy if it remains at its current levels.

China reacted to U.S. borrowing plans at the beginning of this year with a call for guarantees of the value of its dollar lending. They were clearly worried about a depreciation of the dollar, which would undercut the value of China's massive reserves.  While G-20 nations were calling for global rebalancing at their Pittsburgh summit (by which they really meant that China should appreciate its currency and import more goods), Chinese President Hu Jintao said:

"Major reserve-currency issuing countries should take into account and balance the implications of their monetary policies for both their own economies and the world economy with a view to upholding stability of international financial markets."

This nicely captures the dilemma facing the Obama Administration. How do you catch a falling dollar? A classic approach would be for the U.S. government to stand ready to raise interest rates and adopt plans for future fiscal austerity. It would be responsible, but it would not be much fun, particularly at a time when U.S. unemployment is approaching 10 percent.

Suppose, instead, the dollar continues to slide and loses its premier status among world currencies. There could be domestic political benefits, but it would leave key countries economically bruised and seething. It is very difficult to tell such a story in which the United States' standing, prestige, and ability to project power do not decline along with its currency. U.S. foreign policy prowess would not be immune should the dollar fall from grace.

John Moore/Getty Images

By John Hannah

There are some noteworthy developments this past week on the Iraq front that merit attention. First, after Sunday's horrible bombings in Baghdad, President Obama immediately phoned Prime Minister Maliki and President Talabani to offer condolences and reaffirm U.S. support. The president also issued a strong statement condemning the attacks and making clear that "America will stand with Iraq's people and government as a close friend and partner as Iraqis prepare for elections early next year, continue to take responsibility for their future, and build greater peace and opportunity. Together, we will continue to work for lasting security, dignity, and justice."

This response from the Obama administration was in stark contrast to two months ago, when twin suicide truck bombs hit the Iraqi Ministries of Finance and Foreign Affairs, killing at least 100 people and injuring hundreds more. The president was largely missing in action on that occasion -- no phone calls, no statement. Instead, Vice President Biden spoke to Maliki and issued a one-sentence readout of the call.

Iraq's heightened profile on the president's radar screen is only to be applauded. With more than 100,000 American combat troops still in country, and Iraq's success by no means a foregone conclusion, it's entirely fitting that the commander-in-chief remain intensely focused on the situation there. With just this minor investment in time and political capital, Obama has reminded our soldiers, our enemies, and -- perhaps most importantly -- the Iraqi people, themselves, of America's resolve to remain engaged and to help Iraqis consolidate their political, economic and security gains. For our Iraqi allies, it's hard to over-estimate the reassurance provided by this kind of steady determination from the president of the United States.

Also noteworthy in this respect was Obama's public remarks during his Oct. 20 Oval Office meeting with Maliki. True, the president opened with a long salvo on Afghanistan that left the Iraqis somewhat miffed. But he recovered with his first meaningful invocation of the "d" word as applied to the Iraqi context. And not just once, but on three occasions:

We have seen in the last several months a consolidation of a commitment to democratic politics inside Iraq. ... I just want to ... reemphasize my administration's full support for all the steps that can be taken so that Iraq can not only be a secure place and a democratic country, but also a place where people can do business, people can work, families can make a living, and children are well educated. And that broader sense of a U.S. relationship with a democratic Iraq is one that I think all of us are confident we can now achieve." (emphasis added) 

During his campaign, as well as during the first months of his administration, the president's default position was to talk Iraq down, and to leave the impression that America's only stake in the country was to wash our hands of it as soon as possible. That now seems to be changing, as the administration begins to realize that America's strategic interests could in fact be reasonably well served by having a potentially very prosperous, very powerful democratic friend in what historically has been one of the Arab/Muslim world's most influential countries. Moreover, this can be achieved through a relatively modest dedication of additional political, economic, and security resources -- even as U.S. forces continue to withdraw from Iraq and America's combat role dramatically diminishes.

If pursued, the president's shifting paradigm on Iraq and its possible role in American strategy in the Middle East is a most welcome development that deserves encouragement and support from both sides of the political aisle.

TIM SLOAN/AFP/Getty Images

By Michael J. Green

In opinion polls, Americans now rate Japan as one of the United States' most reliable allies -- usually behind only Britain, Canada, and Australia. The relationship between President George W. Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Junchiro Koizumi was particularly close, and Koizumi's successor Shinzo Abe often described recent years as the "golden age" of the U.S.-Japan alliance. So it was probably something of a surprise for most readers of The Washington Post and The New York Times to see front page stories on October 22 describing an open spat between Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Japan's new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, over U.S. bases in Japan and the future of the U.S.-Japan alliance.

Hatoyama came into office a month ago vowing to pull Japanese ships out of the coalition effort in Afghanistan; to oppose the U.S.-Japan agreement realigning U.S. bases on the island of Okinawa; to investigate U.S.-Japan secret agreements on nuclear weapons dating back to the 1950s and 60s; and to increase Japanese independence by establishing a new "East Asia Community" that would exclude the United States. Gates' message in Japan this week was no-nonsense: The Obama administration is not interested in renegotiating previous base agreements and needs the new Japanese government to get behind the alliance. Hatoyama's response was defiant: He would not rush to decisions just to accommodate Obama's visit to Japan on Nov. 11.  But Gates' tough stance sent shudders through Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan.

So much for the "golden age" in U.S.-Japan relations.

Many Japan experts had urged the Obama administration to be patient so that the new Japanese government would have time to figure out its policies. Some of the same experts are now berating Gates on blog sites for provoking an "unnecessary" crisis with Japan. To be sure, there were good reasons to start off with a gentle posture toward the Hatoyama government. The DPJ won its landslide victory because of the economic crisis and the mounting unpopularity of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) -- not because of the unpopularity of the alliance (supported by 76 percent of the public in recent government polls) or because the Japanese people wanted changes in foreign policy (only 3 percent in exit polls said those issues shaped their choices). Moreover, the DPJ's main purpose is to move toward a more redistributive economic policy in order to steal constituencies away from the LDP before a critical first test at the polls in next summer's elections for the Upper House of the Diet. There is little interest in expending political capital on foreign affairs or defense, where the DPJ is badly divided internally to begin with. It therefore seemed likely that the DPJ would move away from some of its more extreme positions on security policy after coming to power -- just as the Obama administration did. A gentle stance would give Hatoyama the "face" to begin that shift.

However, it has become increasingly apparent that the Hatoyama government cannot -- or will not -- move to the center. The Socialist coalition partners are exerting too much control; Hatoyama is afraid of opening a split within his own party by adopting pragmatic governing policies; and the DPJ has interpreted Washington's gentle touch as a green light to continue slapping around the United States for domestic political purposes while loosely associating with Obama's idealistic visions for a nuclear-free world.

On the Okinawa basing issue, Hatoyama has said he will postpone a decision until next year (presumably after the Upper House elections), but his dithering will only increase opposition to U.S. bases on Okinawa, causing the whole deal to unravel -- whether that is ultimately what Hatoyama intends or not. The half-baked East Asia Community idea has the Chinese and South Koreans as perplexed as it has the Obama administration unhappy, but still sends unhelpful signals to the region at a time when the United States needs its closest ally in Asia on its side. The investigation of secret nuclear agreements may end up a big bore, particularly since the United States has not had tactical nuclear weapons in Asia since 1991. But the special committee of outside academics being established to "investigate" the government's past understanding with the United States could also turn into a witch hunt against the traditional managers of the alliance within Japan's Foreign Ministry.

With the U.S. president heading to Tokyo in less than a month, Gates had no choice but to splash cold water on the DPJ on Wednesday. There is some risk that the ever-populist DPJ will now try to use a spat with the United States to increase votes before the election next year.  But Gates is a shrewd judge of his counterparts. He knows that a crisis in the U.S.-Japan alliance would split the DPJ and turn much of the media against Hatoyama, particularly given the strong public support for the alliance and the growing menace from North Korea and China.  Meanwhile, Hatoyama was letting the DPJ leadership play with firecrackers in a room full of dynamite. Letting the alliance drift posed the greater risk.

On the whole, this could be a rough year for managers of the alliance with Japan. But the future looks brighter. The Upper House election next year will probably flush the Socialists out of the coalition and allow the DPJ to move to the center. The next generation of leaders in the DPJ is made up of realists who want a more effective Japanese role in the world and are not afraid to use the Self Defense Forces or to stand up to China or North Korea on human rights.  Gates did the DPJ a favor by forcing the debate on national strategy that the party was never willing to have while in opposition, and that Hatoyama was eager to avoid for his first year in power.

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By John Hannah

My old boss, Dick Cheney, gave a speech last night blasting the Obama administration's national security policy. One of his many targets was an interview that Rahm Emanuel did with CNN this past weekend -- in particular, Emanuel's claim that President Obama's current reassessment of Afghan policy was, for the first time ever, airing certain first-order questions about U.S. strategy. For officials of the previous administration, the objectionable portions of Emanuel's remarks included the following:

And when you go through all the analysis, it's clear that basically we had a war for eight years that was going on, that's adrift. That we're beginning at scratch, and just from the starting point, after eight years. ... And the president is asking the questions that have never been asked on the civilian side, the political side, the military side, and the strategic side. What is the impact on the region? What can the Afghan government do or not do? Where are we on the police training? Could that be something the Europeans do? Should we take the military side? Those are the questions that have not been asked. And before you commit troops . . . before you make that decision, there's a set of questions that have to have answers that have never been asked. And it's clear after eight years of war, that's basically starting from the beginning, and those questions never got asked.

The first problem with Emanuel's charge, of course, is the inconvenient fact that the Obama administration, itself, already conducted an exhaustive review of Afghan policy this past spring. Remember? The one that had the president on March 27 unveiling a "comprehensive, new strategy" that "marks the conclusion of a careful policy review." The one that had the president sending another 21,000 American troops off to war?

If true, Emanuel's implicit accusation that basic questions were not asked in that first review would be a shocking indictment of the administration's own competence. If untrue, Emanuel was gratuitously insulting the professionalism of his hard-working colleagues involved in the review, presumably to advance some other agenda. Anyone familiar with the skills, experience, and stellar reputation of Bruce Riedel -- who the administration hand-picked to oversee the initial assessment -- knows full well that the first possibility is out of the question. Rest assured that all the questions Emanuel asserts have simply never, ever been asked before about U.S. strategy were indeed asked in the course of Riedel's efforts.    

Of course, Emanuel's real target here was - surprise! -- the Bush administration. President Obama has come under heated criticism for wavering in the face of General McChrystal's recommendation for a large troop increase in Afghanistan. But it's not wavering at all, Emanuel assures us. It's purely a matter of the president acting responsibly and performing necessary due diligence -- basic Policy 101 sort of stuff that his predecessor in the White House never did before sending Americans into harm's way.

The problem with this claim is that it's as untrue (and slanderous) with respect to the Bush administration as it is with respect to the Riedel review. As Cheney pointed out last night, the fact is that President Bush ordered a comprehensive review of America 's faltering Afghan policy in the early fall of 2008. That October, the Washington Post reported that the review's purpose was to "return to basic questions":

What are our objectives in Afghanistan ? What can we hope to achieve?  What are our resources? What is our allies' role? What do we know about the enemy? How likely is it that weak Afghan and Pakistani governments will rise to the occasion?

The review was led by Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, President Bush's deputy national security advisor for Afghanistan and Iraq. It brought together officials from the White House, Pentagon, State Department, Intelligence Community, and every other civilian agency concerned with Afghan policy. The review lasted for weeks and exhaustively examined all angles of U.S. strategy. In addition to its internal discussions, the group received briefings from the likes of Afghanistan 's Defense Minister, Abdul Rahim Wardak, and (Ret.) General Dave Barno, the first commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan. The review included a trip by Lute to the AfPak theater to test some of the emerging recommendations with our political and military leaders on the ground. Its deliberations were ruthlessly self-critical of severe shortcomings in the war effort and argued the need for urgent changes in American strategy, in particular a far more robust counter-insurgency effort. All the questions that Emanuel raised with CNN were in fact raised during the Bush review, in addition to an array of others.

The Bush effort was provided to the incoming Obama administration during last year's transition, including its finding -- based on an initial request for additional forces submitted by then-commanding General McKiernan -- that more U.S. troops would be needed to conduct a successful counterinsurgency strategy. On that question, my understanding is that President Bush was fully prepared to defer to the wishes of President-elect Obama and do whatever would make the new administration's job easier; that is, Bush was fully prepared either to shoulder the decision to order more U.S. forces to Afghanistan before leaving office or he would leave that critical call to President Obama, giving the new administration a chance to conduct its own comprehensive review of the situation. The Obama team, quite understandably, opted for the latter course and President Bush deferred to their wishes -- as he invariably did on virtually every major question during the transition in his determined effort to make it one of the smoothest and most cooperative in American history.

As Cheney suggested in his remarks yesterday, anyone reading both documents would find significant overlap in the Bush review from 2008 and the review that the Obama administration conducted this past spring. One reason that's not particularly surprising is that Doug Lute, who was in charge of the Bush review, was also a major player in the initial Obama assessment. Indeed, Lute continues to serve on President Obama's national security council staff with responsibility for the Afghan portfolio. Perhaps Rahm Emanuel should ask Lute to refresh his memory by taking the short walk over to Emanuel's White House office with a copy of the Bush review. Emanuel could also draw on the expertise of any number of the other participants in the Bush effort, many of whom continue to work for the Obama administration, including at senior levels. I'm also quite sure that some of those who have subsequently left government service, such as former State Department Counselor, Eliot Cohen, former advisor on counter-insurgency, David Kilcullen, and former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, Jim Shinn, would also be happy to talk to Emanuel about their work on the 2008 Bush assessment and the wide range of issues that were studied.

None of this, of course, should obfuscate the fact that the Afghan war effort was in dire shape by the close of the Bush administration.  An urgent course correction was required. President Obama quite courageously decided to do exactly that last spring when he accepted the recommendations of the Riedel review, opted to pursue a fully-resourced counter-insurgency strategy, and put in place a commanding general committed to carrying that strategy out. In response, conservative national security experts in general -- and former Bush administration officials, in particular -- were quite vocal in their support of the president, applauding his gritty determination to buck the advice of many in his own party and do what was necessary to fight and win the war against al Qaeda and the Taliban.

What has people criticizing the administration now is the endless public hand-wringing about whether to support its hand-picked commander in doing what's urgently required to implement a strategy that President Obama himself announced to the world less than six months ago. The key things that have changed in the interim -- the badly flawed Afghan presidential election and rapidly declining public support for the war effort, especially within the president's own Democratic Party -- were both developments subject to the Obama administration's influence and control, not the Bush administration's. It's President Obama's performance as commander-in-chief and wartime leader, both at home and abroad, that is now in the spotlight and it's clearly causing the administration real discomfort. Trying to deflect attention from that serious problem by leveling new, politicized charges against its predecessor that are so demonstrably spurious is unlikely to help much. It should stop so that the Obama administration and the country can get back to the deadly serious business of how best to protect and defend our interests in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as the broader war on terrorism.     

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By Michael Singh

When companies are faced with making a decision between multiple risky options, they will often seek out information in order to reduce their uncertainty. So, a pharmaceutical firm will conduct clinical trials in order to determine if a drug is safe or dangerous, information that could mean the difference between profitable sales and damaging litigation. Such an investment in information is never free -- indeed, it often comes at a significant cost that must be weighed against the value of the knowledge obtained.

In this sense, the recently concluded U.S.-Iran talks in Geneva can be considered a diplomatic purchase of information. The United States, by offering to remove Iran's low-enriched uranium and turn it into the raw material required to make medical isotopes, is testing Iran's claim of peaceable intent and the Obama administration's hopes for engagement. If the Iranians comply, they may be open to further compromise, perhaps as a result of the political pressure they have faced at home since the summer's election turmoil. Their refusal, on the other hand, would serve as a clear signal of intransigence and lead Washington to pursue an alternative path. The most likely result is somewhere in between -- Iran gives no clear answer, but seeks to draw out talks and divide the P5+1 -- meaning that the United States has to ensure that we and our allies agree on what constitutes an acceptable response from Tehran. Whatever the result, it is a bold and innovative gambit by the United States, and the Iran hands at the National Security Council should be commended for devising it.

Like all purchases of information, however, this one comes at a cost. The P5+1 have had to accept the uranium enrichment which Iran has conducted in recent years in defiance of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions. Even if it ultimately does not reach a deal to send its LEU abroad, Iran will surely seek to pocket this concession and declare a measure of victory. Similarly, by presenting the admission of IAEA inspectors to the until-recently-covert Qom enrichment plant as a concession, Iran gains tacit international acceptance of a facility built in defiance of its Nonproliferation Treaty obligations. If the P5+1 accepts this fait accompli and negotiates to limit rather than eliminate uranium enrichment in Iran and to monitor rather than shut down the Qom facility, the result could be a dangerous one for the stability of the Middle East and the viability of the global nonproliferation regime.

Another cost of the current U.S. initiative is that it risks demoralizing Iran's ascendant political opposition by bolstering the regime at a time when its legitimacy at home appears to be waning. Given that an internal transformation in Iran may be the best hope for long-run peace and stability in the region, any action that risks delaying it could be costly indeed. None of this is to say that the current approach should not be tried, given the paucity of attractive options; it is simply to say that it is not free. At some point the purchases of information must end, and a decision must be taken. A pharmaceutical company that conducts many clinical trials but sells no drugs eventually finds itself out of business.

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By Peter Feaver

Will's measured analysis of Team Obama's Sudan policy is kind. Perhaps too kind. From my vantage point, today's Sudan rollout has all the feel of a group being hoisted with their own petard, in this case the bombast of their campaign rhetoric. And precisely because it was all so foreseeable, perhaps this counts as a teachable moment.

The two protagonists, U.N. ambassador Susan Rice and Sudan czar Scott Gration, had key roles during the 2008 presidential campaign. In particular, their job was to peddle the meme that Barack Obama could be trusted on national security because he was going to be even tougher than George W. Bush or John McCain when push came to shove. Gration, a retired Air Force general, was trotted out to participate in one of the more remarkable attacks on Senator McCain -- a series of retired military people floating the notion that McCain was temperamentally unsuited to be commander in chief, a not-so-subtle effort to play off of the notion that McCain's time as a PoW may have left him unhinged. Gration put it this way: "I have tremendous respect for John McCain, but I would not follow him."

Ambassador Rice, for her part, was especially barbed on the issue of Sudan: "The Bush administration has spent years not only talking at very senior levels with one of the world's worst tyrants, who is responsible for genocide, but also reportedly offered the regime major concessions in exchange for minor steps and rolled out the red carpet for some of its most reprehensible officials." She didn't mention "gold stars and cookies," but she might as well have.

The notion that President Obama was going to be more hawkish on Darfur than President Bush should have been easy to dismiss from the outset. For years, President Bush was the single person in his administration most passionately committed to the Sudan issue (first the North-South civil war and then the Darfur genocide). If memory serves, he would raise it in his bilaterals with other world leaders even when his staff had not included it in the briefing materials. He regularly pressed the staff to come up with viable ways to move the Darfur issue along. Yet we were unable to make as much progress as the president wanted for several reasons: (1) our nonmilitary coercive diplomacy toolkit was already heavily utilized on Sudan; (2) our military coercive diplomacy toolkit was fully extended in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere; and (3) the global balance of resolve heavily favored those backing the Khartoum regime (what we called Khartoum's "heat shield") and not our weakly committed allies.

The Obama campaign made it sound like the problem was with President Bush. With today's roll-out, the Obama administration is conceding that the problems actually lay elsewhere and they have proven just as insurmountable for President Obama as they were for President Bush. Perhaps it is time for a different kind of apology tour.