Barack Obama has what seems like a pretty good idea for Pakistan, basically “continue funding for Pakistan in the Foreign Operations bill in the areas of counter-terrorism funding, public education, health, micro-enterprise development, humanitarian assistance, and democracy and rule of law programs” but suspend the large general support grants to the Pakistani military until such time as the conditions are set for free and fair elections and the Pakistani government comes up with a credible al-Qaeda plan.

Ilan Goldenberg likes this approach as well. Basically, you’d be pressure the Pakistani military to pressure Musharraf to get back on a path to civilian rule. As I say, seems like a decent idea for the short-term.

Kevin Drum remarks on the public’s growing indifference to the question of how things are going in Iraq. Polls show an uptick in the number of people who think the war is going well, but CNN’s polling indicates that more people than ever — 68 percent — say they oppose the war in Iraq.

I think this makes a lot of sense. It all comes down to what you think of the overall strategy. If you think, as I do, that the war is serving no strategic purpose except, perhaps, to present a continuing risk of a flare-up with Iran while antagonizing Arab public opinion then the war “going well” is, just like the war “going poorly,” just another reason to leave. On the other hand, if you think that the war serves the vital strategic importance of projecting American power into the region and keeping other antagonists like Syria and Iran at bay, then the war going poorly would be a reason to redouble our efforts, but the war going well would also be a reason to redouble our efforts.

Reality on the ground does matter at some level, of course, but in a fundamental sense the question is still about strategy not about the exact state of play in such-and-such neighborhood in Baghdad. The original strategic purpose of the war was to eliminate an advanced nuclear weapons program that didn’t exist. Today, the purpose is … what? Mainly, it seems, to allow people who staked their reputations to this venture to avoid admitting that they made a horrible mistake.

It’s not quite the much-rumored DC cocktail party circuit, but I did get to go to a “salon lunch” today with Dmitri Simes talking about Russia and he had a novel take on the continued uncertainty about what Vladimir Putin’s going to do when his term of office as president ends. As Simes laid the situation out, Putin very much wants to hold on to ultimate authority. But he doesn’t want to do so much damn work! And so there’s no clear picture of what he’s going to do because he hasn’t decided yet; he’s still working on devising a formula that will maximize his power while minimizing the day-to-day workload. Apparently, they took a look at constitutional monarchy and some consideration has been given to creating an entirely new post aside from President and Prime Minister, possibly called “Supreme Leader” like in Iran.

William Arkin catches George W. Bush musing again about World War III: “This is a country that has defied the IAEA — in other words, didn’t disclose all their program — have said they want to destroy Israel. If you want to see World War III, you know, a way to do that is to attack Israel with a nuclear weapon. And so I said, now is the time to move.”

Obviously, as we’ve had several occasions to note, Bush’s efforts to portray his Iran stance as in line with the IAEA are wrong and dishonest. What’s more, while it would obviously be a horrible turn of events for Israel to be subject to an Iranian nuclear attack, the response would be an Israeli counterattack and the destruction of Iran — no World War III. And, more to the point, since the response would be an Israeli counterattack and the destruction of Iran, there’s not going to be an Iranian nuclear attack on Israel. The whole thing is ludicrous. But the Bush administration, by repeatedly talking as if the US and its allies have no ability to deter rogue states, is possibly opening the door to some kind of dangerous misunderstandings.

As Condoleezza Rice wrote before going insane “These regimes are living on borrowed time, so there need be no sense of panic about them. Rather, the first line of defense should be a clear and classical statement of deterrence — if they do acquire WMD, their weapons will be unusable because any attempt to use them will bring national obliteration.”

I’m trying to learn more about the situation in Pakistan and America’s policies in the region, and I want to keep posting on this even as my overall knowledge-level remains a bit low. But here are some informative things I’ve been checking out:

• A Perilous Course: U.S. Strategy and Assistance to Pakistan from the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
• “Catastrophe or a Last Chance in Pakistan” by Stephen Cohen.
• “Collateral Damage” from the Center for Public Integrity
• “The China Factor in Pakistani Politics” from China Matters.

Have fun.

Roger Cohen deploys his mastery of geopolitics: “Given the nuclear-charged risks, the U.S. must stick with him and maintain aid for now, but with the insistence he move rapidly toward promised elections, restore an independent judiciary, work with Bhutto and get real about quashing the Taliban.” But why would Musharraf do any of those things if he knows that our view is that given the nuclear-charges risks we must stick with him? Either we’re going to continue granting Musharraf his direct cash transfers or else we’re going to make aid conditional. Obviously, this is a difficult policy question. But Cohen’s answer: keep giving him the money “but with the insistence” that he do some stuff is no answer at all.

In general, I’d say this is pretty typical of the sort of magical thinking that seems to have infested our foreign policy pundits. How many times have I read a column making an argument like “Iraq is all fucked up for reasons A, B, and C but given the price of failure we have no choice but to close our eyes and hope really hard that A, B, and C vanish for some reason”? It’s really foolish, a way of trying to present oneself as wise and knowledgeable about difficult questions without putting anything out there that one can be held accountable for if things don’t work out. “No, no,” the pundit protests, “I said we needed a policy that works and had no costs this fiasco has nothing to do with me.”