I don’t think it is particularly surprising that the Obama administration has decided to drop the plans to build an anti-missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic. I remember, shortly before the election, an Obama foreign-policy adviser describing the plans to me as a “system that won’t work, against a threat that doesn’t exist, paid for with money we don’t have.” I took that as a hint.

Missile defence has, in any case, always been a Republican obsession, dating back to Reagan and “Star wars”. Abandoning the plan has financial and diplomatic attractions for Obama. Most obviously, it removes a bone of contention (or a “rotting corpse” as one Russian diplomat colourfully put it) between the Kremlin and the White House. It might now make it easier for Obama to make progress on nuclear arms-reduction  - and perhaps persuade the Russians not to veto a new round of sanctions on Iran.

If, however, the Russians react by becoming more assertive and demanding - for example over Georgia and Ukraine - then Obama could end up looking foolish. There will certainly now be heightened anxiety in Central Europe. The Poles and the Czechs were, initially, not that keen on the anti-missile scheme. But they won’t like the implication that America has backed off, in the face of Russian pressure - or, even worse, that the Nato military committment to eastern Europe is anything other than rock solid. Recent opinion polls show that respect for America has risen in western Europe since Obama came in, but fallen in the countries of the former Soviet bloc. American diplomats have a big job of reassurance to do there.

Nothing stirs the blood of the British more than the idea of being unfairly arrested by foreigners. London’s mayor Boris Johnson has used his newspaper column to attack both the UK and the US governments over the extradition of a British computer hacker to the US. Read the piece - it’s both funny and thought-provoking.

Meanwhile, the Eurosceptic website, Open Europe, is railing against what it regards as the misuse of the European Arrest Warrant to persecute Brits.

And finally, here is an account of the funeral of Cory Aquino

Peacekeepers declare war on climate change, boy scouts in reserve: Richard Gowan in Global Dashboard

European-Moroccans and the lives they lead: Charlemagne’s notebook in The Economist

Diplomacy 101 from Joe Biden: This post from Daniel W. Drezner in Foreign Policy presciently foresaw that the Russians would be distinctly unamused by Joe Biden’s remarks

An opinion poll released last week revealed some heartening news for the US. President Barack Obama is the most popular political figure in the world. The least trusted leaders, according to a poll of 20 countries conducted by worldpublicopinion.org, are President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad of Iran and Vladimir Putin, the Russian prime minister. When Mr Obama has breakfast with Mr Putin in Moscow on Tuesday, it will be a meeting between the world’s romantic hero and one of its pantomime villains.

But charm and good looks can only get you so far in geopolitics.Mr Obama’s charismatic aura is obscuring an uncomfortable truth. His foreign policy is in crisis.

The arms-control agreement signed on Monday between the US and Russia will give the president some badly-needed positive news to bring back from Moscow. But beneath the smiley surface, relations between Russia and the US remain tense and suspicious.

The remainder of the article can be read here. Please post comments below.

Barack Obama is a soft power president. But the world keeps asking him hard power questions.

From North Korea to Guantánamo Bay, from Iran to Afghanistan, Mr Obama is confronting a range of vexing issues that cannot be charmed out of existence.

The problem is epitomised by the US president’s trip to the Middle East this week. Its focal point will be a much-trailed speech in Cairo on Thursday June 4, in which he will directly address the Muslim world.

The Cairo speech is central to Mr Obama’s efforts to rebuild America’s global popularity and its ability to persuade – otherwise known as soft power. The president has been trying out potential themes for the speech on aides and advisers for months. He is likely to emphasise his respect for Islamic culture and history, and his personal links to the Muslim world. He will suggest to his audience that both the US and the Islamic world have, at times, misjudged and mistreated each other – and he will appeal for a new beginning.

The remainder of the article can be read here. Please post comments below.

Visit the vast bureaucracies of the Pentagon or the State Department and “under-staffed” is not the first word that springs to mind. But - in fact - as the Obama administration grapples with the world, it is short of key people in vital areas.

Take North Korea: the US’s special envoy for North Korea is Stephen Bosworth, but he is only a part-timer. He divides his time between the State Department and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Boston, where he is the dean. The lead State Department official should be Kurt Campbell, Obama’s nominee for Assistant Secretary of State for Asia - but almost six months into the administration, he has yet to be confirmed by the Senate. Continue reading "Washington’s over-stretched foreign policy establishment"

It is amazing how quickly the news cycle moves on. When I was packing my bags for Washington over the weekend, the big story was Guantanamo. By the time I got here on Memorial Day (Monday), it was the North Korean nuclear test. And today the headlines have been dominated by Obama’s first Supreme Court pick - a Latino woman, and therefore a “twofer”.

But neither the North Korean or Guantanamo messes are going to go away. They are both an illustration that this foreign-policy business is full of unpleasant surprises that are strangely impervious to the charms of President Obama. Continue reading "Obama’s North Korean and Guantanamo headaches"

When President Barack Obama welcomes the presidents of Pakistan and Afghanistan to the White House on Wednesday, he will be meeting two leaders the US relies on – and deeply distrusts.

The Americans desperately need both Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan and Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan to get a grip on the deteriorating security situation in the region now referred to in Washington as “AfPak”. But both men are regarded as incompetent leaders with whom the US has a scratchy and difficult relationship.

Mr Obama will doubtless greet the two leaders with his trademark grace and bonhomie. But behind the scenes US officials will be anxiously weighing the options for alternative leadership. Is it too late to find a better candidate to run against Mr Karzai in the Afghan presidential elections this year? Is there a more competent would-be president of Pakistan waiting in the wings?

The remainder of the article can be read here. Please post comments below.