The Cable reported last week that Deputy Secretary of State Jim Steinberg was being considered to be the next dean of Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. "It would be news to me," Steinberg emailed to say when asked for comment before we published the item. State Department spokesman PJ Crowley later provided the following statement saying that Steinberg is not "a candidate" for the deanship. "He has a great job now as a key player within the administration helping develop policy alternatives regarding the most complex and urgent challenges facing our country. He is not seeking another one."

Richard Holbrooke, the special representative for the issue formerly known as Af-Pak, will visit Georgia "shortly," with plans to finalize the deployment of Georgian troops to Afghanistan.

Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg revealed that Holbrooke will go to Georgia while traveling in Tbilisi Friday. Sources said the current thinking is that the visit will occur toward the end of February.

So what will Holbrooke be doing there? Well, in addition to possibly discussing Georgia President Mikheil Saakashvili's offer to allow his country to become a supply route to Afghanistan, which Steinberg reportedly said was a Pentagon matter, Georgian sources tell The Cable that Holbrooke will be putting the final touches on the plan to deploy Georgian troops to Afghanistan in March.

In Georgia, they are calling it the "Holbrooke Brigade," according to a source close to the Georgian government. The plan is for 750 Georgian troops to be deployed in Helmand province at the personal request of Gen. David Petraeus, the source said, who was impressed with their effectiveness along the Iranian border during operations in Iraq. According to the current plan, they will be under U.S. command and supplementing 350 Georgian troops already in country as part of the International Security Assistance Force.

It will be the largest per-capita contribution of any country in Afghanistan other than the U.S.  One lingering question that the Georgians plan to raise with Holbrooke is whether the U.S. will offer them any military aid for the mission. The U.S. has not provided any lethal military aid to Georgia since their war with Russian in 2008, but the Georgians may need some items, such as parts for the U.S.-made M4 rifles they will be using in the Afghanistan mission.

In a December report, Senate Foreign Relations ranking Republican Richard Lugar, R-IN, argued for an end to the unofficial ban of U.S. lethal military aid to Georgia, arguing that the increase of Russian arms near there was dangerously tipping the balance.

"The United States, under substantial Russian diplomatic pressure, has paused the transfer of lethal military articles to Georgia, and no U.S. assistance since the war has been directly provided to the Georgian Ministry of Defense," the report stated. "Consequently, Georgia lacks basic capacity for territorial defense."

In which we scour the transcript of the State Department's daily presser so you don't have to. Here are the highlights of Friday's briefing by spokesman P.J. Crowley:

"As we all know, Washington, D.C., does not do snow well," Crowley told the 30 or so brave attendees at Friday's earlier-than-usual press briefing. So true.

• National Security Advisor Jim Jones will lead the U.S. delegation to the Munich Conference next week. From the State Department, Deputy Secretary Jim Steinberg and Special Representative Richard Holbrooke will also attend. Steinberg was also in Yereven, where he met with Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian, Crowley said, adding that Steinberg plans to meet with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and also President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan.
• Steinberg also stopped in Georgia and met with President Mikheil Saakashvili as well as opposition leaders, according to several reports. Steinberg also told the Georgian press that Holbrooke will visit Tbilisi "shorty."
• Undersecretary William Burns had a 90-minute conference call with all of his counterparts from the P5+1 countries regarding Iran. They discussed the engagement and pressure tracks, but it was not "the intent of the call" to decide on any particular pressures. Have the Iranians followed through by formally submitting their new openness to fuel transfers? "No - there's been no change in the position as stated by the Iranian representative at the IAEA," Crowley said.
• The State Department welcomes the pending release of Robert Park, the American missionary who deliberately crossed into North Korea and said that he did not want to be released. The U.S. will help facilitate his travel home. Following several questions asking if the U.S. had given North Korea any assurances or made any deals related to Park's release, Crowley finally said, "There was no deal involved here."
• On the 10 American missionaries arrested in Haiti, Crowley said, "We have not had any discussions with Haitian officials about shifting prosecution to the United States.  This is a Haitian legal process."

"Okay.  Go home, man the shovels and get ready for the storm," Crowley said.

The State Department plans major increases in its Iraq mission, with hundreds more employees there and a stepped-up diplomatic presence outside Baghdad as the U.S. military prepares to leave later this year.

A new fiscal 2010 supplemental request asks for $2.1 billion for use in Iraq, the bulk going to set up two permanent consulates and three temporary "Provincial Development Teams." The funding will enable another 129 State Department positions in Iraq, bringing the total to 664 by the end of this fiscal year. One consulate will be in Basra, one in northern Iraq. The PDTs will be along the Arab-Kurb fault line near Kirkuk, Ninewa, and Diyala, and $735 million in the supplemental request is designated for the security needed to protect civilians in the new outposts. The new presence around Iraq is described in the budget request as crucial "to mitigate ethno-sectarian conflict, to minimize the risk of instability, and to seize strategic policy opportunities."

Some have wondered why the money for Iraq came in the supplemental request rather than through the State Department's regular budget request for fiscal 2011.

"The most important point in terms of the supplemental is timing," Deputy Secretary of State Jack Lew said in an interview with The Cable, "The plan to transfer a set of responsibilities from the military to civilian control is on a pretty fixed timetable. In order for us to make this transition process to work smoothly, there's a fair amount of work that has to be done in advance."

The fiscal 2011 budget request asks for another $2.6 billion for Iraq, but that will focus more on longer term needs, said Lew.

"Enduring diplomatic presence comes a little later than police training, so there's more of that in the 2011 proposal than the supplemental," he said, adding, "Planning for this Iraq mission has been intensive."

Experts said that the U.S. attention to lingering ethnic tensions in Iraq is crucial over the next few months as the fragile reconciliation process there continues.

"There's a view that sectarian conflict is done and gone; on the other hand that would be very unusual as a historical matter," said Stephen Biddle, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, "It's one of these half full, half empty kind of glasses."

In the new budget request, more than $500 million is to go to the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Bureau (INL), known as the "drugs and thugs" bureau, for the police training mission. That mission will be transformed from focusing on individual soldier training to more administration, investigative, and organizational assistance, said Lew.

The Special Inspector General for Iraqi Reconstruction criticized INL in a recent report  for lax oversight of the police training mission to Iraq, which is contracted out largely to DynCorp, but Lew said that more contract oversight personnel were on the way to Baghdad and the poor past accounting of DynCorp funds was being corrected.

More than two dozen liberal-leaning members of Congress sent a letter to President Obama Thursday calling on the administration not to lose its focus on Iraq, especially with upcoming elections there that could prove crucial to Obama's stated timetable for withdrawal of U.S. forces.

The letter, led by Massachusetts Rep. Bill Delahunt, a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee chairman, was also endorsed by committee chairman Howard Berman, D-CA, House Oversight National Security subcommittee head John Tierney, D-MA, and several leaders of the progressive caucus. The impetus for the letter was a recent dispute over the attempt by Shiites to ban hundreds of Sunni candidates from the polls and several delays that have already pushed the elections to March 7.

"What has prompted the letter has been a profound concern about the initial election ruling and continuing concerns about letting the recent gains slip away, given the realities on the ground," Delahunt told The Cable.

An Iraqi appeals court ruled this week against the ban on the Sunni candidates, but the issue is now being brought before Iraq's Supreme Judicial Council, the highest court in the land.

Vice President Joseph Biden traveled to Baghdad late last month during the height of the dispute in what was widely viewed as an effort to mediate, though rhetorically, Biden maintained the dispute was a matter for the Iraqis to work out among themselves.

Delahunt said lawmakers wanted to go on record as imploring the administration not to lose focus on Iraq as attention shifts to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"We want the administration to continue to comply with the withdrawal dates but not to lose any focus, because this is one of the most critical moments in terms of the Iraq adventure," he said, adding, "Part of the purpose of the letter too was to refocus members of Congress on this election. There's a sense that we've moved on from Iraq."

Stephen Biddle, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said that continued U.S. government involvement in Iraq was crucial over the next few months as the fragile reconciliation process there continues while U.S. military forces withdraw.

"I think we still have an important role to play," said Biddle, "Iraq isn't at war and neither is it at peace. It's at the earliest stages at what's typically a very long transition."

In which we scour the transcript of the State Department's daily presser so you don't have to. Here are the highlights of Thursday's briefing by spokesman P.J. Crowley:

• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met Thursday with Kazakh Secretary of State and OSCE chairman-in-office Kanat Saudabayev, who will be working with Ian Kelly soon, as soon as the Senate confirms him.
• Romania has agreed to host Standard Missile 3 interceptors as part of the administration's new missile defense plan. "The choice of Romania extends the missile defense into southern Europe, and we expext this will be online by 2015," Crowley said.
• President Obama has submitted a report that states North Korea does not meet the statutory criteria for being again listed as a state sponsor of terror, despite their continued suspected ties to Hamas, Hezbollah, etc. ‘That said, we obviously have considerable concern about activities involving North Korea, its proliferation of dangerous technologies within the region and around the world," Crowley said.
• Sure, Clinton said the U.S. and Haitian governments have been in contact over "detained Americans," referring to the 10 arrested missionaries there, but "I wouldn't read too much into that," said Crowley, adding that the U.S. government is simply providing regular consular services. "I would put it in the category of just, you know, asking them and clarifying exactly how they were going to proceed, in this particular case," he said.
• Crowley said he was "optimistic" that the U.S.-Russia nuclear treaty, now being called "New Start," would be settled soon, after the Russian side announced a deal is imminent. "With that said, I wouldn't put a particular timeline on it," Crowley added.
• So now that the Jan. 31 first deadline for reaching the next phase of movement on the Copenhagen agreement has passed, what happens next? "Clearly there's still work to be done," said Crowley, "There's work to be done domestically, in terms of our own legislation that enshrines the 17- percent pledge that the United States has made. And there's work to be done coming out of Copenhagen to make sure that there is an accounting process and oversight as countries continue to pursue their respective pledges."
• The U.S. is giving $40 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees in the Near East, $10 million of which will go to the West Bank and Gaza while the rest is used in other countries. In 2009, the United States provided over $267 million to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, Crowley said.
• The State Department wishes a safe journey for Tai Shan, the National's Zoo's famous panda who is going back to China. "He is a dual citizen, U.S.-born, of Chinese parents," said Crowley, "But he is a tangible and furry manifestation of cooperation between the United States and China."

Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg is being considered for the job of dean of the Georgetown School of Foreign Service, multiple sources close to the process told The Cable.

Steinberg, the number-two official at the State Department, is widely regarded as a top-tier academic and most recently served as dean of the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin, but has faced some turbulence since landing in Foggy Bottom.

Reportedly disappointed after initially angling for a higher position, Steinberg has taken on a broad portfolio at State, both as Secretary Hillary Clinton's deputy and focusing on Asia as his personal policy domain. But some State Department bureaucrats privately gripe about what they see as Steinberg's sometimes intrusive style, and some of his policy proposals have been seen as poorly coordinated with the other parts of the policy community. "He's a brilliant guy, but just not a great fit for that job," said one administration source.

According to two sources familiar with the process, Steinberg has expressed an interest in applying for the job. The search committee has also met with individuals close to Steinberg, to hear their recommendations for him. Sources said the search committee is still narrowing the candidate list and conducting interviews, before making any recommendations to the university president.

When asked if he was a candidate for the job by The Cable, Steinberg said by email, "It would be news to me."

The leading contender, according to insiders, is the current acting Dean Carol Lancaster. A graduate of the School of Foreign Service herself, Lancaster was once deputy administrator of USAID and is a tenured professor there now. Other potential candidates, according to sources, include former Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, Princeton University professor Tom Christensen, and former State Department official Marc Grossman. Grossman told The Cable he was contacted about the job, but he is not a candidate. The others did not respond to requests for comment.

"Carol has brilliantly checked boxes," said Robert Gallucci, the immediate past dean, who now heads the MacArthur Foundation after stepping down from the School of Foreign Service after 13 years.  Gallucci worked with Lancaster on the State Department's policy planning staff under Anthony Lake, another Georgetown professor.

Gallucci is not part of the search committee, but talked with The Cable about the process and what the school might be looking for.

"It's a wonderful, challenging job with great opportunity to impact young people who will be in positions of leadership in the international sphere," Gallucci said, adding, "Somebody who had success in the policy world, more likely in government service, could bring something special to the shaping of these minds and the atmosphere of this school."

UPDATE: Steinberg wrote to The Cable after this story posted, "I have not talked with or been contacted by anyone at GSFS or Georgetown Univeristy... I have not met with the search committee."

In which we scour the transcript of the State Department's daily presser so you don't have to. Here are the highlights of Wednesday's briefing by spokesman P.J. Crowley:

• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met Wednesday with Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa.
• Two Uighur Guantanamo Bay prisoners are headed to Switzerland, prompting quick protests from the Chinese Communist Party government. Latvia is also taking a Guantanamo prisoner, but since he's not a Uighur, the Chinese seem OK with that one.
• Assistant Secretary Kurt Campbell is in Asia and met Wednesday with South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Lee Yong-joon.
• Crowley said he was not aware of any consular contacts between the U.S. and Haitian governments related to the 10 America missionaries arrested there for child trafficking. "First and foremost, is a judgment for the Haitian judge and whether he refers this case for further investigation. This is right now a matter in the Haitian judicial system," Crowley said, "As far as we know right now, we're satisfied with what's happening."
• The State Department is still waiting for Iran to formally communicate to the IAEA their willingness to sign on to a nuclear fuel transfer agreement, as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad recently announced. "We will look for actions as opposed to just words," said Crowley, "We're just seeking clarification through the IAEA as to whether Tehran has changed its current position."
• "There are no negotiations taking place between the United States and Iran regarding a prisoner swap," Crowley added, "I think we're not interested in a swap, per se." There will be some kind of P5+1 consultation in the next few days.
• Crowley said the White House has passed on a name to the Syrian government for the next U.S. Ambassador to Damascus and is waiting for a response, but he wouldn't not confirm that name was Baghdad DCM Robert Ford.
• On the news that the ICC could charge Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir with genocide related to Darfur, Crowley said, "The United States strongly supports international efforts to bring those responsible for genocide and war crimes in Darfur to justice and believes firmly that there cannot be a lasting peace in Darfur without accountability and justice." Not sure if that jives with Scott Gration's suggestion of cookies and gold stars for Khartoum, "But in the absence of significant action by Sudan itself to investigate and prosecute those responsible for genocide in Darfur, this is an acceptable and - under the ICC, this is the kind - just the kind of case and circumstance that it was formed for," Crowley said, "At some point, Bashir has to get a good lawyer."