Diplomacy

The Washington "power couple" is a familiar model: officials are often hitched to journalists, staffers to academics, lawmakers with lobbyists, and on and on. It's a natural phenomenon in such a small and social town filled with so many policy professionals.

But in what is much less common, a husband-and-wife team is set to represent the United States as ambassadors in adjoining European countries. Mary Bruce Warlick is set to be confirmed as the U.S. ambassador to Serbia and her husband James Warlick is on his way to represent America as ambassador to Bulgaria.

"This is actually the first time ever in the history of our diplomatic corps where we're having hearings for a husband-and-wife team at the same time," Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-NH, said at the couple's confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

"They can meet up at the border," noted a congressional staffer with a smile.

Mary Warlick was most recently the acting deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasian policy in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Prior to that, she was the acting deputy assistant secretary for European and NATO policy.

James Warlick was principal deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of International Organizations, and, prior to that, director of the Office of European Security and Political Affairs in State's Bureau of Eurasian and European Affairs.

The Warlicks aren't the only husband-and-wife team to find new homes in the administration. In fact, it turns out that these sorts of "Obamarriages" are surprisingly common.

Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Kurt Campbell is married to Treasury under secretary nominee Lael Brainard. His former CNAS partner Michèle Flournoy, the new under secretary of defense for policy, attended the confirmation hearing for her husband, W. Scott Gould, on his way to becoming deputy secretary for veterans affairs.

The National Security Council's Samantha Power has a short walk if she wants to have lunch with her husband, White House regulatory czar Cass Sunstein. And White House Communications Director Anita Dunn shares a commute (although not for long) with her husband Robert Bauer, the next White House counsel.

And there are many more: Shere Abbott and James Steinberg, Sarah Feinberg and Dan Pfeiffer, Antony Blinken and Evan Ryan, Tom Donilon and Cathy Russell, just to name a few. 

Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration's special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, is headed to Russia soon, just as a U.S. government team is also on its way there to deal with problems surrounding a new U.S.-Russian agreement to transit lethal materials through Russian space to supply U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

The controversial Holbrooke has had an ever-growing portfolio since taking on the Afghanistan/Pakistan mission, not to mention a staff that's grown from an initial 15 to more than 30 people. There are conflicting accounts of whether Holbrooke would deal with the Russians on the problems implementing the transit agreement. An interagency technical team is also on the way to Moscow to deal with the same issue, two administration officials confirmed.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told The Cable that Holbrooke is going to Russia "for meetings with his special representative counterpart and to discuss U.S.-Russia cooperation regarding Afghanistan," but said he couldn't be more specific.

"He doesn't do Russia," said one administration official who was surprised to hear Holbrooke was on the way there. Several sources said that Holbrooke's famously aggressive style and lack of history in dealing with the complicated and difficult Russians made him a particularly surprising choice to send there. "He's probably the worst personality that could be picked for something like this," said another experienced Russia hand.

The State Department could not confirm the specific date, but the trip is expected soon; a senior official described Holbrooke's mission in veiled terms only as discussing "political issues at a high level."

Speculating on Holbrooke's international standing throughout the region is somewhat of a parlor game for the diplomatic community. Despite his AfPak job, Holbrooke has not been to Afghanistan since before the disputed presidential elections in August; his lack of appearances there recently prompted many to think he was not welcome, in light of a reported feud with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The Indians have also made it clear they are not interested in being included in Holbrooke's sphere of policy influence. Holbrooke maintains he has just been hard at work in Washington dealing with the administration's Afghanistan strategy review.

Nevertheless, there are increasing signs Holbrooke's reach is widening. A team from Holbrooke's office is currently in Beijing for discussions with Chinese officials on both Pakistan and Afghanistan, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Tuesday.

Meanwhile, multiple sources tell The Cable that there are problems with the U.S.-Russian agreement to allow lethal military materials pass through Russian space on the way to Afghanistan. The deal, agreed to in July during Obama's trip there, is the one tangible example of progress in the administration's effort to "reset' U.S.-Russian relations.

"We're trying to build a more constructive relationship with Russia," said Kelly. "Two of the best examples of our cooperation are the lethal transit agreement and cooperative counternarcotics training."

But the Russians are now attempting to place new conditions on the supply routes, the sources said. For example, Russia is demanding to know exactly what items are in each shipment before allowing them to go through, a condition the U.S. military is not about to meet.

The U.S. government is receiving different messages from different segments of the Russian government, the sources said, complicating the matters. Another part of the Russian government demanded a tariff be paid on U.S. shipments entering Russia on their way to Afghanistan, a complete surprise to the U.S. side.

Update:  Holbrooke is also headed back to Afghanistan, his first trip there since August, at the end of his whirlwind trip around Europe, his spokesman said.

Holbrooke is currently en route to Berlin, after which he will travel to Paris, then Munich, then Moscow, before heading to Kabul. The trip is part of his regular diplomacy to consult with allies and partners on the Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy review currently ongoing, the spokesman said.

Holbrooke’s trip to Russia is not primarily to deal with the lethal transit agreement between the U.S. and Russia, the spokesman explained. An interagency task force is in Moscow to iron out implementation issues with that agreement, but that is a coincidence, the spokesman said.

Holbrooke has a long history of dealing with the Russians, including a personal relationship with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, the spokesman explained.

The spokesman could not give details about who exactly Holbrooke would meet with either in Moscow or Kabul.

BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images

The Obama administration is mounting a high-profile effort to bring senior officials to Singapore for the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum beginning next week, but struggling with how much substance they will need to deliver in addition to the pageantry.

During the Bush administration, the countries of East and Southeast Asia sought American attention but often felt the Bush focus on the war on terror crowded their issues off the White House's priority list.

The Obama administration has been working furiously to reverse that impression and the APEC forum will represent the largest display of those efforts yet.

The president, four cabinet-rank officials, dozens of appointee level bureaucrats, and maybe even a few Congressmen will attend the multi-faceted session. But already, administration officials are warning that the event might not produce any actual tangible progress on issues prized by those countries, most importantly on the issue of trade.

"APEC is a non- binding, voluntary organization that operates on consensus," the State Department's Korea desk chief Kurt Tong said Tuesday, "There are real benefits to that, in the ability then to set the agenda within APEC... On the other hand, it doesn't often result in legally binding commitments in and of themselves; but rather, decisions to then take back the outcomes of APEC and implement them on a sustained and voluntary basis."

Tong laid out a number of broad themes for this year's conference: Economic recovery, "resisting protectionism," regional economic integration, as well as balanced and sustainable growth. But his message was clear: the increased U.S. attention and presence at the conference is what the administration wants to focus on and wants credit for.

"That's certainly the perception which we wish to convey," Tong said, "It's really quite a concerted and very enthusiastic embrace of the APEC meetings and APEC as an institution by the United States, as evidenced by that participation," he said.

Top Obama officials who will be attending different part of the conference, in addition to the Obama himself, are Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, and U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk.

Although the Bush administration's delegation to last year's APEC Forum in Peru was large, in addition to the president, Condoleezza Rice was the only cabinet official to attend.

But while Southeast Asia experts give the Obama team credit for improving the optics of U.S. involvement in the region, they warn that the countries of the region will be satisfied with that for only so long before wanting to see the new American government put its money where its mouth is.

"The Obama administration gets very high marks on form and being there, which counts for a lot in Asia," said Ernie Bower, the newly minted senior advisor and Southeast Asia program director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, "But the wheel is about to turn, and eventually you've got to have substance behind this."

The two main things regional actors are waiting for Obama to start moving on are the idea of a free trade area for the Asia-Pacific region and commitment to finalize the stalled Doha round of World Trade Organization talks.

In both cases, the administration is debating its strategy internally now, but faces problems selling the ideas in Congress and a lack of political capital to spend on trade in the face of an already crowded and ambitious domestic agenda.

"The message to Asia is: We're here, the substance is coming, but please hold on, we have things to do at home first," Bower said.

There is at least a feeling that the conference itself could shake out some movement from the Obama administration on trade. Singapore, the host of the conference, is particularly dependent on trade and therefore is seen as needing some concession from the U.S. on that front.

One area where progress could be demonstrated would be some U.S. commitment to the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP). The TPP is seen as a "coalition of the willing" on trade cooperation and a lighter, a less restrictive way to advance cooperative trade that could eventually evolve into an FTA.

The other main event in Singapore for U.S. foreign policy watchers will be the side meeting between all ten countries in the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which will for the first time include senior Burmese and American leaders in the same room.

ASEAN has been pushing for an annual meeting with the U.S., as they already have with China, but the U.S. hasn't yet agreed to that. But a big part of the Obama administration's engagement strategy in the region is a recognition that China's charm offensive has made great strides over the last decade.

"The Bush administration was not able to put the needed investment in Southeast Asia, which provided a historic opportunity for China to really step up its game," said Bower, "If the Americans want to play, we're going to have make a significant commitment to ASEAN."

For the protocol-obsessed Japanese, scheduling a cabinet-level meeting and then canceling it is a rare occurrence. But that's exactly what happened today when the State Department had to withdraw its announcement that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would meet Friday with Japanese Foreign Minister Katusya Okada.

The diplomatic SNAFU is emblematic of the shifting ground underneath the U.S.-Japan alliance. The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), which took over the government in September, campaigned on a pledge to reform relations with the U.S., but now in power, they are battling internally to determine how far and wide those changes should go. The latest twist certainly won't dampen the view of those who've proclaimed a "crisis" in the U.S. relationship with Japan since the elections; a State Department official told The Cable that Clinton was still holding time in her Friday schedule, just in case Okada is able to make the trip.

Reports out of Japan suggest that Okada wanted to secure a deal on his pet issue, the Futenma air base in Okinawa, ahead of President Obama's trip to Tokyo next week. But Okada is being reined in by Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who doesn't want Okada gallivanting around making policy while the issue is still a matter of intense internal discussion within the Japanese government.

And both sides are trying to recover from a tumultuous couple of weeks in the relationship following the Tokyo visit of Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who was seen as focusing too much on Futenma, a minor issue for the U.S. but a major emotional hot button for the Japanese.

More broadly, the center of gravity in the U.S.-Japan relationship may be shifting from the Defense Department to the State Department. While Okada might have wanted to focus on Futenma, administration sources said that Clinton's goal was much broader. She wanted to start engaging the new Japanese leadership on a larger set of strategic issues, from Afghanistan to China and everything in between.

The agenda shows the Obama administration's desire to focus less on incremental military issues such as military basing and start bringing the discussion with the new Japanese government around to larger strategic issues. But the Obama administration is unable to advance the conversation due to the ongoing foreign policy fight within the Japanese cabinet.

Hatoyama is refereeing a complex battle between various elements of his party and his cabinet over the direction of Japanese foreign policy, especially with regard to the U.S.-Japan alliance. Okada's interests may lie in making things for Hatoyama as difficult as possible, hence the (maybe) cancelled trip.

Inside the Japan policy infrastructure in Washington, the officials in charge of managing the relationship are taking a two pronged-approach. The first element of their strategy is "wait and see," letting the new DPJ government settle internal disputes and then come to the U.S. side with policy positions, negotiating stances, and the like.

The second part of the approach is "Don't blink," meaning that the U.S. interlocutors are trying to avoid overreacting to what some see as antagonistic or contradictory statements on the alliance coming out of different DPJ leaders. Also, the U.S. managers are determined not to negotiate away any of their positions while the new Japanese government is going through its growing pains.

"We're waiting for them to give us some indication of where they see the path as leading from here," said one senior U.S. official dealing with the U.S.-Japan alliance.

There is also a feeling among Obama administration Japan managers that the reports about the "crisis" in U.S.-Japan relations have been way overblown and that while a number of issues in the alliance are now up for discussion, which is new, that is not necessarily a bad thing.

"You can take any of this stuff and make a story out of it, but none of these issues are unmanageable," the official said, "The U.S. and Japan still rely on each other in a lot of fundamental ways."

The official said that there is a pretty clear path out of the current tense situation, whenever the Japanese are ready to take it. For example, on the issue of the plan for the relocation of the Futenma air base, U.S. officials believe that ultimately there is no real alternative to the current plan. Okada's idea, to combine Futenma with the Kadena air base, is seen as a non-starter inside the Obama administration.

However, there are "sweeteners" that could alleviate some concerns of Okinawa residents and allow Hatoyama and Okada to save face by claiming they got concessions before ultimately accepting the bulk of the current plan as is.

But the talks between the United States and Japan haven't gotten to that stage and probably won't by the time Obama visits Tokyo next week. Obama himself is said to be too far above the issue to negotiate such details and is likely to simply affirm the strength of the alliance, mark its 50^th anniversary, and leave the negotiations for lower officials to resume after the trip.

Traditionally, the Japan relationship inside Washington more heavily managed by the Defense Department as compared to relations with other countries. There are historical and logistical explanations for this phenomenon, but with new administrations on both sides, a change might be in store.

At the National Security Council, the Japan policy is managed by Jeffrey Bader, a former Ambassador and senior State Department official and Daniel Russel, former State Department Japan office director.

At the State Department, Assistant Secretary Kurt Campbell is in charge of all things Japan, aided by Japan desk chief Kevin Maher. Campbell has been back and forth to Tokyo several times since assuming his post and is scheduled to stop in Tokyo on Thursday on his way home from Burma.

The Japan team at the Pentagon is centered around Assistant Secretary Gen. Chip Gregson, Principal Deputy Derek Mitchell, Deputy Michael Schiffer, and Japan desk officer Suzanne Bassala.

Photo: Pool/Getty Images

The two battling sides in the Honduran crisis have come to an agreement that would allow ousted President Manuel Zelaya to return to office, after a parliamentary vote and with the prior approval of the Supreme Court.

Also included in the deal are terms for a power sharing government, an agreement to respect the results of November 29 elections, and the establishment of a trust commission to weigh in on how the crisis started in the first place.

A U.S. delegation has been in Tagucigalpa since Wednesday, led by Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Tom Shannon, principal Deputy Assistant Secretary Craig Kelly, and National Security Council Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs Dan Restrepo.

Zelaya was deposed June 28 by force and replaced with a de facto regime led by Roberto Micheletti. Zelaya snuck back into Honduras last month and has been hiding out in the Brazilian embassy in Tagucigalpa ever since.

Here are Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's congratulatory remarks, delivered while traveling in Pakistan:

I'm very pleased to announce that we've had a breakthrough in negotiations in Honduras.

I want to congratulate the people of Honduras as well as President Zelaya and Mr. Micheletti for reaching an historic agreement. I also congratulate Costa Rican President Oscar Arias for the important role he has played in fashioning the San Jose process and the OAS for its role in facilitating the successful round of talks.

As you know, I sent Assistant Secretary Tom Shannon and his deputy Craig Kelly and the White House NSC representative for the Western Hemisphere Dan Ristreppo to Honduras yesterday after speaking with both President Zelaya and Mr. Micheletti last Friday to urge them finally, once and for all to reach an agreement.

I cannot think of another example of a country in Latin America that having suffered a rupture of its democratic and constitutional order overcame such a crisis through negotiation and dialogue.

This is a big step forward for the Inter-American system and its commitment to democracy as embodied in the Inter-American Democratic Charter. I'm very proud that I was part of the process, that the United States was instrumental in the process. But I'm mostly proud of the people of Honduras who have worked very hard to have this matter resolved peacefully.

We're looking forward to the elections that will be held on November 29, and working with the people and government of Honduras to realize the full return of democracy and a better future for the Honduran people.

When North Korea's lead nuclear negotiator Ri Gun (left) makes his tour of the United States next week, all eyes will be on the State Department, which is planning to make the first face-to-face, government-to-government contact with Kim Jong Il's regime in quite a long time.

Ri arrives in New York today and then will be in San Diego early next week to attend what's called the Northeast Asian Cooperation Dialogue. He will then come back to New York later in the week to hold "track two" (nonofficial) meetings organized by the National Committee on American Foreign Policy (NCAFP), a private insiders' policy group that has been key in organizing such meetings in the past.

The State Department issued the visa for Ri but has been extremely cagey about who will be going to meet with him. Spokesman Ian Kelly said today that State Department officials will probably meet with him in both cities, but no final decision has been made on who that would be.

The hands-on favorite among Korea watchers is Sung Kim, who is officially titled the "special envoy for the six-party talks." Those talks have been stalled since North Korea unilaterally withdrew in April. Kim was previously deputy to former lead negotiator Chris Hill, then assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs. He met with Ri in New York last November. Another leading contender is Korea desk chief Kurt Tong.

Conspicuously absent from the discussion over who will meet Ri is Stephen Bosworth, Obama's choice for special representative for North Korea policy. Bosworth has been handling the North Korea issue for State part time, maintaining his other full-time gig as dean of the Fletcher School at Tufts University.

The North Koreans have issued repeated invitations for Bosworth to visit Pyongyang, invitations that have gone completely unanswered. The choice of Bosworth, a sacred cow of the Asia policy community for decades, was seen by many as an effort to smooth out relations over the issue with allies Japan and South Korea, countries to which Bosworth has deep ties.

There is a long tradition of engaging the North Koreans through unofficial channels and by using experts that Pyongyang prefers as proxies, such as University of Georgia professor Han Park or journalist Selig Harrison. NCAFP has been at the center of what's called the "New York channel," which sometimes includes contact with North Korea's delegation at the United Nations. The key figure in NCAFP is professor and author Donald Zagoria.

If and when Kim or another U.S. official meets with Ri, the implication is that they would be setting the stage for a resumption of talks, even though the North Korean and U.S. positions on terms of discussion are still far apart. The Obama administration is insisting that any bilateral talks be in the context of the multilateral process and be based on the previous agreement North Korea signed promising to denuclearize.

The North Koreans, however, want direct talks with the U.S. without promising anything and without including regional powers. Kelly, the State Department spokesman, acknowledged that next week's meetings are essentially that.

"This is really kind of a hybrid," said Kelly, "It's not just track two. It's really a combination."

TEH ENG KOON/AFP/Getty Images

A Pakistani delegation representing the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs is in Washington this week to deliver its report to D.C. academics, think tankers, and officials. The mission is to inform American policymakers on the Pakistani perspective on a range of issues prominent in the U.S.-Pakistan relationship, including the impact of the Kerry-Lugar aid bill, nuclear stability, and the ongoing problems of terrorism and insurgency.

The delegation is composed of several senior Pakistani policymakers and former officials, including retired Lt. Gen. Talat Masood, a former secretary for defense production, retired Maj. Gen. Mahmud Durrani, former national security advisor and the previous ambassador to the U.S. (shown at left in 2008 with Sen. John Kerry and Pakistani Foreign Minster Shah Mehmood Qureshi), Ambassador Aziz Ahmed Khan, a former envoy to India and former ambassador to Afghanistan, Ahmer Bilal Soofi, a lawyer representing clients before the Supreme Court of Pakistan who appeared in the A.Q. Khan case, and Ejaz Haider, op-ed editor for Pakistan's Daily Times.

Pugwash, which won the Nobel Prize in 1995, has a mission to foster dialogue in the hopes of "reducing the danger of armed conflict and seeking cooperative solutions for global problems." Toward that end, here are some excerpts of the report on Pakistani views and attitudes they are presenting around town:

On the U.S.-Pakistan relationship:

There is widespread resentment in Pakistan toward the U.S.; Pakistanis are cognizant that the lack of trust is mutual. At the root of this resentment is the U.S. role in the Afghan Jihad... There is skepticism about the way in which [the] U.S. is conducting its campaign in Afghanistan... The perception is that U.S. heavy handedness has dictated Pakistan's policy and it has often not been in Pakistan's own interests. The problems of the insurgency in Pakistan are deemed to be distinct from the corresponding problems in Afghanistan. Pakistan wants to decide itself how to deal with the insurgency in its own territory and what its priorities should be.

The U.S.' view of itself as a domestic player in [Pakistan's] internal politics, especially its perceived influence on successive Pakistani governments is not welcomed. Excessive visibility to U.S. official presence in Pakistan is received equally negatively... There is a general perception that Pakistan's portrayal in the U.S. media and popular discourse is exceptionally negative... It is believed that U.S. officials understand Pakistan's concerns but often turn a blind eye to the negative publicity Islamabad receives as a means to maintain pressure on Pakistan.

On President Obama's Af-Pak strategy:

The Af-Pak terminology is disliked and has received strong criticism across Pakistan. The Pakistani intelligentsia is not pleased with a de-hyphenation of the Indo-Pak equation and the hyphenation of the Pak-Afghan calculus. The issue is not only one of national pride; there is a genuine concern among the strategic enclave that the permanence of the threat from India has not eroded.,, There is objectively no interest for Pakistan to be fully involved in what is happening outside its borders, namely in Afghanistan.

On the Pakistani government's relationship with extremists:

Compromises with the Taliban and the militants in general are possible, provided that the end result is improvement of living conditions for the civilians. A generalized military confrontation is not the solution according to most Pakistan experts... This points to the need for effective military operations, for a distinction to be drawn between different militant outfits, and to deal with different policy measures depending on the group in question. Al Qaeda and the Taliban are not the same entity and Pakistani policy makers insist on a distinction here.

On the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons:

The reality of the matter is that all nuclear weapons (irrespective of the country possessing them) are intrinsically insecure. In comparative terms, why should Pakistani nuclear weapons be more insecure than others?... Pakistani nuclear weapons are India-specific, namely they are an answer to India's nuclear arsenal. Anything like the deployment of Indian Ballistic Missile Defense systems or expansion of the Indian nuclear weapons program will destabilize the situation... The nuclear issue has to be dealt with regionally, with India taking the lead.

A perception has developed that the U.S. may prepare contingency plans to take out the Pakistani nuclear weapons. The reluctance on the part of the U.S. to deny such plans is problematic.

 FAROOQ NAEEM/AFP/Getty Images

What a difference a month makes. In May, Barack Obama's administration reportedly sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterating the U.S. president's public offer of talks with Iran. Then in early June, the State Department said it had instructed U.S. embassies to invite Iranian diplomats to attend official American Independence Day festivities around the world.

But the "hotdog diplomacy" is off, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs announced today: The United States has rescinded its July 4 invitations to Iranian diplomats. Granted, no Iranian officials had actually RSVP'd to the invites, he acknowledged. "I don't think it's surprising that nobody's signed up to come given the events of the past days," Gibbs said. "Those invitations will no longer be extended."

And there are other potential indications that Western efforts to reach out to Iran are being put temporarily on ice. Gibbs's announcement comes a day after Italy said that it too is rescinding invitations to Iran to participate in multilateral talks going on in Trieste Italy later this week, which Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Bill Burns will attend. (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had been scheduled to go but is recovering from surgery to repair a broken elbow.) Iran hadn't responded to that invitation, either, before it was revoked, reports said.

Obama said at a news conference yesterday that he believes prospects for near-term engagement with Iran were not high. "What we have been seeing over past couple weeks is not encouraging in terms of the path this regime may try to take," the U.S. president said.

"The international community is bearing witness to what is taking place," Obama continued. "And the Iranian government should understand that how they handle the dissent within their own country generated indigenously, internally from the Iranian people will help shape the tone not only for Iran's future, but also its relationship to other countries."

Indeed, some Middle East watchers believe the timing of news last night that the United States would send an ambassador back to Damascus Syria after a four-year absence is no coincidence, and may be related to the new Obama administration tone on Iran.

Asked about that theory, a U.S. official said: "You're warm." Syrian Embassy and Middle East expert sources noted that news reports on the envoy to Damascus seemed to have originated with the White House -- which has been in the midst of daily meetings about Iran for several days -- not the State Department.

"I think the Obama administration strategy -- while not fully formed -- was always that it wanted to engage with both Iran and Syria, and it wanted to play one side off the other," said Syria expert Andrew Tabler of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "This does have to do with that. I don't think we fully understand all of their reasoning on this ... but by announcing that it will send an ambassador to Damascus, it sends a message both to Damascus and Tehran."

"As for engagement at this point, the focus is necessarily on the events in Iran," a senior administration official emailed The Cable Wednesday of current thinking. "How could it be otherwise?"

Asked about a report in the Washington Times on the Obama administration's letter to Khamenei, the senior official said, "We have indicated a willingness to talk for a long time and have sought to communicate with the Iranians in a variety of ways. We have made it clear that any real dialogue -- multilateral or bilateral -- needed to be authoritative." 

"[I'm] not gonna get into the specifics of our different ways of communicating," the official added, "but there is an outstanding direct request from the [permanent five members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany] that was made on April 8th. The Iranians have yet to respond to that."

The apparent cooling of Obama's outreach efforts to Iran represents a tactical shift, not a change in the goal of eventually getting to engagement, Iran analysts said.

"At the end of the day, the necessity of diplomacy has not changed by this," said Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, referring to the post-elections violence in Iran. "The political feasibility [of engagement] has changed."

"When the dust has settled, the U.S. has an interest in dealing with whoever is in charge," Parsi added. "What I don't think should be done prematurely is to determine who is standing before the dust has settled. That is the difference."

UPDATE: A State Department spokesman e-mails the following:

Since so many of you have asked us what the WH was referencing in this afternoon’s briefing, here is part of the ‘ALDAC’ cable that went out today from Secretary Clinton to posts worldwide directing them to rescind all invitations that have been extended to Iranian diplomats for July 4th events:

“Unfortunately, circumstances have changed, and participation by Iranian diplomats would not be appropriate in light of the unjust actions that the President and I have condemned.  For invitations which have been extended, posts should make clear that Iranian participation is no longer appropriate in the current circumstances.  For invitations which have not been extended, no further action is needed.” – Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, ALDAC, 6/24/09