Obama at the U.N.: Tough Sledding

Perhaps it was a measure of the height of his soaring rhetoric at the United Nations that prompted President Obama repeatedly to reassure his audience.

"Now, I am not naïve,'' he said at one point, and later added, "I know this will be difficult." And he concluded by acknowledging that "... the changes I've spoken about today will not be easy to make ...''

Granted, the changes on which he urged action involve the most difficult issues that have confounded American presidents (and the UN itself) for decades: Israel-Palestine, North Korea, Iran, nuclear proliferation, U.S.-Russian nuclear arms reduction, pollution and global warming. And Obama is wrestling with two big new ones, the messy war in Afghanistan (though not mentioned by name), and the sputtering world economy.

And, given that the annual opening session of the United Nations General Assembly ("UNGA'') is traditionally a cockpit of rhetorical excess (see Libya's Qaddafi here, and catch Iran's Ahmadinejad later), perhaps not much actual progress ought to be expected.

Still, Obama leaves New York Wednesday with an undiminished agenda that promises a lot of diplomatic grunting and shoving and heaving in the months immediately ahead. To wit:

-- China and Russia both signaled this week that that they are not convinced of the value of tough, new sanctions against either North Korea or Iran for their nuclear weapons efforts. The Obama administration is hoping that six-party talks with Iran planned for next week will ease some of Tehran's hard-line positions, but don't count on a unified international front: the Russians believe even discussing potential new sanctions against Iran could be "counterproductive," Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told Bloomberg.

-- On nuclear non-proliferation, a key sticking point is the failure of the United States Senate to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty that has been signed by 180 countries, including Afghanistan, Grenada and Togo. More to the point, the treaty won't go into effect until it is ratified by India, Pakistan, North Korea...and the United States. For "could-be'' nuclear states such as Syria and South Korea, for instance, a ban on testing would help ensure that they don't 'go nuclear' out of fear of being left behind in a regional nuclear arms race. Obama's got some work to do here on Capitol Hill.

-- Obama met head-on with Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas Tuesday in what was described as "businesslike'' but not cordial, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported. Haaretz said Obama "strongly expressed his impatience'' with the two leaders -- I'm guessing particularly with Netanyahu's announced intention of enlarging Israeli settlements on the West Bank, the equivalent of a bloody shirt to Palestinians. "No tangible results'' were recorded, according to Haaretz.

-- As noted, Afghanistan wasn't mentioned in Obama's speech Wednesday, but it looms large on Obama's to-do list. Whether or not he accedes to the requirement for reinforcements recently stated by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, or finds some other war strategy, it's going to be a tough sell. The costs and duration of a counterinsurgency campaign are "a very difficult political management problem for democracies to make, that on balance the costs are worth paying,'' said Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, who served this summer on McChrystal's Afghanistan strategy reassessment team. "The costs, to have any reasonable chance of success, are going to be high,'' Biddle said in a conference call with reporters. But any consensus that once existed about the "good war'' in Afghanistan has shattered, and Biddle said it will take a major effort by the White House to rebuild public support for the war. "Nobody I know thinks this war can be won in a year or two years,'' he said. "You could certainly lose public support of the war in the United States sooner than that.''

Pestered by reporters about this lengthy and daunting agenda, Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, is urging patience. "The president has been here for little more than eight months,'' he said, referring to the White House rather than the United Nations. "And we did not -- we never came in under the impression that years of these challenges would be wiped away in only a matter of months.''

Or as Obama himself told the General Assembly Wednesday, "Now ... we must do the hard work ... in our own capitals.''