WASHINGTON — President Obama begins two days of talks at the White House today with the leaders of Pakistan and Afghanistan to overhaul a painstakingly developed security strategy that was unveiled only five weeks ago but already has become badly outdated.
The three countries spent months developing their plan to combat an Islamic insurgency centered in eastern Afghanistan, near the Pakistani border. But growing militant activity in Pakistan is forcing them to hastily switch focus.
In what is emerging as Obama's first major foreign policy crisis, U.S. officials fear the militants could fracture Pakistan, the far more populous nation, further destabilizing the region and even posing a grave risk to the security of Islamabad's nuclear arsenal.
Obama will press Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari to intensify his country's efforts to fight the insurgency, step up economic development efforts and reach out to political rivals to broaden his fragile government's base of support.
"We need to put the most heavy possible pressure on our friends in Pakistan to join us in the fight against the Taliban and its allies," Richard C. Holbrooke, Obama's special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, said in testimony before a House committee Tuesday.
Yet U.S. officials acknowledge that their influence over Pakistan is limited, consisting mostly of the money and arms they can supply.
Though the situation in Afghanistan may not have improved, it does suddenly seem more manageable. "By comparison, it looks like Canada," one U.S. official said in an interview.
The talks convene as fighting rages in Pakistan's Swat Valley, about 60 miles from Islamabad, the capital. Pakistani officials had hoped to strike a lasting cease-fire there by agreeing to the Taliban's imposition of Islamic law in the region. But the militants have since attempted to advance even closer to the capital, igniting the military confrontation.
Obama announced his new Afghanistan-Pakistan security plan in March, pledging extra combat troops and training units for Afghanistan and civilian and military aid for Pakistan. The Taliban's gains and subsequent fighting in Pakistan overtook that strategy.
Obama today will meet separately with Zardari and Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and then will meet with them together.
