Holbrooke on the 'Afpak mission'

One hopes President Zardari and his colleagues know the man they will have to deal with in days to come. There is a peculiar trait in Mr Holbrooke's character that draws compliments from his admirers and strong disapproval from his detractors, and it is for this very trait that he has been assigned by President Obama what is being called the "Afpak mission." Jody Cantor has described Holbrooke in a recent write up in The New York Times as a diplomat with the ability "to twist arms as well as hold hands." Time South Asia Correspondent Jeremy Page calls him "a hard-nosed negotiator." According to Steve Clemens, who would have liked him to be the foreign secretary, Holbrooke is "someone willing to deploy any tools it takes to achieve his (and America's) ends." He has been alternately described as the "face of American pugnacious nationalism", one of the "global arm twisters", the type who are "ruthless, shrewd, and morally elastic in hitting their targets," and a sort of "modern Machiavelli." For Strobe Talbott, Holbrooke is the "diplomatic equivalent of a hydrogen bomb."
Holbrooke has spent four days in Pakistan which along with Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan constitutes what he calls the "arc of crisis to "listen and learn the ground realities" and report to President Obama. This he needs badly as unlike his former assignments the area is new to him and he has no personal contacts in the region. He has however already got done some of the exploratory work on the region as former chairman of the Asia Society.
President Obama considers FATA a highly dangerous place for the US. As he puts it at his first press conference after inauguration his bottom line is "that we cannot allow Al-Qaeda to operate...We cannot have those safe havens in that region." Mr Obama thinks this is not possible without Pakistan's support which is not forthcoming as desired. The task assigned to Holbrooke is to work on the Pakistani political and military leadership to ensure their whole-hearted participation in the anti-Al-Qaeda war.