Ready, steady, talk

NEXT week, when George Bush sets out more of his thinking about the future of America's armed forces, Asia's problems are expected to loom large. A report published this week by RAND, a think-tank, and partly written by a man who is now one of Mr Bush's senior advisers, argues that to help keep a “dynamic peace” in this fast-changing region, in future America will need to broaden its activities from north-east Asia, where its forces are concentrated in Japan and Korea, to deal with China-Taiwan tensions, instability in south-east Asia and hostilities between India and Pakistan. Yet for now, says even this report, “overshadowing all else” from an American perspective is still the military confrontation on the Korean peninsula. So will Mr Bush resume talks with North Korea on ways to end its destabilising missile production?