By Ben Katcher

I’ve been in Germany for the better part of the last week, on a trip for young policy professionals sponsored by the Friedrich Naumann Stiftung.

For better or worse, the word most associated with President Obama’s foreign policy is “engagement.” Many in the United States and throughout the world perceived the Bush administration as heavy-handed, abrasive, and too unwilling to listen to other nations’ hopes, fears, and perspectives.

(Photo Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images North America) This is a guest post by Anya Landau French, who directs the New America Foundation/U.S.-Cuba Policy Initiative. This post originally appeared at The Havana Note.

(Photo Credit: Flickr) Conflicts Forum Director Alastair Crooke recently wrote a strikingly original article in The Washington Quarterly on the Middle East’s shifting strategic landscape.

(Photo Credit: Svenwerk’s Photostream) Ian Lesser‘s most recent “On Turkey” brief for the German Marshall Fund raises a number of important issues surrounding the United States’ relationship with Turkey. Most importantly, Lesser notes that those seeking to understand Turkey’s emerging regional role should examine Turkey’s internal political dynamics more closely.

(Photo Credit: White House Photostream) Joshua Walker has a good piece at Foreign Policy that takes a broad view of U.S.-Turkey relations and arrives at largely positive conclusions about the long-term prospects for the alliance.

(Photo Credit: State Department Photo by Michael Gross) George Washington University Middle East Studies Program Director and Foreign Policy Middle East Channel Editor Marc Lynch has an excellent post up on the legacy of a counter-productive Bush administration narrative.

(Photo Credit: The U.S. Army’s Photostream) Blake Hounshell has a must-read piece in Foreign Policy that raises some serious questions about the timing and accuracy of today’s article by James Risen in the New York Times, which claims that the United States has discovered $1 trillion worth of precious metals in Afghanistan.

This post, which originally appeared at The Havana Note, is a guest note by Tom Garofalo, a consultant for the New America Foundation/U.S.-Cuba Policy Initiative.

(Photo Credit: Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) In the aftermath of the Flotilla crisis, many U.S. commentators have suggested that the United States needs to make clear to Israel that there are limits to the kinds of behavior that Washington can accept. For instance, Center for Strategic and International Studies Arleigh A.