President Obama is turning the screws on Afghanistan's President, Hamid Karzai, demanding that he gets serious about corruption, before the US comes up with any more troops. The US ambassador to Afghanistan has been even more forthright, sending a supposedly secret cable urging against further troop deployments.

The eighth meeting in the White House situation room was discussing four options on troop numbers, but it seems as if the discussion went back to basics, and focused a great deal on whether the Afghan government was a fit partner.

We're told the president was concerned about timelines: when would Nato forces be able to hand over to the Afghan army, and when would they be able to leave. It's clear he wants any announcement of increased troop numbers to go hand in hand with a clear exit strategy.

There were, we are told, mounting questions about the credibility of the Afghan government. No wonder. The president was being told by the US ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, who used to be the top commander in the field there, not to send more troops.

The BBC has spoken to an official who confirmed that the ambassador sent at least one cable saying that sending more troops was "not a good idea". The source said that the intervention was seen as "dramatic" and that the man who is now in charge of the military operation, General Stanley McChrystal, was left "fuming" at this outright opposition to his call for 40,000 more troops. If these two hard men in the field are at loggerheads it doesn't bode well for any new strategy.

The Washington Post says Eikenberry's main concern is that the Afghan Government shows no sign of addressing the concerns that have been repeatedly raised with them, and that sending more troops would increase their dependence on the United States, rather than building up their own forces.

The offical White House statement after the meeting was pretty blunt:

"The president believes that we need to make clear to the Afghan government that our commitment is not open ended. After years of substantial investments by the American people, governance in Afghanistan must improve in a reasonable period of time to ensure a successful transition to our Afghan partner."

My translation into even less diplomatic language would be: "We're can't send more troops unless Karzai improves, otherwise we'll be there for ever."

The Associated Press version goes a little bit further, saying that Mr Obama has rejected all four options currently on the table:

"President Barack Obama does not plan to accept any of the Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, pushing instead for revisions to clarify how and when US troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government".

But again the core of the objection is about refusing to send more troops unless there is a clear exit strategy, and a responsible Afghan partner.

So a warning to Hamid Karzai to shape up. But is the administration just sending a message, or is it really still in agonies about which direction to take?

Is it a bluff or could the president really send far fewer troops than expected? Sensible caution or more dithering? What do you think?

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"America will not let you down, we will take care of our own." President Obama's words are perhaps exactly what you would expect any commander in chief to say.

But he not only makes these remarks ahead of a vital meeting about sending troops to an unpopular war, but against the background of two unpopular wars.

He did not refer to Iraq directly, but to the war that scarred America's soul and divided its people like no other.

He said that in honouring the obligations to those who have fought "we are keeping faith with the ideals of service and sacrifice upon which this republic was founded".

"And if we're honest with ourselves, we will admit there have been times where we, as a nation, have betrayed that sacred trust. Our Vietnam veterans served with great honour, and they often came home greeted not with gratitude or support but with condemnation and neglect. That's something that will never happen again."

The comparison is interesting not just because you can hardly move in this town for articles comparing Afghanistan to Vietnam.

It is interesting because of Iraq. Such is the reverence for the military in America that even at the height of opposition, there was no suggestion that those who fought there should be regarded as anything less than heroes.

President Obama did not support the Iraq war and campaigned on a promise to bring troops home. But his language could be taken as reassurance to veterans of that war, that they will be honoured whatever the verdict on the politicians who sent them to fight.

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The president's morning will begin laying wreaths for Veterans Day; it may end with him very much closer to a decision to send more troops to a foreign war.

He's just come back from honouring the dead at Fort Hood - not killed in a war, but almost certainly killed as a result of wars.

As the ceremony began soldiers wounded in the shooting made their painful way down the steps, on crutches, helped by friends, clutching on to the side of stone steps. It must have been even more difficult for the bereaved, walking past the shrines to the memory of the dead. For each, a pair of boots, a gun, a helmet, and a photograph.

It was a ceremony designed to wring tears. A group of solders at roll call, some shouting their presence, then silence when the names of those who died were called. The last post, or taps, as it is called here, is always moving.

This is a ceremony to emphasise the sorrow of loss and to make some sort of sense out of it with talk of heroism and sacrifice.

The president has to fulfil so many roles. The head of state. Commander-in-chief. And the person who sums up the mood of the nation, and who should strike the right tone. What is called here, somewhat tritely, "healer in chief".

There has been a lot of debate, here and elsewhere, about whether politicians and the media have played down possible religious motives of the killer. The president did not: "No faith justifies these murderous and craven acts; no just and loving God looks upon them with favour.  For what he has done, we know that the killer will be met with justice - in this world, and the next."

If the president automatically adopts roles like commander in chief he may also have to automatically adopt a set of values, even when he is talking in part about a war in Iraq, which he did not support. He talked of the military's greatness, the values they were fighting for "to protect our people, while giving others half a world away the chance to lead a better life". He said no march on a capital, or surrender ceremony would mark military victory in today's wars "in a world of threats that no know borders, their legacy will be marked in the safety of our cities and towns, and the security and opportunity that's extended abroad".

This synergy, protecting the homeland by improving the life of foreigners far away, is the logic of Obama's war. The president will again be trying to decide what practical measures can possibly achieve this later today. It is his eighth, possibly last, probably critical, meeting on strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He will have before him four options. There is one that is proposed by General McChrystal, the others aren't being spelt out, but they all include sending more troops. One senior source told the BBC that whichever option was chosen, the focus would be on protection and training rather than going out and seeking to kill the Taliban.

There's a sense that a decision isn't far away. An announcement may be a different matter. I may be proved wrong later today, but it seems unlikely it will come before the president travels to the Far East, unlikely to be made while he is abroad - and that means we still have nine days or longer to wait.

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