The president is certain to press Maliki to embrace political inclusion during their Oval Office talks Friday.
Senior US officials do believe some progress has been made approving of Maliki’s recent visit to Anbar province and pointing to scheduled national elections in Iraq early next year.
They also privately note that so far, there has been little resurgence of attacks by Shiite militias in reprisal for activity by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, the front group for Al-Qaeda.
Washington is also increasing intelligence cooperation with the Iraqi government as it battles radicals.
“We really want to help the Iraqis have a better vision of what they face so they can target it effectively,” a senior official said, though declined to get into intelligence information.
Maliki is having to make his case for US military hardware amid skepticism in the US Congress of his performance.
“Unfortunately, Prime Minister Maliki’s mismanagement of Iraqi politics is contributing to the recent surge of violence” in Iraq,” wrote a bipartisan group of senators in a letter to Obama this week.
The senators want more cooperation from Maliki in curtailing arms supply flights from Iran to the Assad regime in Syria over Iraqi air space, and worry about Tehran’s influence in Baghdad.
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