BUDAPEST --- Here and there in downtown Budapest, the bullet holes remain. It was more than a half-century ago when Hungarian freedom fighters dared to take to the streets and do battle with the Soviet Union. Expecting help – apparently promised but never delivered – from the United States, the Hungarians were quickly outmatched and paid a terrible price at the hands of the Soviet military.

Do they threaten US national security or are they simply a US national embarrassment? One test is to see if the cables show a secret diplomacy that is at serious odds with the public.

The diplomatic cable urged US to consider a new raft of anti-Bin Laden propaganda through the Voice of America radio station, interviews with Bin Laden victims, "commissioned articles" in the local press and an anti-Bin Laden website.

Here and there in downtown Budapest, the bullet holes remain. It was more than a half-century ago when Hungarian freedom fighters dared to take to the streets and do battle with the Soviet Union. Expecting help - apparently promised, but never delivered - from the United States, the Hungarians were quickly outmatched and paid a terrible price at the hands of the Soviet military.

The latest document dump from WikiLeaks reveals the diplomatic high wire the United States is often walking in its relationship with countries that are considered crucial allies in fighting terrorism, such as Pakistan.

Australia is spending tens of billions of dollars to ramp up our naval power, chiefly to stand alongside our US ally in countering what strategists view as an expansionist China. But China is still working out the way it will work in the region, says Wang Yuzhu, a top international affairs expert in Beijing.

Public diplomacy -- defined by the State Department as "engaging, informing, and influencing key international audiences" -- has become increasingly passé among American officials, scholars, and NGOS as a term and activity used to define how America should communicate with the outside world.

U.S Ambassador to Nigeria, Ambassador Terence Maculley has said that the United States of America will monitor the conduct of forth coming 2011 general elections to ensure that it is conducted in accordance with democratic principles.