President Bush's surprise trip to Baghdad this week underlined an unsettling truth about U.S. efforts in Iraq.

The war effort, and his own political future, now depend on Iraq's politicians. That's why Bush had to travel to Baghdad to shore up its shaky leaders. The U.S. project in Iraq will turn on whether the new Iraqi government can improve its own people's lives.

The administration long ago concluded that Iraq could not be stabilized by military force. Any chance of halting the sectarian violence depends on whether Sunni and Shiite politicians can settle their differences by political negotiation rather than bullets — and present a united front to the country. Otherwise Iraq's national security forces will split along sectarian lines with little chance of standing up sufficiently for U.S. forces to stand down.

When Bush grasped the hand of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, he was holding America's best hope of drawing down troops in the near term. After two weeks in Iraq, I would estimate that betting on al-Maliki is a long shot. But it is not a hopeless proposition.

The Iraqi leader has made several strong proposals in recent weeks about restoring security and services. However, he has limited powers. He has been hamstrung by infighting among his fellow Shiites and between Sunni and Shiite parties who were unable for months to agree on the key ministers of defense and interior.

Al-Maliki was given a boost by the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. But until now, many Iraqi ministers have been focused more on personal enrichment than on performance. The art of compromise is foreign in a country where, historically, winners take all and losers wind up jailed or dead.

A handful of competent government figures, however, grasp the importance of the moment.

"Now that we have appointed the security ministers," Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told me last week, "this government has no more excuses."

So here is a list of benchmarks suggested by Zebari and other ministers by which you can judge al-Maliki's progress in the days and months ahead.

First, the prime minister will attempt to restore security to Baghdad, which has fallen under the control of terrorists, militias and criminal gangs in the last few months. "Soon you'll see a major operation by U.S. and Iraqi forces to clean Baghdad," Zebari said.

A special force of army and police will be created for Baghdad, with a single commander, with a single uniform that is hard to copy. This force will control all entrances to Baghdad, and tens of thousands of men will secure the city district by district.

The idea would be to eliminate the current mess whereby many units police Baghdad but achieve little. Baghdadis don't know which units can be trusted or which forces may actually be sectarian death squads dressed up as policemen. No progress can be made in Iraq until the capital is controlled.

Second, al-Maliki will try to turn the lights on in Baghdad, which has had from two to eight hours of electricity a day in 115-degree heat. Iraqis can't run their fans, refrigerators, elevators or air conditioners, and these daunting conditions aggravate unemployment.

Al-Maliki has appointed a highly respected technocrat, Karim Wahid Hassan, to run an electricity ministry until now plagued by corruption, sabotage and lack of coordination between U.S. contractors and Iraqi experts. In Baghdad, more watts could mean revived morale.

Third, al-Maliki will try to promote national reconciliation — both at home and through a conference scheduled for Baghdad in late June or July and sponsored by the Arab League. Iraqi Sunnis tout the importance of such a conference; Shiites are dismissive. For Iraqi violence to decline, Iraq's Arab and Iranian neighbors would both have to stop their meddling.

U.S. help will be essential in pursuing his goals. But the greatest burden will fall on Iraqis, who must cope with a collapsed state and the consequences of U.S. mismanagement of the occupation. They also must learn to overcome sectarian urges and think of one Iraqi nation.

"Our job is to help them succeed, and we will," Bush told cheering U.S. forces. How long those troops stay in Iraq may depend on whether the president can keep his pledge.

Trudy Rubin is a columnist and editorial-board member for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Reach her at trubin@phillynews.com