The White House faces a delicate messaging task next week as President Obama seeks to bring one foreign engagement to an end while making a new bid for American influence abroad.

Obama's return to Washington -- after 10 days in Martha's Vineyard and a quick stop in New Orleans to commemorate the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina -- will begin with an address to the nation marking the end of combat operations in Iraq (on Tuesday, the U.S. military announced that the number of U.S. troops in Iraq has fallen below 50,000 for the first time since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion).

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