It is hard to imagine that any American administration could mess up U.S. relations with NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which was established in 1949.

But, by lagging behind the evolution of relationships in the world and insisting on pursuing failed policies to their end, President Bush's administration seems to be doing just that.

The first problem is that Mr. Bush had the idea of passing off to NATO the defense of Afghanistan against a resurgent Taliban. Even though Afghanistan has been ground zero of the war on terrorism since 9/11, from the U.S. point of view the struggle there has been done on the cheap compared to the five-year war in Iraq. America's allies in NATO get that, do not support the war in Iraq and do not feel like picking up the U.S. slack in Afghanistan.

The second problem is that, for whatever reasons, the Bush administration seems determined to add as many Eastern European nations to NATO as possible. Whether to prove something to Russian President Vladimir V. Putin, or to write a line in Mr. Bush's legacy about having expanded NATO to 29 countries, the United States is now pushing the alliance to add three more marginally eligible members -- Albania, Croatia and Macedonia -- to the organization.

That was one of the principal objectives of Vice President Dick Cheney's recent overseas trip, during which ABC News reported him comparing Mr. Bush to Abraham Lincoln.

Albania remains a shambles as a country. Croatia's armed forces are somewhat credible, although one of its generals is on trial at The Hague for war crimes. Macedonia is in a long-standing quarrel with longtime NATO member Greece over its name.

These issues will come to a crunch at the NATO summit in Romania next month. It would not be wise policy for the United States to let bad policies in the final months of the Bush administration damage NATO, still America's most important alliance.