“The Chinese, according to our records, have now established 60 Confucius centers here in the United States, but they are permitting only four of our centers to be built in China,” Mr. Lugar told Mrs. Clinton. “So I call this to your attention for some potential negotiations with [our] Chinese friends, as we try to extend this idea of diplomacy centers, which I think is important.”

Mr. Lugar suggested that the administration is resigned to the restrictions, noting that its 2011 budget request has asked for funds for just “eight to 10 American centers of public diplomacy” around the world, but “it’s not clear where those would be located.”

Mrs. Clinton responded that the administration is “raising the issue of reciprocity with Chinese officials,” though she made clear a change in the numbers is unlikely anytime soon.

“On the Confucius centers, the Chinese government provides each center with $1 million to launch, plus they cover operating expenses that exceed $200,000 per year,” she said. “We don’t have that kind of money in the budget, so we are limited in the numbers that we can do.”

It’s hard to directly equate the Confucius Centers in the United States with the public diplomacy centers the United States is trying to establish overseas. They’re similar in idea but are not identical:

“The U.S. centers are much more explicitly associated with the U.S. government, but on the other hand, they both have the same function, which is public diplomacy and outreach, and trying to present a version of the respective country,” said Dean Cheng, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation.

Mr. Cheng said China’s concerns about prospective U.S. centers most likely have to do with human rights, which are part of Washington’s outreach around the world.

He also noted that it is almost impossible for Washington to find a Chinese university to partner with that is not at least partially controlled by the Chinese government, which is not a problem in the United States.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the creation of the program in  May 13 commencement speech at New York University:

I am pleased to announce that over the next year the State Department will be creating Virtual Student Foreign Service Internships to harness the energy of a rising generation of citizen diplomats. Working from college and university campuses, American students will partner with our embassies abroad to conduct digital diplomacy that reflects the realities of the networked world. And you can learn more about this initiative on the State Department’s website.

So far, the biggest VSFS presence online appears to be on Facebook, where they recently set up the first country-specific page for Iraq.

The Iraq page has a modest number of fans – 218, with decent participation from Iraqis. Its mission is stated as: “VSFS is a critical tool for 21st century statecraft, applying technology to expand the practice of diplomacy beyond government-to-government to citizen-centered engagement. Iraq VSFS seeks to connect Iraqis and Americans in innovative ways to increase mutual understanding.”

Some of the recent posts include links to information about a U.S.-Iraq Business and Investment Conference in Washington, D.C., an opportunity for an Iraqi to go to the United States and intern with an IT company, and a query as to whether any students in Iraq would be interested in teleconferencing with two classes at a Wisconsin university.

One of the virtual interns for the Iraq project, University of Wisconsin student Antoinette Pick-Jones, has done most of the postings, while Mariam Hanna, an Iraqi medical student, has assisted with translations into Arabic.

Henry, a Foreign Service officer in Iraq, also is helping out with the Facebook page, and posted about a visit by engineers from Google to help with US-Iraq projects, like the Virtual Student Foreign Service, using technology:

The general idea is to harness expertise from U.S. companies to help Iraq develop – one company is developing pro bono a web site for the national museum, several companies will host some Iraqi IT engineers and we are working through this site to get more and more young americans and iraqis connected.

For those not on Facebook, there’s also a US Iraq Connect blog. According to the blog, over half of the Facebook followers are Iraqis.