Karachi, Pakistan ? When he meets with President Bush this week, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf will be looking for more than a pat on the back for helping the war on terrorism.

He wants economic aid and political support to strengthen his hand against Islamic extremists who have challenged him over the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s crisis with India.

Musharraf, who meets Bush on Wednesday, needs to show both friends and foes at home that he has the firm support of the United States as he seeks to steer Pakistan away from the fundamentalist course his predecessors followed for nearly 20 years.

To succeed, analysts believe Musharraf will have to show his people that the new relationship with America will bring tangible improvements to their lives. Some Pakistanis want Washington to forgive Pakistan’s $3 billion official debt, encourage U.S. investment in Pakistan and open the huge American market to Pakistani exports.

“He needs more of a reassurance from the Bush administration that the relationship that Pakistan is now forging with the United States is a permanent one and that after the war on terrorism is over, the United States is not going to abandon us,” said Riffat Hussein, a professor of international relations at Qaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad.

Despite Pakistan’s longtime support for the Taliban in Afghanistan, Musharraf was quick to promise “unstinting” support to the United States immediately after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Musharraf let the United States use military bases here to support the Afghan campaign.

That enraged the country’s vocal Islamic fundamentalist establishment, which organized nationwide protests and sent thousands of Pakistanis to fight alongside the Taliban.

Musharraf’s steps were bold for the leader whose country had been moving ever closer toward Islamic radicalism. The Jan. 23 kidnapping of Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl in Karachi is widely assumed to have been carried out by Islamic extremists seeking to embarrass the Musharraf government.

Musharraf’s decision reversed a steady deterioration in relations between Pakistan and the United States, which accelerated after this country tested nuclear devices in 1998 and after Musharraf overthrew the elected government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif a year later.

Washington cut off all military and humanitarian aid to Pakistan in 1990 to punish it for its nuclear weapons program.

Pakistan’s economy suffered as the country found itself increasingly isolated and under fire from its neighbor India for sponsoring terrorism in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.

But Musharraf’s gamble paid off. After backing the United States, most of the U.S. sanctions were lifted.

Bush’s invitation for Musharraf to visit the United States now rather than after parliamentary elections in October is widely regarded in Pakistan as a gesture of personal thanks.