WASHINGTON (REUTERS) — President Bush, rallying Americans behind a possible war on Iraq, said Monday that military action was not “imminent or inevitable” but that Washington was ready to lead a coalition against Saddam Hussein if he defied demands to disarm.
In a speech in Cincinnati aimed at Americans who are uneasy at the prospect of war, Bush said the threat from President Saddam Hussein’s suspected weapons of mass destruction grow more dangerous with time.
“If we have to act; we will take every precaution that is possible. We will plan carefully. We will act with the full power of the United States military. We will act with allies at our side. And we will prevail,” he said.
He spoke as the chief U.S. ally, Britain, attempted to forge a tough new U.N. resolution on weapons inspections with France, a key Security Council member, which would be backed by the threat of force.
The United States and Britain accuse Iraq of developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and are pushing for a U.N. Security Council resolution to allow intrusive inspections of suspected Iraqi arms sites.
Iraq has agreed to allow arms inspectors to return after a four-year hiatus, but under previous, less rigorous U.N. rules, in a move seen as intended to divide the international community and Security Council.
In his address, broadcast on cable-news outlets but not by the main networks, Bush said Iraq’s history and technological capabilities make it a “unique” threat, and that lawmakers’ willingness to give him authority to use force would “tell the United Nations, and all nations, that America … is determined to make the demands of the civilized world mean something.”
“Approving this resolution does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable,” he added.
He said Iraq has ballistic missiles with a likely range of hundreds of miles, far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey and other nations in a region where more than 135,000 American civilians and military service members live and work.
Bush, who accuses Saddam of backing international terrorism, said there had been high-level contacts for more than a decade between Iraq and al Qaeda, the militant Islamic movement accused of the Sept. 11 attacks on America.
France, like fellow Security Council members Russia and China, opposes a U.S. draft U.N. resolution authorizing use of force if Iraq fails to cooperate with arms inspectors, but has proposed that military action could be evoked in a second resolution.
After meeting in Paris Monday, the French and British foreign ministers indicated the differences over a new resolution had not yet been bridged.
“We have a close position, and we have the same goals,” said French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin. “We want to go on working together at the Security Council and hope to achieve very quickly a new resolution.”
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who stopped in Paris on his way to Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait and Iran to gather support for the U.S.-British line, said London would not necessarily be against a two-resolution approach.
Iraq had said it is incapable of producing nuclear, chemical or biological weapons after seven years of U.N. inspections in the 1990s and rejected as “lies, and fabrications” a report from British Prime Minister Tony Blair that Saddam could deploy chemical or biological weapons within 45 minutes.
Blair also said in a dossier last month that Iraq tried to buy uranium in South Africa to build a nuclear bomb.
In a 12-page report, circulated Monday at the United Nations, the Iraqi foreign ministry said its capabilities to produce biological and chemical agents were “destroyed during the 1991 aggression,” a reference to the Gulf War.
Iraq dismissed accusations that it tried to obtain black-market uranium as “a bogus lie.”
The United Nations said in Vienna its arms inspectors remained ready to return to Baghdad at short notice to resume their work, despite a delay caused by the discussions on a new U.N. resolution.
Villepin reiterated France’s opposition to Washington’s proclaimed aim of removing Saddam from power, saying the focus was on disarming Iraq, not on overthrowing the Iraqi president.
“We (France) have no particular sympathy for Saddam Hussein’s regime, but our aim and that of the international community is not a change of regime,” Villepin said.
Of the countries Straw will visit, Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait are all sympathetic to the West while fearful of what a war might entail. Iran, though suspicious of U.S. motives, is also influenced by its long-standing rivalry with Iraq.
Iran, which fought a war with Iraq from 1980-1988, said it would not object to a tougher U.N. resolution on Iraq but condemned any unilateral U.S. military action.
“Right now the resolution is on the Security Council’s agenda. If it gets approved, Iran would consider it as a fact,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters.
Iraq, meanwhile, is mounting its own diplomatic offensive. Foreign Minister Naji Sabri held talks Monday in the United Arab Emirates, the latest stop in a Gulf Arab tour to drum up regional support against a possible U.S. attack, and Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz left to visit Syria and Lebanon.
In Baghdad, Iraqi newspapers quoted Saddam Monday as warning the United States that his country was ready to resist any invasion: “With whatever weapons we have in our hands, and after depending on God with faith, and because we are on the course of righteousness, we are able to confront any aggressor, from wherever he comes.”
