A War of Words Led to Unanimous Iraq Vote

America’s victory at the United Nations that tightened the noose around Iraqi President Saddam Hussein capped a diplomatic campaign the Bush administration almost didn’t fight.

In the heat of this past summer, Vice President Dick Cheney and some others close to the president argued for war to overthrow Hussein and eliminate the threat of his suspected weapons of mass destruction. Seeking the return of weapons inspectors or U.N. approval of military action was a waste of precious time, they insisted.

But Secretary of State Colin L. Powell counseled that the best road to Baghdad actually went through U.N. headquarters in New York.

And so on a Friday in mid-August, after weeks of increasingly sharp rhetoric from the administration, the White House videoconferencing system brought the Bush foreign policy team together to resolve the issue: Bush and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice at the president’s Texas ranch, and Powell, Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld sitting at a conference table in the White House Situation Room.

Their discussion that day launched the United States on nearly three months of tortuous negotiations that led to Friday’s unanimous vote in the U.N. Security Council.

Along the way, there were behind-the-scenes efforts to defuse the crisis: an improbable mission to Baghdad by an Arab diplomat who suggested exile to Hussein, a failed bid to get Hussein on the phone with former South African President Nelson Mandela.

There were key moments behind closed doors when the diplomatic momentum shifted, such as the Mexican U.N. ambassador’s insistent questioning that tipped a doubting Security Council toward accepting what the United States wanted: a new resolution on Iraq.

There was British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s patient insistence on caution.

And there were the very public pronouncements of Bush, Cheney and Hussein that alternately reassured and frightened the world.

The resolution that finally passed was a diplomatic compromise, a textbook demonstration of the extent of U.S. power -- and an expression of its limits.

The United States won international legitimacy for its confrontation with Baghdad, the likely backing of key allies if war comes, and their help rebuilding a post-Hussein Iraq. Other nations also got what they wanted most: confirmation of the Security Council as the premier global authority to deal with international crises, and a process that gave peace a final chance.

More than any other time in memory, the United States used its global dominance to intimidate rather than persuade. Threats of unilateral military action, coupled with the knowledge that the U.S. had the means to carry them out, moved reluctant powers to stand against Hussein in a way few thought possible only weeks earlier.

Although the United States, too, was forced to soften its stance, and engage in dogged, patient negotiation, the result was a triumph of a new kind of American assertiveness based as much on political, economic and military dominance as it was on shared values or the quality of its arguments.

Intrigue in Washington

The fear instilled by America’s bellicose statements during the summer was no accident. For months, Bush and his aides had drummed at a single insistent theme: The United States was determined to overthrow the Iraqi leader.

As early as January, Bush made Iraq a central target of his State of the Union address, when he identified it as part of an “Axis of Evil” along with Iran and North Korea. Despite the shock of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the administration was replacing Osama bin Laden with Hussein as America’s public enemy No. 1.

Most alarming to foreign leaders, Bush repeated the message in private. He wanted them to know he was dead serious. After a visit to Bush at his ranch near Crawford, Texas, on Aug. 1, Jordan’s King Abdullah II was distraught; he believed a war with Iraq would bring a virtual “Armageddon” to his neighborhood.

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Abdullah was nearly as worried. He warned that the United States could not count on using Saudi air bases in a war -- an extraordinary position for a country that U.S. troops still defend against Iraq.

Bush and his aides were hearing appeals from all quarters to slow down. Republican elder statesmen such as Henry A. Kissinger and Lawrence S. Eagleburger weighed in. Blair argued that his own Labor Party would desert him if he joined an attack on Baghdad without an effort to get a U.N. resolution.

Over a four-day stay at his parents’ summer house in Kennebunkport, Maine, the president had “in-depth conversations” with his father about Iraq, a person close to the former president said, and those conversations appeared to affect the president’s thinking.

But inside the Bush Cabinet, two camps jousted. One, led by Cheney, argued against another round of U.N. inspections. The other, headed by Powell, underscored the benefits of a broad international coalition.

During the summer, Powell and Blair could sense that Bush was moving to their side, if only as a practical matter. “It became clear that we could not go to war nearly as well -- if at all -- without a resolution,” a senior U.S. official said.

On Aug. 16, Rice flew to Bush’s Texas ranch to act as moderator of a videoconference of the administration’s most senior foreign policy and defense officials.

Rice gave the floor to Powell. Appearing on the flat, four-paned video screen, the secretary of State said they all agreed that “regime change” was the right goal. The question was how best to accomplish it.

U.S. allies in Europe and the Arab world, including countries important to any military operation, were virtually unanimous about the need for U.N. agreement. For many of them, it would become a matter of principle: an attack not sanctioned by the U.N., they insisted, would be the first step toward an international law of the jungle.

Powell told Cheney and the other hawks that it was worth trying for a tough U.N. resolution that would launch stringent arms inspections. If the U.N. couldn’t agree, he said, the U.S. would still come out ahead; merely trying, he said, would make it easier for others to join a coalition against Hussein.

In any case, he promised, the United States wouldn’t give up its right to attack Iraq.

“If the Security Council doesn’t deal with it effectively, we reserve our right to do what is necessary,” Powell said, according to an aide.

There was a discussion of whether inspections could succeed. Powell agreed that the rules had to be much tougher. Rice polled the participants. The tally was unanimous in favor of trying the U.N. route.

The next steps were to draft a speech for the president to give at the U.N., quietly brief Blair and a few other close allies, and prepare a diplomatic campaign.

But Cheney still wanted to make sure his concerns were clear. Ten days after the Crawford meeting, he was scheduled to give a speech in Nashville to the Veterans of Foreign Wars. The vice president didn’t show the speech to Powell, but he did tell Bush that it would be “tough,” one aide said. “Fine,” the president reportedly replied.

Tough it was.

“A return of inspectors would provide no assurance whatsoever of [Hussein’s] compliance with U.N. resolutions,” Cheney warned. “On the contrary, there is a great danger that it would provide false comfort that Saddam was somehow ‘back in his box.’ ”

Cheney aides argued that the speech didn’t go beyond what had been agreed. But to the American public and the world, it sounded like an argument for invasion.

Less than two weeks later, on Sept. 7, Bush reassured Blair at Camp David that he was set on going to the U.N. However, the rest of the world didn’t know that. And that suited Bush just fine.

Prologue to Diplomacy

Cheney’s speech reverberated through Europe like a sonic boom. Such uncompromising language from the vice president led some governments to conclude that Washington had now closed off all options but one: war.

Suddenly, many of America’s closest allies found themselves more frightened about the prospects of being dragged into a U.S.-led attack on Iraq than they were about Hussein’s potential use of weapons of mass destruction.

Joseph Cirincione, director of the nonproliferation project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, visited Europe in mid-September. He recalls his surprise that even in traditionally friendly capitals, he felt a genuine fear of the United States.

“I was shocked at how weak they felt, how compliant they were, how frustrated they were that the United States no longer came to consult, but to lecture,” he said.

Washington’s talk of deposing Hussein also stoked angst in the Arab world, where footage of Israeli military action against Palestinians had become the nightly fare on evening television news.

Bush’s policy seemed to confirm the darkest of Arab suspicions: that the United States was out to control Middle East oil, strengthen Israel and harness Arab states into an American-controlled world.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak argued to nearly every leader he met that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict posed a greater security risk than Iraq. But he also told aides privately that Washington wasn’t listening.

Despite these worries, rhetoric from the region softened in late August. Arab leaders concluded that their voices were irrelevant in Washington, and they were afraid of being on the wrong side if the United States attacked Iraq and won.

Still, they did try to influence events.

Qatari Foreign Minister Sheik Hamad Jassim ibn Jaber al Thani traveled to Baghdad in early September and reportedly raised the idea to Hussein that he consider exile. According to credible Arab press reports, Hussein responded with the suggestion that his guest leave town immediately.

According to British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, both Mubarak and Mandela wanted to urge Hussein to comply with U.N. demands, but failed repeatedly to even reach him by telephone.

The reason: Hussein’s well-documented obsession with secrecy and security. Said Straw: “He thinks if he takes a phone call, then people might find out where he is.”

Others, including the British prime minister, also were working behind the scenes.

Blair tried to allay the fears of his electorate. It would be a mark of how he would conduct his diplomacy over weeks to come: whatever the private state of British nerves over Washington’s conduct, the Blair government would keep strict solidarity with the Bush administration in front of the cameras.

Differences were certainly there. The British talked about behavior change, rather than regime change, in Baghdad. London did not accept U.S. efforts to link Hussein to the Al Qaeda terrorist network. The British government was uncomfortable with Washington’s aggressive language and its effort to broaden the case against Hussein to include such issues as human rights and prisoner-of-war exchanges.

Still, Blair’s willingness to confront Hussein with a strong resolution backed by the real threat of military force made him America’s closest partner and gave him important influence.

Those around Blair are convinced that over time, arguments from Powell, the senior Bush and Blair coaxed the American president to try for a new U.N. resolution.

The question of war and peace in Iraq was about to enter the United Nations.

The Opening Gambit

Standing on the dais in the cavernous General Assembly chamber before ambassadors and foreign ministers from 190 countries, Bush issued his ultimatum to the United Nations. It was a challenge carefully crafted, weeks in the making, and it would shake the U.N. to the core.

Both hands gripping the lectern, he declared Hussein’s regime “a grave and gathering danger,” then challenged the world body to do something about it.

“Iraq has answered a decade of U.N. demands with a decade of defiance,” he said. “All the world now faces a test, and the United Nations a difficult and defining moment. Are Security Council resolutions to be honored and enforced or cast aside without consequence? Will the United Nations serve the purpose of its founding, or will it be irrelevant?”

The chamber was still, the president’s comments uninterrupted until the end. And then, it was diplomatic applause -- courteous, sustained, but not enthusiastic. It was polite cover for a range of reactions.

Compared with the summer of bellicose language from Washington, Bush’s appearance at the U.N. was reassuring -- as were parts of his speech. As a gesture of goodwill, he had announced America’s return to UNESCO after an 18-year absence.

He had also pledged to take his case against Hussein to the Security Council for “the necessary resolutions” that would finally hold Iraq to account for any and all weapons of mass destruction it might have. Bush detailed a powerful case against Iraq and its repeated defiance of earlier Security Council resolutions.

Bush had downplayed the goal of “regime change” in Baghdad. From the day of the U.N. speech, Bush and his aides simply stopped talking about overthrowing Hussein. “We had to change our emphasis” to win a majority on the Security Council, one aide said. “It doesn’t mean we abandoned regime change.”

Despite the skepticism of his audience, Bush seemed to gather sympathy for America’s central point: It was time to confront Hussein.

One veteran U.N. official recalled sensing a kind of euphoria that the U.S. was not rushing directly to war against Iraq.

But the American president’s words also contained a clear warning: Failure to pass a resolution tough enough for Washington would lead the United States to act on its own, and it would push the United Nations to the sidelines of global diplomacy.

Those present understood that if the United States was unable to persuade, it would bully. If that didn’t work, it would turn its back on the world body.

In practical terms, Bush’s warnings added one more dimension to an already complex, high-stakes debate: Every issue carried implications far beyond its face value. When the Security Council debated how soon Iraq should be required to reply to its demands, the question was really whether Iraq should be given a realistic chance to comply at all.

When the council debated the new rules under which weapons inspectors would work, it was also debating how onerous the terms of Iraq’s compliance should be.

And when the council debated how to determine whether Iraq had complied and how to decide what the U.N. should do if it did not, it was debating not only the future of Iraq but also the role of the Security Council in crises to come. The issue wasn’t merely whether the U.N. could disarm Hussein; it was also whether the U.N. could restrain Bush.

Said one French diplomat: “This is about the rules of the game in the world today, about putting the Security Council in the center of international life and not permitting a nation -- whatever nation it may be -- to do what it wants, when it wants, where it wants.”

An equally intense struggle unfolded as the council’s five permanent members -- Britain, France, Russia, China and the United States -- maneuvered to protect their own interests.

Britain sought a U.N. stamp of legitimacy for military action against Iraq, but it also wanted to prevent any isolation of the United States. Russia worried about its economic and political stakes in the Middle East, but even more about American unilateral action and the council’s credibility.

France also sought to protect its interests. However, it was a belief that unilateral U.S. action would be the first step toward a might-makes-right world that led Paris to openly challenge the United States and then lead the search for compromise.

China, unhappy about any intervention in another country’s affairs, remained on the fringes.

With little support or enthusiasm in the council to confront Hussein, Washington resorted to a variety of tactics to push its hard line. Its initial method, however, seemed to be intimidation.

The Early Going

Confident of its power, the United States entered the diplomatic fray with a full head of steam.

At the U.N., in Europe -- and in Baghdad -- a sense of despair began to grip diplomats as expected resistance within the U.S., from congressional Democrats, the media and a small antiwar movement, melted.

Within days of Bush’s speech, the U.S. floated a sweeping draft resolution that declared Iraq “in material breach” of existing U.N. resolutions -- wording that international legal experts claimed would justify punitive action.

It set out demands ranging from armed escorts for inspectors to an accounting of Iraqi-held prisoners from the 1991 Persian Gulf War and then authorized the use of “all necessary means” should Hussein refuse. The term is a diplomatic euphemism for an armed attack.

The Americans knew that the draft wouldn’t fly. In fact, it was submitted in part as a sop to administration hard-liners.

“It had everything but the kitchen sink in it,” one official said. “It was drafted by committee, and nothing got taken out.”

The response among council members was predictably negative.

In both tone and content, they saw the U.S. draft not as a first step toward a peaceful solution, but as a de facto declaration of war.

Instead of being the opening shot in a swift diplomatic blitzkrieg, the harsh U.S. draft mobilized opposition. Almost immediately, France countered with its own, more moderate, proposal.

In the meantime, Iraq drove a wedge even deeper between the United States and other Security Council members.

In a move that caught nearly everyone by surprise, the Iraqis delivered a letter agreeing to let weapons inspectors return for the first time in four years. The letter, signed by Foreign Minister Naji Sabri, added that the U.N. inspectors were free to resume their work “without conditions.”

The catch was that they could return under existing ground rules that Hussein had managed to flout in the past. But several Security Council members, eager to avoid a confrontation, seized on the offer.

Bush had managed to put the argument against Hussein in the U.N.’s own terms, listing resolution by resolution each measure that Iraq had violated and the U.N.’s own failure to respond. But Iraq’s diplomatic feint slowed whatever momentum Bush had built.

What surprised observers -- and added credibility to Sabri’s letter -- was that U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, working quietly with Arab foreign ministers and other senior diplomats, had helped put Iraq’s offer together.

On a Monday evening, after a day of swirling rumors, Annan stepped up to a microphone as he was leaving U.N. headquarters to welcome the letter as “an indispensable first step” in ending the crisis. Annan’s office sent the letter to the Security Council and, half an hour later, released it to journalists.

In his soft-spoken way, Annan had dropped a bomb.

Completely blindsided, the White House was furious.

Administration officials complained that Annan should have given Washington more time before he released copies to the media. They implied the secretary-general had been duped by a cheap propaganda ploy. Most important, they said, Annan shouldn’t have been working so closely with Iraq.

“He overstepped his bounds,” one U.S. diplomat said.

Annan, stung by criticism for what he felt was a sincere effort to find a peaceful solution, immediately bowed out of the process.

Still, the letter’s impact was considerable. Whatever its motives, it was a rare sign of flexibility from Baghdad and a reminder of the new unspoken reality in the Security Council: Most members were more frightened of the United States than of Iraq.

The incident led Washington to understand that, despite its enormous power, the diplomatic fight at the U.N. would be no simple walkover.

Europeans sympathetic to Bush’s approach complained that they weren’t certain of Washington’s true intent. Did the Americans really want to help the arms inspectors succeed? Or was it all a sham, designed to lead to a war on the earliest available pretext?

Powell and his aides understood. One aide said the lengthy debate gave other Security Council members time to realize that the United States would give inspections a chance.

But there was another factor at work.

“They also needed time for their own internal debates,” the aide said. “We were ahead of them [in deciding on a policy]. In some ways, the debate over the resolution also became an internal debate over policy ... in each capital. It wasn’t just the guys in New York. Going home for instructions meant that the people at home had to wrestle with the big issues.”

Powell was walking a tightrope. He had to convince Cheney and the other hard-liners in the administration that tougher inspections could work. He had to convince the Europeans that the United States was serious about giving diplomacy a chance. And he had to convince Iraq and its defenders that the only alternative to unrestricted arms inspections and disarmament was war.

Thus the two protagonists in the Security Council -- the United States and France -- had conflicting goals. The U.S. went to the U.N. hoping to strengthen its position in case of a conflict with Iraq and determined to preserve its freedom of action. France negotiated in hopes of establishing some limits to U.S. power, and particularly to deprive Bush of his freedom to attack Iraq at will. Neither fully trusted the other.

Some good personal chemistry helped Paris and Washington narrow their differences. France’s straight-forward foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin, had developed an understanding and a respect for the United States during his tour as a junior diplomat in Washington.

At the U.N. too, French Ambassador Jean-David Levitte -- already designated to become the next French ambassador in Washington -- and his American counterpart, John D. Negroponte, worked closely. The fact that both Villepin and Levitte had served as senior advisors to French President Jacques Chirac gave them added credibility.

In the end, it would be Britain -- historically tugged between America and Europe -- that would bridge the “trust gap.”

Blair worked to convince the French and Russians that Bush was not simply looking for a U.N. rubber stamp to back its goal of “regime change,” one well-placed diplomat said. But he also made it clear that the Americans were serious about eliminating the threat of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.

His message: “This is as good as you’re going to get.”

Coming Closer

In American eyes, the French draft proposal was appallingly soft. It contained no deadline for Iraq to formally accept the terms of a new resolution, or a time limit for Baghdad to provide a list of weaponry.

It made no reference to removing existing restrictions on inspections of sensitive sites, ignored the ideas of providing weapons inspectors with armed escorts or allowing representatives of the five permanent Security Council members to go along. It omitted any provision for interviewing Iraqi scientists away from the intimidating glare of their government.

It also included no consequences if Hussein failed to comply, stating only that the council should “convene immediately in order to consider any measure to ensure full compliance ....”

Although the initial U.S. and French drafts contained what one diplomat called “a lot of negotiating fat” that could -- and would -- be sacrificed, they also reflected real differences.

The U.S. and French drafts had achieved what all had hoped to avoid: They split the Security Council into two distinct camps, one including the United States and Britain, and the other with France, Russia, China and the majority of the council’s 10 elected members.

Although the latter group wanted to rid Hussein of any nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, it did not want to provoke a war. Many representatives were convinced that the existing rules for weapons inspections were good enough. The real objective, they argued, should be to get the inspectors back as fast as possible.

On the morning of Oct. 3, chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix addressed a deeply divided Security Council.

Blix, a deceptively canny diplomat whose slightly disheveled appearance masks a precise mind, had just returned from two days of meetings in Vienna with Iraqi representatives. Council members wanted to hear what Blix felt he needed to carry out effective inspections.

Did he need new and tougher rules as demanded by Washington and London? Or, with Iraqi cooperation, would his existing mandate work?

Blix made clear that he wanted a clear mandate and a unified Security Council. At the moment, he had neither.

But it was Mexico’s ambassador, Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, who pressed Blix with the ultimate question. Did Blix need a new resolution? When Blix slid off the point, Aguilar Zinser pressed again and got his answer.

“Yes,” said Blix. “A new resolution would be useful.”

According to those present, the reply seemed to shift the center of gravity in the council.

Washington had its first success. For France, it was time to choose.

Despite the popularity of their position, the French knew from the start that they could take a stand on principle and be swept aside, or search for common ground with Washington.

That they chose the latter was hardly surprising. The last time the French vetoed an American-sponsored Security Council resolution was at the height of the Suez crisis 46 years ago. According to U.N. legend, the French ambassador had to be locked in a closet after he refused to cast the veto, and his deputy carried out the government’s instructions.

In the current crisis, Paris was now ready to give the Americans more, including its agreement on a threat to use military force if Hussein failed to comply.

But the U.S. would give ground too. Lots of it.

Washington dropped the idea of sending the U.N. inspectors in with international military backup. Blix told the Americans privately that armed escorts would probably hamper rather than ease inspections.

Blix also convinced hard-liners in Washington that he would take a tough approach if inspections did get underway. He said he was glad the United States was threatening Iraq with military action.

“The threat of military force is the only thing that’s going to bring the Iraqis into compliance, and I need that,” one of the Americans quoted Blix as saying.

France still wanted a second debate in the Security Council on what consequences Iraq should face if it rejected or violated the tough conditions in a new resolution.

Straw and Powell came up with a possible compromise -- promising to go back to the Security Council for discussion, but not necessarily waiting for a second resolution. It would be enough to have the council agree that Baghdad was in violation.

The U.S. also gave up language calling for members to use “all necessary means” to force Hussein’s compliance -- wording that would have opened the door to war. Instead, Washington agreed to wording that Hussein would face “serious consequences” in case of noncompliance. For the Americans, the fuzzier language was still broad enough to allow military action. But this, the U.S. and Britain made clear, would be the bottom line.

The Final Push

The key players had agreed on what the United States considered the main issues, but the negotiations weren’t over yet.

France and Russia still worried that buried in its wording, the Bush administration could find the legal authority to launch military action.

The French thought that if the Security Council declared Iraq to be in “material breach” of its obligations under the 1991 cease-fire that ended the Persian Gulf War, it would be handing the United States a license to invade.

The United States protested that Iraq clearly was in material breach; the Security Council had said so repeatedly in the past.

Yes, the French replied, but we refuse to say it now if it might become an automatic trigger for war.

What ensued from mid-October right up to one hour before the Security Council voted Friday was a frenzy of long-distance telephone negotiations over just a few key words, mostly among four men: Powell, Straw, Villepin and Russian Foreign Minister Igor S. Ivanov.

On Nov. 2, the morning of his daughter’s wedding, Powell got on the phone to Villepin to work out how the Security Council would recognize a new “material breach” by Iraq.

The call was interrupted by Powell’s wife, Alma: “Colin, get dressed. We’re going to be late.”

Powell’s last conversation with Villepin that day was by cell phone, only 20 minutes before he walked his daughter down the aisle, an official said.

Over the entire eight weeks of negotiations, aides calculated, Powell made more than 150 telephone calls to foreign officials on Iraq. “We don’t have an accurate number because he’s got some of these guys, like Jack Straw, on speed dial,” one aide confessed.

“The ratio of diplomacy to actual words changed has been the smallest I’ve ever seen,” another aide said.

In Washington, Bush and Rice were frustrated at the slow pace. Powell reassured them that progress was being made. Still, at one point, White House officials leaked a warning that they might demand a quick Security Council vote -- roll the dice, win or lose -- just to get it over with.

The basic problem remained that the French and the Russians still feared that the United States might point to some clause in the resolution and interpret it as the legal authority to start a war.

When the United States and Britain formally introduced a draft text of the resolution Oct. 23, the French responded by circulating a draft of their own -- and described it as a means by which the rest of the world could restrain the out-of-control superpower.

Then, after a few days, the French announced that they had collected nine votes, enough to pass their version (unless, of course, the U.S. or Britain vetoed it). The Americans fumed; the French, their point made, backed off.

While diplomats in New York pored line by line over the text, looking for “traps and tricks,” Powell, Straw and Villepin worked through the larger points by telephone. They kept the Russian, Ivanov, in the loop, although he played a less active role, officials said.

In the last days of October, U.S. officials announced every day that they were making progress. But they were getting worried -- not only were Russia, France and China still resisting, but so were countries that they thought should be in their camp by then, such as Ireland, Mexico, Cameroon and Mauritius.

They ratcheted up the pressure, demanding that Mauritius make its support of the U.S. clear. When the country’s soft-spoken ambassador disappeared over the weekend -- recalled by his government -- his absence sent a clear message.

The United States announced that it now had two key swing votes -- Ireland and Mauritius.

But they still weren’t over the top with the two that counted most: France and Russia.

The next breakthrough came when British Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock scribbled a phrase on the back of an envelope during one negotiating session: “Final opportunity.”

The “material breach” problem could be solved if the resolution also made it clear that Iraq could have one more chance to comply. So a new paragraph was added, saying the council was giving Iraq “a final opportunity to comply with its disarmament obligations.”

In another important step -- the one Powell worked out only minutes before his daughter’s wedding -- Villepin agreed that France would not insist on a paragraph stating that only the council could declare a new material breach.

The Americans and British also were worried that Russia would object to the provision requiring Iraq to formally accept the resolution within seven days. They knew that clause was open to challenge, because as a matter of law, a Security Council resolution is automatically binding; most resolutions don’t demand a formal response.

But the Bush administration wanted the clause in there to give Hussein an early opportunity to reject it. To U.S. officials’ relief, the Russians did not object.

By Tuesday -- election day in the United States -- Powell and the foreign ministers were almost done. On Wednesday, the Americans and British released a new draft. The text went out to all 15 delegations in New York and all 15 of their capitals.

But the French and the Russians still weren’t comfortable.

Over the final 48 hours, the foreign ministers changed exactly two words. Instead of vowing to “restore” international peace, the resolution would seek to “secure” international peace -- a way to avoid suggesting that action needed to be taken immediately. In another paragraph, the word “or” was changed to “and.” That change locked in the two-step process channeling complaints of Iraqi violations and a decision on action back to the Security Council.

Most important, Washington’s willingness to give ground on that point reassured others that the United States and Britain weren’t looking for an authorization for war. They already claimed to have that. They were looking for international backing, they said. Finally, the rest of the council seemed to accept it.

Powell and Villepin took the changes to their presidents, who approved them late Thursday afternoon, Washington time.

At that point, Powell telephoned Ivanov to tell him that the French had agreed.

Ivanov “considered that to be a breakthrough that he wanted to take to President [Vladimir V.] Putin right away,” a U.S. official said. “So at that point, I knew that the Russians were very close.”

About 9 Friday morning, Ivanov called Powell in his office at the State Department and told him that Russia was on board. “Khorosho, da, “ the Russian told Powell -- “OK, yes.” The U.S. had the votes of 14 of the 15 Security Council members, including all five permanent members. Syria was expected to vote no; but 14 votes would be close enough.

A consensus, though, would be better, Annan told Syrian President Bashar Assad by phone Friday morning. Chirac called too. If the vote is unanimous, he said, war will be less likely.

Only minutes before the Security Council met at 10 a.m., Syria’s Fayssal Mekdad told his American counterpart, Negroponte, that his government had decided that it didn’t want to cast the lone “no” vote. Negroponte telephoned Powell from the hallway outside the council chamber. Powell, delighted, informed Bush.

The president had the prize he wanted: an international coalition demanding that Iraq disarm, and a strong new measure of international support if he decided to go to war.

“The world has now come together to say that the outlaw regime in Iraq will not be permitted to build or possess chemical, biological or nuclear weapons,” Bush said, standing in the White House Rose Garden.

“That is the judgment of the United States Congress, that is the judgment of the United Nations Security Council. Now the world must insist that that judgment be enforced.”

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Road to the U.N. resolution

Key developments in President Bush’s efforts to acquire a United Nations resolution on Iraq:

Jan. 29: In State of the Union speech, Bush mentions Iraq as one of three “Axis of Evil” nations that threatened world peace and the United States’ security.

Winter: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein begins replacing Osama bin Laden in Bush administration rhetoric as the individual posing the biggest threat to U.S. security.

Late summer: Talk accelerates within the Bush administration of “regime change” in Baghdad and a military strike against Iraq.

Aug. 16: Bush consults with senior advisors in

videoconference; all agree to take America’s case against Hussein to the United Nations.

Aug. 26: In speech to Veterans of Foreign Wars, Vice President Dick Cheney says the return of U.N. weapons inspectors to Iraq would be a waste of time.

Sept. 12: President Bush addresses United Nations General Assembly, tells world body it must act against Hussein or face irrelevance.

Sept. 26: Toughly worded first U.S. draft resolution on Iraq gains support of Britain, followed a few days later by a softer French draft, but neither is formally presented.

Oct. 7: Bush addresses the nation on Iraq in speech aimed at building congressional support for administration’s hard line.

Oct. 10 and 11: First, the House of Representatives, then the Democratic-controlled Senate vote overwhelmingly to give Bush the authority to attack Iraq.

Mid-October: U.S. drops some demands from its draft, France accepts stronger language as differences narrow between two of the Security Council’s five permanent members. America continues to resist France’s demand that if Hussein violates terms of new resolution, the U.S. must consult the council before launching an attack.

Oct. 23: U.S. floats second, more moderate draft resolution.

Nov. 6: Major differences bridged. Formal resolution sponsored by Britain and U.S. is tabled. Final details discussed.

Nov. 8: Security Council passes resolution imposing tough new inspections on Hussein and warns of “serious consequences” if he fails to comply.

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Sources: Times staff

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Times staff writers Edwin Chen, Sonni Efron, Robin Wright and Janet Hook in Washington contributed to this report, as did Sebastian Rotella in Paris, John Daniszewski in Moscow, David Lamb in Cairo and special correspondent William Wallace in London.

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