Time Is Running Out, Bush Cautions

President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair warned Friday that their patience with Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and the weapons inspections process is running out, and they urged the United Nations to act quickly or be deemed irrelevant.

“This is a test for the international community,” Blair said in a brief White House news conference with Bush.

Blair has been the president’s most resolute ally on Iraq. But the two leaders’ positions have differed slightly: Blair wants a second round of deliberations and a resolution by the U.N. Security Council to authorize any attack. Bush, although keeping open the possibility of a second resolution, says that is not necessary.

“Should the United Nations decide to pass a second resolution, it would be welcomed if it is yet another signal that we’re intent upon disarming Saddam Hussein,” Bush said.

But he made clear that he would not delay for long while the United Nations deliberates.

“This is a matter of weeks, not months,” Bush said. “Any attempt to drag the process on for months will be resisted by the United States.”

Despite three hours of talks in the White House residence, the two leaders did not appear to have moved closer together. British officials, however, said they took as a positive sign the fact that Bush stated for the first time publicly that he would welcome a second resolution.

Blair said he would like to see the Security Council respond quickly to a report to the United Nations earlier this week by chief weapons inspector Hans Blix, who concluded that the Iraqi regime is not cooperating fully with the council’s demand in last fall’s Resolution 1441 that it immediately disarm.

“What is important is that the international community comes together again and makes it absolutely clear that this is unacceptable,” Blair said. “And the reason why I believe that it will do that is precisely because in the original Resolution 1441, we made it clear that failure to disarm would lead to serious consequences.”

The resolution did not specify whether the “serious consequences” would include use of military force.

For his part, Bush reiterated his administration’s interpretation that “1441 gives us the authority to move without any second resolution.”

“Saddam Hussein must understand that if he does not disarm, for the sake of peace, we, along with others, will go disarm Saddam Hussein,” the president said.

According to opinion polls, opposition to a possible war against Iraq is growing, both in the United States and overseas, especially if the U.N. does not sanction military action. A second Security Council resolution would dramatically increase public support, the polls indicate.

The situation is particularly stark for Blair: 71% of British respondents say they would support a war with U.N. approval, but support drops to 22% if Britain and the United States were to act without U.N. support.

The two leaders were originally set to meet in the president’s suburban retreat at Camp David, Md. But inclement weather made a helicopter trip inadvisable, so the meetings were held in the White House instead, officials said. A dozen antiwar protesters marched up and down Pennsylvania Avenue in the drizzle outside the White House chanting: “Remove the sanctions! Stop the war!”

Officials said the two leaders had hoped to develop a diplomatic plan to win a second Security Council resolution. After the meeting, a British official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the two sides are now focused on Feb. 14, when Blix will give another report to the Security Council.

“There’s no question we will go for [a second resolution] at some point,” the official said. “The question is the timing.”

During their news conference, Bush and Blair appeared to be playing a kind of “good cop, bad cop” routine aimed at maximizing their diplomatic flexibility while cranking up the pressure on the Iraqis. Bush remained intransigent in his view that time is running out and that the United States is willing to act without a new U.N. resolution. Blair appeared the consensus builder, urging the U.N. to act.

“It’s important we hold to the path that we’ve set out,” Blair said. “They have to disarm. They have to cooperate with the inspectors. They’re not doing it. If they don’t do it through the U.N. route, then they will have to be disarmed by force.”

In a speech Friday, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell also sought to keep the pressure high, striking an increasingly hard-line position. Hussein is “not an enemy you can deter,” he said. “This is an enemy we must destroy.

“There is still an opportunity for war to be avoided, but it will not be avoided by us looking away, us turning away from the challenge, or us being so afraid of what war might bring that we are frozen into inaction,” Powell told a gathering of the World Affairs Council. “The way forward is to keep the pressure up, to use diplomacy to the fullest extent, to recognize Iraq wouldn’t have done as much as it has done now if it hadn’t been for the threat of military force.”

Powell acknowledged that U.S. policy on Iraq is not supported by “large numbers” of people in Europe and elsewhere, but he disputed that such sentiment reflects anti-Americanism. Even among people opposed to specific U.S. actions, there is “residual admiration and appreciation and affection for America,” Powell said.

Powell has become the standard-bearer of the Bush administration’s policy. On Wednesday, he is scheduled to provide Security Council members with new intelligence on Iraq’s weapons programs that administration officials say will demonstrate that instead of disarming, Hussein is deceiving U.N. inspectors.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) wrote to Bush on Friday asking that Powell brief Congress on the new intelligence before addressing the U.N.

The letter also was signed by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), the top Democrats on, respectively, the Armed Services, Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees.

The senators said a Powell briefing to the Senate would be “consistent with the duties of the Congress as a coequal branch of our government.”

Times staff writers Robin Wright and Edwin Chen contributed to this report.

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What’s next

Wednesday: Secretary of State Colin L. Powell is to present evidence of alleged Iraqi defiance to the United Nations Security Council.

Feb. 14: Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei are to report further to the Security Council from U.N. weapons inspectors.

Los Angeles Times