Rumsfeld: U.S. won't rush to war

CAMP AS SAYLIYAH, Qatar -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld rejected suggestions Thursday that the United States is eager for war with Iraq, saying American officials intend to spend the next few weeks scrutinizing the weapons declaration compiled by Baghdad.

Rumsfeld spoke inside a partially completed press center being built at Camp As Sayliyah, a base in Qatar that likely would be used as a command post in any conflict with Iraq. He visited Gen. Tommy Franks and his headquarters staff, who are conducting a war game widely seen as a rehearsal for war.

Franks denied that the exercise was saber-rattling and said it was meant only to test his troops and a new, portable command post deployed from Central Command headquarters in Tampa. The 24-hour a day exercise, which was planned before the Sept. 11 attacks and began Monday, includes Navy, Army, Air Force, Marine Corps and special operations commanders in the region and the United States.

Rumsfeld also denied an American rush to war, saying it could take weeks to analyze Iraq's weapons declaration for signs that Iraq is in violation of U.N. resolutions, and also to discuss it with other members of the U.N. Security Council.

"A declaration that is in thousands of pages in two languages has just arrived in the early part of this week in the hands of the Security Council; it doesn't seem unreasonable for our people to look at it, read it and analyze it," Rumsfeld said. "My impression is the United States is not pushing too hard. What I've said here today is a reflection of it."

President Bush took a dim view of Iraq's declaration, telling ABC News in a report to air today, "I don't want to prejudge the report. But my gut feeling about Saddam Hussein is that he is a man who deceives, denies."

The initial U.S. assessment of the Iraqi report is to be given to chief weapons inspector Hans Blix today. An administration official said it will not be made public.

Bush has threatened to use military force if Hussein, the Iraqi president, does not allow U.N. inspectors to identify and destroy Iraq's chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Rumsfeld said it remained unclear whether war would be necessary and held out the possibility that Hussein would voluntarily disarm, noting that Iraq is now more cooperative precisely because of Bush's threat and the U.N. resolution.

"Because of those activities -- and only because of those activities -- there now are inspectors in Iraq," Rumsfeld said. "And only time will tell the extent to which they really are or are not going to cooperate."

On the outskirts of the capital city of Doha, Rumsfeld had earlier given a pep talk to several hundred troops. He reminded them of the death toll from the Sept. 11 attacks and said their mission is to ensure that such an attack does not happen again.

Commenting on a Washington Post report that Islamic extremists affiliated with al-Qaida might have taken possession of VX, a chemical weapon, in Iraq, Rumsfeld said the possibility "should come as no surprise to anybody."

But others strongly disputed the report. Iraq denied passing such weapons to Osama bin Laden's supporters.

U.S. intelligence has received reports -- of questionable reliability -- that al-Qaida has sought chemical and biological weapons assistance from Iraq. But there is no solid evidence Iraq actually provided any, officials said.

Also ...

PRELIMINARY CONCLUSIONS: American intelligence agencies have reached a preliminary conclusion that Iraq's 12,000-page declaration of its weapons programs fails to account for chemical and biological agents missing when inspectors left Iraq four years ago, the New York Times reported, citing unnamed American officials and U.N. diplomats.

Iraq's declaration on its nuclear program leaves open a host of questions, the officials told the New York Times on Thursday. Among them was why Iraq was seeking to buy uranium in Africa in recent years as well as high-technology materials that the United States and Britain have said were destined for a program to enrich uranium. The nuclear document is under review both in Washington and at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna.

INSPECTIONS CONTINUE: Six new sites were inspected Thursday, including a plant in a Baghdad suburb said to have been manufacturing Iraq's banned Hussein ballistic missile in the 1990s, and the Hateen missile launch site in the desert 125 miles west of Baghdad. The inspectors also went to an antibiotics factory, an electronics factory, another missile plant on a site that previously housed buildings engaged in nuclear weapons work, and a former uranium enrichment plant, all in or near Baghdad.

-- Information from the New York Times was used in this report.

© 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111

Contact the Times | Privacy Policy
Standard of Accuracy | Terms, Conditions & Copyright