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White House: Action not imminent against Iraq

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House said Tuesday that "no military action is imminent" against Iraq and that President Bush has not decided to use U.S. military power against any country he listed as a member of the "axis of evil" in his State of the Union address.

Senior U.S. officials described a months-long strategy designed to build international support for new diplomatic pressure on Iraq and said only if that failed to bring significant progress would the White House turn to the military option.

"No military action is imminent," White House press secretary Ari Fleischer told reporters when asked about Iraq. "No decisions are made," he said when asked if Bush had settled on the military option but not a timetable.

Other senior U.S. officials were critical of media reports suggesting a trip next month by Vice President Dick Cheney to 11 countries, mostly in the Middle East region, was a precursor to U.S. military action.

These officials said Cheney certainly would raise U.S. displeasure with the regime of President Saddam Hussein and make clear the United States reserves the right to use military force if, in its view, the Baghdad government did not keep its commitments to the United Nations -- including a pledge to allow weapons inspections to make certain it is not trying to rebuild its weapons of mass destruction programs.

Both Bush and Cheney use blunt language when talking about Iraq, and top advisers say they understand how people at international gatherings may get the impression the administration had settled on a strategy.

"It is also fair to say many of us are more than skeptical the guy (Hussein) understands anything other than the military message," one senior official said. "But having said that, there is a long way to go."

Diplomatic sources in Washington, for example, said in conversations Tuesday that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel emerged from recent meetings with Bush and other senior administration officials convinced, as one of the sources put it, "that in terms of Iraq it is a question of when, not if."

One key event will be the United Nations Security Council debate, now slated for May, on new sanctions against Iraq. The administration's short-term goal is to build international support for sanctions that include a demand that Iraq re-admit U.N. weapons inspectors. If Baghdad balks, the Bush White House would consider that an opening for a military confrontation, senior U.S. officials say.

The CIA also is trying to reinvigorate an oft-criticized U.S.-led effort to topple the Iraqi regime from within, administration officials say; but there is widespread pessimism within the administration that this approach will succeed.

"Let's assume a decision is made down the road to take the military route," one senior official said. "That would require a much larger force than anything we have in the region and anything we have planned to send to the region -- so there would be obvious signs of that possibility."