Bush holds line on Iraq

President Bush went to the United Nations Tuesday with a message of both conciliation and resolve.

In a speech making clear that the war on terrorism remains the organizing action of his government, the president accepted a crucial UN role in the world, but did not waver on the rightness of going to war in Iraq.

In a sense, the message of Mr. Bush's speech to the world body was, as last year, a challenge: Let us together tackle gathering threats to global security, including terrorism, nuclear proliferation, and even scourges such as human trafficking, so the US won't need to resort to another Iraq war.

On Iraq, the president called for all countries to join in building its security and political foundation, but offered no concession to those who seek a quicker transition to full Iraqi sovereignty.

Bush spoke to a skeptical audience at the UN and a US constituency now split over the wisdom of going to war in Iraq. And despite the points he probably won with world leaders for emphasizing the challenge of "soft" threats like disease and poverty, some experts say he probably failed in his goal of eliciting more global support for Iraq.

"Bush showed he was concerned about a lot of the softer problems, but his real challenge was to get the UN members involved with more money and troops in Iraq, and on that I don't think he accomplished much," says Lawrence Korb, a former Pentagon official under the Reagan administration.

Mr. Korb, who ranked Bush's challenge to the UN last year among the president's best speeches, says his lack of specificity in what tasks he wants the world to take on in Iraq and what control it would have in doing so will leave countries shy about jumping in. "I don't see any promises of troops and money from this, and that's what the American public wants to see," says Korb, now a fellow at the Center for American Progress in Washington.

Bush maintained a focus on the moral rectitude of international action by using a rhetoric of black and white, and good and evil - a rhetoric that has made some countries uncomfortable, but is now expected of the president by his core supporters at home. In speaking at length about the scourge of commerce in human life as well as the international sex trade, Bush cited a "special evil in the exploitation of the most vulnerable."

By also focusing on his Proliferation Security Initiative, which seeks to unite countries in the interdiction of internationally transported nuclear materials, Bush is emphasizing a multilateral approach to global security. That reflects the tack the administration has so far emphasized in confronting both North Korea and Iran.

The US has pressed the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect Iran's nuclear program, and emphasized multinational talks with North Korea. Both efforts are proceeding, even as the two countries advance towards nuclear status.

Yet as the president's polite but reserved reception in the General Assembly demonstrated, the war in Iraq, unpopular with a majority of countries and deeply questioned as a model for preemptive action against a security threat, hangs over the international body like a sword.

In his speech opening the General Assembly's annual session, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the logic behind the Iraq war - unilateral preemptive action -- presents the UN with a "fundamental challenge" to the principles on which it was founded.

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