WASHINGTON - The United States is "perfectly capable" of taking military action against Iraq and North Korea at the same time, should that ever be necessary, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday.
Rumsfeld made his comments at a Pentagon news briefing, where much of the discussion focused on Iraq's apparent downing of an unmanned American spy plane yesterday and North Korea's statements over the weekend signaling that it might be reviving its nuclear reactor program.
Asked whether he thought the North Koreans might feel emboldened because of the U.S. focus on Iraq and the campaign against terrorism, Rumsfeld said: "If they do, it would be a mistake.
"We are capable of fighting two major regional conflicts," he said. "We're capable of winning decisively in one and swiftly defeating in the case of the other. And let there be no doubt about it."
But Rumsfeld sought to dispel speculation about a possible conflict with North Korea. Asked whether there was "a military option on the table" for preventing North Korea from manufacturing nuclear weapons, he declined to respond directly, saying that the Defense Department prepares for "a whole host of contingencies."
Over the weekend, a senior Bush administration official said that tougher measures against North Korea, such as a blockade or economic penalties, were not under consideration. But the official warned, despite President Bush's recent assurances that he had no intention of invading North Korea, that Washington might weigh "nondiplomatic" actions if the North moved much closer to building new weapons.
The loss of the Predator spy plane over the southern "no-flight zone" of Iraq and North Korea's renewed activity with its reactor program raised concerns in Washington about two of the three members of the "axis of evil," as Bush has labeled Iraq, North Korea and Iran.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard B. Myers, played down the importance of the downing of the spy plane, apparently by Iraqi aircraft.
"They got off a lucky shot," Myers said. "It's the same thing they've been doing the last couple of years."
Iraq has claimed that it shot down U.S. surveillance drones at least twice before, last May and in October 2001, and it routinely fires at aircraft from the international coalition that have patrolled over the country for years. But the incident yesterday was the first since the passage of the United Nations disarmament resolution in early November.
"They attempt to shoot down all our aircraft that fly over southern and northern Iraq in support of the U.N. Security Council resolutions," Myers noted.
In that sense, the Iraqi action did not represent an escalation of belligerence from the government of President Saddam Hussein, the general said. But the incident, coming only a few days after the United States rejected Baghdad's declaration that it is in full compliance with U.N. orders to scuttle its weapons of mass destruction, seemed bound to increase tensions.
Asked about Iraq's assertions that it is complying fully with the United Nations, Rumsfeld said, "They obviously aren't."
Bush has said repeatedly that if Iraq does not disarm peacefully, it will be disarmed by force.
The Bush administration's alarms over North Korea were heightened over the weekend, when the North Korean government said it had removed monitoring equipment installed more than eight years ago by international inspectors to make sure it did not use plutonium stockpiles to produce nuclear weapons. North Korea also said it was removing monitors from a nuclear reactor.
Experts say North Korea may be able to develop a nuclear arsenal within a year.