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WASHINGTON - Robert Gates, US President George W. Bush's choice to run the Pentagon, said today America was not winning in Iraq and the next year or two would determine whether the Middle East explodes into violence.
Appearing at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee,
Gates said Bush wanted him to take a fresh look at the war and that all options were on the table.
"Our course over the next year or two will determine whether the American and Iraqi people and the next president of the United States will face a slowly and steadily improving situation in Iraq and in the region or will face the very real risk of a regional conflagration," Gates said.
Asked by Democratic Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan if the United States was winning in Iraq, Gates replied: "No, sir."
He later said he believed the US was not losing either "at this point."
Gates, a former CIA director, was chosen by Bush to replace Donald Rumsfeld as US Defence secretary after the president's Republican Party lost control of the US Congress in elections last month driven largely by voter anger over Iraq.
Gates said a military attack on Iran, embroiled in a dispute with Washington over its nuclear program, should be an "absolute last resort." He also said he did not favor an attack on Syria, another foe of the United States in the Middle East.
"We have seen in Iraq that once war is unleashed, it becomes unpredictable, and I think the consequences of military conflict with Iran could be quite dramatic," Gates said.
Senators have said they expect Gates to be confirmed quickly, partly as they are eager to be rid of Rumsfeld, an architect of the unpopular war.
Expanding on his fears about Iraq, Gates said he believed Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran and Syria would all get increasingly involved if the United States left Iraq in chaos.
"My greatest worry, if we mishandle the next year or two, and if we leave Iraq in chaos, is that a variety of regional powers will become involved in Iraq," he said.
Bush had Gates over to the White House for breakfast before the hearing and urged the Senate to move quickly.
"Bob Gates will be a fine secretary of defence," Bush told reporters. "I hope for speedy confirmation so he can get sworn in and get to work."
Many Democrats have advocated a phased withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, to begin in four to six months, and say their victory in last month's election gives that option a popular mandate.
Gates said he would consult widely on the options in Iraq but did not say which he favored.
"In my view, all options are on the table in terms of how we address this problem in Iraq," Gates said.
The outgoing committee chairman, Virginia Republican John Warner, hopes the panel will send Gates' name to the full Senate in time for a Wednesday vote.
That would be the same day the Iraq Study Group is to make recommendations to Bush on change of course in Iraq. Before he was nominated to the Pentagon Gates took part in the group, headed by former Secretary of State James Baker and Democratic former Rep. Lee Hamilton, which has spent six months studying the situation in Iraq and working out its recommendations.
Gates, 63, has no Pentagon experience but he is a former CIA analyst who ran the agency from 1991 to 1993 and is recognised as having a powerful intellect, even by his detractors. He left Washington in 1993 and is president of Texas A&M University.
Smooth sailing for him this week would be a contrast to his brutal 1991 confirmation hearings, when he was nominated to run the CIA and accused of having skewed 1980s intelligence to suit the Reagan administration's anti-Soviet views.
He also faced questioning over his alleged role in the "Iran-Contra" affair, involving secret US arms sales to Iran and diversion of profits to Nicaragua's Contra rebels.
- REUTERS