SECRETARY POWELL: Thank you very much, Neil.

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, you spoke yesterday with a group of European journalists, and you said you were being flexible in offering the Security Council a second debate to authorize war should Iraq fail inspection, but you wanted to emphasize that the United States would not be handcuffed. What did you mean by that?

SECRETARY POWELL: What I meant was that the President really believes this problem has to be dealt with now, before it gets any worse, and he would much prefer to see it dealt with by the international community.

Iraq's offense is against the United Nations for ignoring the many resolutions that Iraq has been bound by for these past 11 years, and so we would like to see it done through the multilateral organization of the UN.

We want a tough resolution that puts in inspectors to go back in with the toughest set of standards to see if Iraq will cooperate. If Iraq cooperates, then we can find a peaceful solution to this if it results in their disarmament; but we also know that Iraq will not cooperate unless the element of pressure in the form of potential military force is there, and we want to make sure that that pressure is there.

Now, some of our friends in the Security Council say, well, therefore, that has to come back to the Security Council for its consideration, and we say, fine, it can come back to the Security Council for its consideration, but if the Security Council refuses to act, the United States must be free, with other likeminded nations, to act to deal with this danger.

But we will participate in whatever debate the Security Council chooses to have in whether a decision is made to provide a second resolution authorizing force or not, but the United States cannot find itself handcuffed to an extended debate in the presence of a new Iraqi violation and new Iraqi material breaches.

QUESTION: In the Los Angeles Times today, a French diplomat is quoted as saying, "This is a matter of principle. This is about the rules of the game in the world today, about putting the Security Council in the center of international life, and not permitting a nation, whatever nation it may be, to do what it wants, when it wants, where it wants."

SECRETARY POWELL: He might just as easily have been referring to Iraq than the United States. It's Iraq that has decided to do what it wants to do, when it wants to do it, notwithstanding the international rules of the road.

The United Nations passed 16 resolutions telling him to disarm. He frustrated, Saddam Hussein frustrated the inspectors for years, and violated the international community.

Now, is the international community supposed to simply say, well, oh, never mind, and look away?

And so the United States took this problem to the international community and is asking it to act. We hope it will act. And the one who is the violator of international standards and law is Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi regime, which has gassed its own people, gassed its neighbors, and invaded its neighbors. It's not the United States that's done all that, it's Iraq that's done all that.

QUESTION: Let me put the same question another way --

SECRETARY POWELL: Mm-hmm.

QUESTION: -- and this time, I'll get a quote from Francis Fukuyama who wrote, on September the 11th, "Americans are largely innocent of the fact that much of the rest of the world believes that it is American power, and not terrorists with weapons of mass destruction, that is destabilizing the world, and nowhere are these views more firmly held than among America's European allies."

SECRETARY POWELL: I don't agree with Francis, as much as I respect his opinion. The fact of the matter is, America isn't out terrorizing the world.

If you look at where American armed forces have gone over the last 10 years, they went into Kuwait to do what? To overthrow an invasion of a Muslim nation by another Muslim nation, Iraq invasion of Kuwait.

We sent our brave young men and women into Kosovo to do what? To rescue a Muslim population.

We sent our young men and women into Afghanistan after we were attacked by terrorists operating out of Afghanistan to do what? To free a Muslim people. And now, our young men and women are over there not terrorizing anybody, not threatening anybody, but building a new nation where people are free, where women can come out and participate in the society, where children can go to school and get an education that is useful, where reconstruction has begun.

1.9 million Afghan refugees have returned to Afghanistan since the United States invaded, as some might call it. What we did was free Afghanistan. And those 1.9 million Muslims are voting with their feet for the opportunity, to get to the opportunity created by America.

Our European allies know that. Most of our European allies participated with us in these efforts.

So although there may be disagreements from time to time -- as there is now between some of our European allies and the United States, but not all of them -- a number of our European allies are solidly supportive, the United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, a number of the Benelux countries, but it is not a monolithic alliance, transatlantic alliance, and there will be disagreements; and we work our way, through debate and dialogue, through these disagreements.

QUESTION: President Bush has been speaking today with Chief UN Weapons Inspector Hans Blix to outline inspection processes that could validate Iraq's disarmament. How much time would this take?

SECRETARY POWELL: That's a good question. A lot depends on the level of cooperation.

I was listening to an earlier segment of your show, and some of the callers said there must be cooperation, there has to be cooperation in order to have a good inspection regime, and that's certainly true. You're going to get a much better inspection regime with cooperation. If they don't cooperate, then it has to be far more intrusive as it was in the early '90s.

I can't tell you how long it'll take, but it's certainly a matter of months before Dr. Blix and the head of the IAEA, Mr. El Baradei, would come back and say, we have made our determination whether or not they are continuing to pursue this kind of technology.

And we understand that it will take time, and the President understands that that means that we will have to wait for them to do their work and complete their report.

When the President met with them this morning -- and I was present at the meeting -- he made it clear to them that we have confidence in them and that we're going to give them all the support we can so that they can do the job, and their job is to find out the truth, and the Security Council will then make its determination of what should follow.

QUESTION: I know you have to leave shortly, but can you give us a better appreciation of the timeline on a vote in the Security Council?

SECRETARY POWELL: I would say that we are narrowing the differences. I've been on the phone most of the day with my colleagues in the Security Council, and I think we're getting much closer, and I would say that this will break in one way or another, either with agreement, or if we don't get agreement, different sides can put down different resolutions to see who has the votes.

I think this is all going to happen, certainly toward the -- by the end of next week. I'd be surprised if it went into the following week.

QUESTION: Secretary Powell, thank you very much for joining us.

SECRETARY POWELL: You're quite welcome. Thank you, Neil. 'Bye.