As foreign leaders weigh his detailed indictment of Iraq's arms programs, Secretary of State Colin Powell is trying to bolster congressional support for a possible war with Saddam Hussein . A senior White House official says the next 24 hours or so will be critical. During testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday, Powell planned to seek support for the Bush administration's view that weapons searches have about run their course and that Saddam is determined to defy U.N. inspectors and U.N. disarmament resolutions.

Democrats, especially, are reluctant to endorse war with Iraq even while agreeing with the Bush administration that Baghdad has a record of years of defiance.

On the Republican side, Sen. Pat Roberts of Kansas, who was briefed at the White House in advance of Powell's presentation to the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday, said he thought the administration would give the United Nations about a "two-week time frame" to digest the material Powell offered.

Roberts is chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Among Democrats, Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia said there were enormous risks at play. "But, faced with such a dangerous dictator who is building deadly weapons in defiance of international law, the price of inaction may simply be too great to bear."

But Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., said: "The threshold for starting a war through unilateral military action should be very high. It should require the presence of an imminent threat, or a solid connection to al-Qaida.

"Secretary Powell asserted that there is such a solid connection today. But classified briefings here in the Senate have cast real doubts on this assertion. I am troubled by this inconsistency," Feingold said.

Another Republican leader, House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois, said Powell made clear that "Saddam Hussein has a loaded gun pointed at the civilized world. It is time to take that loaded gun away from this evil tyrant."

In Baghdad, Iraqi officials dismissed Powell's case as a collection of "stunts," "special effects" and "unknown sources" aimed at undermining the work of U.N. arms inspectors in Iraq.

As for U.S. allies, most believe more weapons inspections are necessary before any resort to force in Iraq, although French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, speaking after Powell's presentation of declassified intelligence, left open the use of force as an option. He also called for more inspections in Iraq.

A Bush administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said French President Jacques Chirac holds the key to whether President Bush will seek a new resolution from the Security Council to authorize force against Iraq.

If Chirac insists on vetoing such a resolution, Bush will not seek one, the official said.

But if Powell determines in the next 24 hours that a resolution can be adopted, the next step would be to determine what it might take to get a consensus. One option is adopting a deadline by which Saddam would have to comply, the official said.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said no timetable has been set for disarming Saddam. "We'll see how people responded to the message" Powell carried to the United Nations, Fleischer said.

Bush watched a portion of the presentation with his assistant for national security, Condoleezza Rice , and other aides.

In the coming days, the pace of phone calls between Bush and foreign leaders and between Powell and foreign ministers will increase, another official said. But at the end of the short period of consultation, "there has to be a decision," the official added.

Although Bush has not made a decision to attack Iraq, the number of U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf region now stands at about 113,000, and it is expected to reach 150,000 by Feb. 15, a senior official said Wednesday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Rice, meanwhile, said on the ABC-TV "Nightline" program that "the Iraqis have one thing to do, and that is to come completely and totally clean about the many, many different questions that have been asked of them, the many programs that have been exposed today."

Methodically making his case that Iraq has defied all demands that it disarm, Powell presented tape recordings of intercepted telephone calls, satellite photos and informants' statements Wednesday that he said constituted "irrefutable and undeniable" evidence that Saddam Hussein was concealing weapons of mass destruction.

Powell also detailed intelligence that purports to link Saddam to supporters of al-Qaida. Post-Sept. 11, the alleged links center on a Jordanian named Abu Musab Zarqawi, whom U.S. officials describe as affiliated with Osama bin Laden .

Zarqawi left Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks and has traveled to Iran, Iraq and Syria. He spent two months in Baghdad last spring and summer receiving medical treatment, Powell said.


PHOTO CAPTION

Sen. Joseph Biden , D-Del., speaks at a Capitol Hill news conference, Wednesday, Feb. 5, 2003, about his reaction to Secretary of State Colin Powell 's speech on Iraq to the United Nations . (AP Photo/Terry Ash