Lawmakers - Bush must decide soon to turn over evidence

WASHINGTON -- The White House must decide soon to release intelligence data to the United Nations and the public if the Bush administration is to make its case that Iraq is lying when it denies that it holds or is developing weapons of mass destruction, lawmakers said Sunday.

"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence" of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's weapons program, said Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Bob Graham, D-Fla.

The timing for the release of that information to Americans and the world, he said on CBS' "Face the Nation," "is going to be an important strategic decision for this administration."

He compared the situation to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, when the Kennedy administration came forth with information on Soviet missile sites in Cuba.

Baghdad, in releasing a 12,000-page arms document Saturday, denied it was producing or stocking weapons of mass destruction.

President Bush has rejected that and warned that continued Iraqi attempts to hide the arms could lead to military retaliation.

'Solid basis'

Last week, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said there was a "solid basis" for assertions that Saddam possessed banned weapons, and the United States would provide intelligence to U.N. inspectors. He did not say what the evidence was.

"It may very well be that the advice of our allies will be that we ought to go very public, that we ought to have worldwide opinion," said Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., the next Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman. "I think these are delicate judgments."

Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota told CNN's "Late Edition" that he supported going public with information that contradicts Saddam's denials. "We have to put our best evidence forward, especially if it's a question of Saddam Hussein again denying all of these assertions," Daschle said.

He said U.S. intelligence, the Iraqi arms documents and the results of U.N. inspectors must be scrupulously analyzed before the United States decides its next course of action.

Former Vice President Al Gore, speaking on ABC's "This Week," acknowledged that the administration "is really facing a difficult situation here" in deciding whether to stick to a multilateral, inspections-based approach or take unilateral action in response to Iraqi deceptions.

But he said that if it could be proved that Iraq is hiding weapons of mass destruction, the United States would be justified in using military force regardless of whether the United Nations had voted its approval.