U.S. May Be Forced to Go Back to U.N. for Iraq Mandate

The Bush administration, which spurned the United Nations in its drive to depose Saddam Hussein in Iraq, is finding itself forced back into the arms of the international body because other nations are refusing to contribute peacekeeping troops or reconstruction money without United Nations approval.

With the costs of stabilizing Iraq hovering at $4 billion a month and with American troops being killed at a steady rate, administration officials acknowledge that they are rethinking their strategy and may seek a United Nations resolution for help that would placate other nations, like India, France and Germany.

Administration officials contend that they are being practical, but within their ranks are policy makers sharply critical of the United Nations and those who would consider it humiliating to seek its mantle after risking American lives in the invasion that ousted Mr. Hussein.

The administration's quandary deepened today, when Russia announced that it would consider sending peacekeeping troops but only with a United Nations mandate that set out a specific mission and timetable.

About 13,000 non-American troops are now in the country, most of them British, compared with about 147,000 Americans.

Joseph S. Nye Jr., dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, said it would be philosophically hard for some administration officials to return to the United Nations.

"They'll disguise it; they'll find ways to excuse it," Mr. Nye said. "For some of them — in particular those who celebrated that we didn't use the U.N. — it will be painful."