Washington, Aug 26: After a high-profile pitch at the United Nations for more countries to send troops to Iraq, the Bush administration is encountering resistance and may not seek a Security Council resolution after all, US officials said yesterday. "We have not yet made a determination," Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage told reporters, alluding to the possibility of a new resolution.

Other officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, noted the strong stand that some UN members had taken against the US decision to go to war with Iraq in March without the Council's blessing. Asked about the status of any new resolution, the US ambassador to the United Nations, John Negroponte said, "We're nowhere near a text on Iraq."

Secretary of State Colin Powell interrupted his vacation last Thursday to travel to New York and make the case for a new Council resolution.

Powell had hoped that outrage over the devastating bombing of the UN compound in Iraq two days earlier would make the Council amenable to a resolution explicitly welcoming a broadening of the US-led coalition in Iraq. But the administration has been sending contradictory signals about whether a larger force is needed in Iraq.

Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said yesterday that the United States "can afford whatever military force level is necessary and appropriate for our national security."

He said that if Gen. John Abizaid, who heads the US Central Command, believes additional troops are needed, "he will have additional troops, let there be no doubt about it." Bureau Report