Germany issued its strongest denunciation yet of looming military action against Iraq on Wednesday and pledged to work with France to prevent war. But a Russian military source said Washington and its allies had already decided to launch military action from mid-February. "Our people can count on the German and French governments combining our powers and efforts to keep the peace, prevent war and maintaining the security," German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder wrote in the Berliner Zeitung newspaper.

President Jacques Chirac, speaking later alongside Schroeder in Paris, said France, which has the power to veto any U.N. Security Council resolution, shared Berlin's view on Iraq.

Those comments and the report carried by a Moscow news agency quoting a senior military source signaled a sharp increase in tensions surrounding the possibility of war against Iraq, accused by Washington of hiding banned weapons.

U.S. President George Bush is massing more than 150,000 troops in the oil-rich Gulf and has made clear he is ready to use them, with or without a new mandate from the Security Council, if he considers Iraq has not disarmed.

But Bush is hoping U.N. weapons inspectors will back his view when they report back Monday and he says the decision on whether to launch a strike has not yet been taken. "I will let you know when the moment has come," he said Tuesday.

RUSSIAN REPORT

Interfax news agency's specialist military news wire AVN quoted an unnamed high-ranking source in the Russian general staff as saying U.S.-led operations would be launched anyway once an attacking force had been assembled in the Gulf.

"According to the information we have, the operation is planned for the second half of February. The decision to launch it has been taken but not yet been made public," the source told the agency, which has generally authoritative contacts in the Russian military and political establishment.

The source did not indicate how the Russian military had obtained such information, but added that the main aim of the operation was not so much to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein  but to secure U.S. control over Iraqi oilfields.

Russia has a major commercial interest in Iraqi oil and has made clear its eagerness to exploit Iraq's huge reserves once U.N. sanctions are lifted.

"The war will be short, lasting about one month," the Russian source was quoted as saying.

Moscow and Paris, which is also a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, are cautioning against U.S action in Iraq now while U.N. arms inspectors are continuing to search for evidence of weapons of mass destruction there.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage flew to Moscow Wednesday for talks with First Deputy Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Trubnikov aimed at trying to convince the Russians that diplomatic options were "just about exhausted."

But Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Tuesday "most countries" believed diplomacy had a long way to run.

France has hinted strongly that it might veto a resolution authorizing force and Germany, which holds a non-veto Security Council seat, said Tuesday it would not vote for one.

Schroeder met Chirac in Paris Wednesday for celebrations their 40-year special relationship as the political and economic driving force of the European Union .

CRUNCH WEEK AHEAD

Hans Blix, head of a U.N. weapons inspection team which has been searching for banned weapons of mass destruction in Iraq for two months, is due to report back to the U.N. Monday.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the U.N. nuclear agency chief who will report with Blix, said the inspectors needed "quite a few months" more to finish their work. He told Reuters: "I am pleading for the inspection process to take its course."
Bush showed impatience with such statements Tuesday.

"It's clear to me now that he is not disarming," Bush said of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein. "Time is running out."

"How much more time do we need to be sure he is not disarming? This looks to me like a re-run of a bad movie and I'm not interested in watching it."

Oil prices hit two-year highs as the Pentagon  ordered two more aircraft carriers and 37,000 troops to the Gulf.

Britain, his main military ally, has also ordered thousands of troops to the region. Australia said Wednesday it was sending troops and the transport ship Kanimbla to the Middle East this week for a possible war with Iraq.

On January 31, Bush hosts British Prime Minister Tony Blair at Camp David which some see as a possible council of war.

Turkey, a staunch NATO  ally which has misgivings about helping start a war on its own doorstep, is to host a meeting of regional foreign ministers in Istanbul Thursday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, in comments carried by the official IRNA news agency, made clear he would call for everything possible to be done to prevent conflict.

"Iraq's neighbors must prevent the outbreak of a war and the interference of foreign powers in Iraq's internal affairs."

PHOTO ACPTION

Protesters set fire to an Israeli-American flag in front of the UN headquarters in Baghdad on January 22, 2003. Germany issued its strongest denunciation yet of looming military action against Iraq and pledged to work with France to prevent war. But a Russian military source said Washington and its allies had already decided to launch military action from mid-February. (Peter Andrews/Reuter