WASHINGTON — The U.S. military's top officer warned Wednesday that an Israeli airstrike against Iran would make the Middle East more unstable and could add to the stress on overworked American forces in the region.
The comments by Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came days after he visited Israel and amid growing international concern that Jerusalem is actively considering such an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.
Mullen spoke at a Pentagon news briefing shortly after President Bush addressed the subject. Bush was asked at a Rose Garden news conference whether he would strongly discourage Israel from an attack, but he sidestepped the question, saying only that he believed the best way to deal with the Iranian nuclear program was through multilateral negotiations.
"I have made it very clear to all parties that the first option ought to be to solve this problem diplomatically," Bush said.
The comments appeared to reflect a strain within the administration as it grapples for a way to address Iran's nuclear program, which Tehran says is peaceful but Washington and its allies suspect is intended for developing atomic weapons.
Bush long has pointedly left open the option of military action by the U.S. or Israel, and administration officials have said they will not interfere with Israel's right to respond to what it sees as a looming threat. But American military officials are concerned that U.S. forces, stationed nearby in Iraq and Afghanistan, could become entangled in any conflict that would result.
The Bush administration is eager to keep the prospects of an Israeli strike on the table to maintain pressure on Iran to freeze its uranium enrichment program, said Jon B. Alterman, head of the Middle East program at the nonpartisan Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"There's a belief in the White House that we shouldn't give comfort to the Iranians," Alterman said. "We're not actively planning an attack, as far as I know, but we're not going to let the Iranians sleep well knowing there's no possibility of an attack."
Fears of an Israeli attack have been fueled in recent weeks by large-scale war games by Israel's air force over the Mediterranean and a warning by a senior official of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government that an attack could become unavoidable.
Although Bush did not directly answer the question about possible Israeli action, Mullen was more direct.
