'The Stakes Are Much Too High'

On the second Pakistani missile test:
Well, I would rather they hadn't done that, and we have expressed our disappointment that they are undertakingmissile tests at this very, very tense time. But they notified appropriately all nations around Pakistan thatthey would be doing it, to include the Indians. The Indians seem to be taking it in stride, but we weredisappointed that the Pakistanis decided to conduct these tests during a time of high anxiety and tension.

On whether the missile tests are aimed to intimidate India:
I don't know if that's their purpose or not. They seem not to have intimidated the Indians with this test,however. The Indians, as I say, have taken it in stride. And it doesn't seem to have caused the crisis to getany worse, but we just didn't need this kind of activity at this time, in my judgment.

On more missile tests:
I don't know how many they're planning to do. They said they would be doing several, so I don't know if therewill be more in the next couple of days or not.

On what, if anything, can or should the United States be doing:
Well, the United States is doing a great deal. First and foremost, we are working with the European Union andwe have been in touch with Chris Patten. We are also in touch with our friends in the United Kingdom. ForeignSecretary Jack Straw will be going in in a few days time.

And as you heard President Putin mention yesterday in his appearance at St. Petersburg University withPresident Bush, he hopes that at the upcoming meeting in Alma-Ati in Kazakhstan, where both PresidentMusharraf and Prime Minister Vajpayee have been invited to attend, perhaps an opportunity may arise forPresident Putin and other leaders to talk to these two leaders directly about the level of tension thatexists, and see if we can get back from the brink.

I have been in constant contact with both nations. I have spoken to President Musharraf four times in thelast several days, and with Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh of India. And so we are doing a lot. We also haveDeputy Secretary Armitage heading out to the region. So the whole international community is seized with thisproblem.

As Don Rumsfeld mentioned and as Chris Patten alluded to, it's a very dangerous situation. We've got to getback from the edge because they are nuclear-armed nations, and they also have huge conventional forces, so agreat deal of damage could be done if a war broke out. And it begins with stopping the infiltration across theline of control. President Musharraf again yesterday reaffirmed that he was taking action to match the wordsthat he has been putting forth for the last several months that that kind of action will stop. And now we haveto watch and see whether or not that action is truly stopped in a manner that all of us can see and detect,and especially the Indians can see and detect.

And the Indians have given us reason to believe that if that line of control infiltration action stops,then it will be possible to take other steps of a de-escalatory nature, and we can start to get our handsaround this crisis and not let it get any worse. We really do have to find a political solution. The stakesare much too high to see a conflict break out in this part of the world, especially with nuclear-armednations.

And I am encouraged that both sides are looking for a political solution. At the same time however, therhetoric is rather high and the mobilization is at a high level, so anything could happen, and this is thetime for all of us to be engaged and we are engaged.

On whether Musharraf is doing everything he possibly can:
He says he is, and we are looking for evidence that the infiltration across the line of control has stopped.And I am not yet satisfied that we have seen that yet, but we are looking very closely. He has given me directassurances and he has given the world direct assurances again in recent days. And as I have said to him in ourrecent conversations, I appreciate these assurances, but the only thing that is really going to count is thatthe action across the line of control does stop. And I hope he is doing everything in his power to make surethat that is the case.

On American concern that the Pakistani military may be moving troops away from the Afghan border towardsKashmir:
That is a concern we have. Obviously if a nation is mobilizing again -- they had gone to a lower level ofreadiness, but if they are mobilizing again and going to a higher level of readiness and start to move troopsor attention away from that western border with Afghanistan, that would be of concern to us, and especially toour military commanders in Afghanistan. We are encouraging President Musharraf to do all he can to work onthose tribal areas and to continue to cooperate with the US and coalition forces. But the kind of tension wesee now and the increased readiness for conflict and combat obviously starts to divert attention away fromthat border.

It raises another issue too, Wolf. We have US forces, US troops in Pakistan, in addition to Americancitizens and our diplomatic presence, and I hope both sides are taking this into account as they make theirdifferent calculations about what might happen in the future. All the more reason that the entireinternational community must work with India and Pakistan to find a political solution to this crisis. Thestakes are much too high.

On the US troops in the region:
The point I'm making is that they could be in danger, and I don't want either side to believe they're going toget pulled into this one way or the other: either that they can be put at risk by one side; or because theycould be put at risk by one side, the other side things that gives them greater freedom of movement. That isthe point I was trying to make: Don't think that the US troops can be used on either side in any contingencythat's coming up.