MUNICH, Feb 4: A senior adviser to United States Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld indicated war with Iraq was likely even if Baghdad backs down and allows inspectors back in to hunt for weapons of mass destruction, according to an interview on Monday.

“I don’t think there’s anything (Iraqi leader) Saddam Hussein could do that would convince us there’s no longer any danger coming from Iraq,” said Richard Perle, head of the Defense Policy Board of the US Department of Defence and a top Rumsfeld adviser.

Perle, quoted in an interview with the German edition of the Financial Times at the Munich Security Conference, said the only thing that would convince the US regarding Iraq would be a change of regime.

US President George W. Bush was now on “a very clear path” heading toward war with Iraq, said Perle as quoted by the Financial Times Deutschland.

The newspaper said if Perle was right even Iraq’s meeting the US demand for the return of international inspectors would do nothing to prevent American military strikes.

Perle said Afghanistan was a possible model for a war with Iraq.

Such a scenario would include massive US air strikes on Iraq, special operations units on the ground and the use of domestic opposition groups to carry the main burden of ground war, said Perle.

“The potential fighting forces would be Kurds in the north and the Shias in the south,” he said.

A leadership structure could be the Iraqi National Congress (INC), he added. The INC has long been regarded as weak and divided, the Financial Times Deutschland pointed out.

Perle repeated the view expressed by American officials at the conference that Washington was little concerned over European opposition to a war with Iraq.

“If we have to choose between defending the US without our allies and not defending ourselves with our allies we will choose defence,” said Perle.

“If the European message is: we accept risks posed by Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and don’t (want you) to do anything about it because it makes us nervous, then the European influence will be zero,” Perle noted.

He added: “Up until now the European recommendations have not been helpful.”

The German foreign ministry on Monday warned against a military strike against Iraq by the United States.

“There are no signs and no evidence that Iraq is involved in the terrorism that we have been discussing for several months,” said Deputy Foreign Minister Ludger Volmer.

The fight against terrorism should not be used to legitimize old enmities and settle old accounts, said Volmer.

Both Volmer and Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer are members of the Greens party which serves as junior coalition partner to Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s Social Democrats.

Asked about Volmer’s comments a foreign ministry spokeswoman, Sabine Sparwasser, said President Bush had assured at talks in Washington on Thursday that there were no plans to attack Iraq.

GERMANY: The German foreign ministry on Monday warned against a military strike against Iraq by the United States.