The United States last night warned Iraq it could face "substantial" force to end the stand-off over United Nations weapons inspections, although France, Russia and the US were all exploring negotiated paths to end the crisis.
As the US Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, issued the threat - strongly backed by Britain - officials in Washington claimed that opposition among Arab states to punitive military action was waning.
In Iraq, hundreds of thousands of men and women in a volunteer army started a three-month training course to help defend Iraq in case of US attack, the Iraqi news agency, INA, said. The courses were being organised in schoolyards and on playing fields.
President Saddam Hussein called for the mobilisation of volunteers as Iraq marked the January 17th anniversary of the start of the 1991 Gulf War.
In Jerusalem before flying on to Kuwait, Ms Albright said: "If diplomacy runs out, we have reserved the right to use force, and if we do so it will be substantial." But she made clear action was not imminent: "It's not days and it's not months, so that leaves weeks," she told CNN.
Ms Albright appeared to have won Israeli agreement to keep a low profile in the worsening dispute with Baghdad - in return for an early warning of US strikes, antidotes to biological weapons and a swift US retaliation in the event of an Iraqi attack.
"Our commitment to Israel is unshakeable," she said. "Were Saddam Hussein to attack Israel or any of the other neighbouring countries our response would be swift and resounding."
In London, the Defence Secretary, Mr George Robertson, made clear that Britain remained reluctant to go for military action - because it is far from certain that this would force the Iraqi leader to comply with UN attempts to stop him developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.
But he said: "All he needs to know is that there is absolute resolution that if he is not willing to comply with the UN Security Council resolutions, then force is an option, and an option that will in extremis be used."
For all the deliberate public emphasis on military action, various diplomatic avenues are still being actively pursued:
France announced last night that the secretary-general of its Foreign Ministry, Mr Bertrand Dufourcq, is to go to Baghdad within 48 hours; President Yeltsin's envoy, Mr Viktor Posuvalyuk, left for Baghdad yesterday after telling Russian state television, "We have to try to get more concessions from them"; Ms Albright said Washington generally supported an expansion of Iraq's food-for-oil programme, which allows Baghdad to export $2 billion worth of oil in exchange for food and medicine.
Officials travelling with Ms Albright said her campaign to win support for military action was going much better than anticipated, especially in view of her failure to achieve any progress in the stalled Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
US sources were jubilant over a leaked letter from King Hussein of Jordan - who met Ms Albright in London on Friday - which squarely placed the blame for the escalating crisis on President Saddam.
Ms Albright, going on to Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, was not expecting open Arab encouragement in view of pro-Iraqi public opinion in the region, but is receiving different signals in private.
"We're getting a lot more Arab tacit support than the public pronouncements would lead you to expect," one aide said. "In fact, the message we're getting is: `If you're going to use force, do the job properly this time'. "
US officials also reported that Palestinian officials had been more ambivalent than in earlier pronouncements against military action.
The Palestinian President, Mr Yasser Arafat, sent an envoy to Baghdad yesterday with a message for Mr Saddam, a PLO official said.
Last night Kuwait told Ms Albright it would support US military action against Iraq if the current crisis made it necessary, a senior US official said.
Despite a Saudi statement yesterday denying US forces the use of air bases on Saudi soil for attacks on Iraqi targets, Washington is confident it will be able to use Saudi Arabia as a logistical base. Most of the 24,400 US troops in the region are on warships patrolling the Gulf. Half the 340 US warplanes in the Gulf also are sea-based.