US Secretary of State Colin Powell's statement that "there are problems with the Iraqi declaration" on its weapons programmes might be compared to the call from astronaut on Apollo 13.

When an oxygen tank on Apollo 13 blew up mid-way to the moon in 1970 Jim Lovell said: "OK Houston, we have a problem."

Both were understated. Both were serious.

The "problems" over the declaration could relate to material unaccounted for when the weapons inspectors left Iraq in 1998.

Explaining what happened to it was the first test laid down by the US and Britain for the truthfulness of the Iraqi inventory.

When Iraq handed over the declaration on 7 December, in fact, it said worryingly that there was nothing new to say about this material.
..
It was made up of 300 tonnes of chemical warfare agents, including 1.5 tonnes of VX, 3000 tonnes of chemical precursors, growth medium for 20,000 litres of biological warfare agents and tens of thousands of shells and bombs for use in chemical and biological war.

Before there can be any military action either by the US or the Security Council as a whole, Iraq has to be in "material breach" of the resolution.

The resolution says that "false statements or omissions in the declaration...and failure by Iraq at any time to comply with and cooperate fully," would amount to such a breach.

Just how strong the word "and" is in the wording above remains to be seen.

It was put there instead of "or" at the insistence of France and Russia to lessen the chances of a mistake in the declaration alone being used as a reason for attack.

» Analysis: US 'problems' with dossier