US looks to UN for extra help, Delhi waits, watches

The sources also acknowledged that even as the US determines the limits of how much it wants to let go, New Delhi has to simultaneously decide how far it could stretch the cover of a ‘‘UN fig leaf’’.

They pointed out that unlike Turkey, which would be happy to send a contingent of troops to Iraq on the invitation of the Iraqi governing council — something Ankara was said to have told de Mello — India’s position remained that such an invitation ‘‘would not be enough’’.

New Delhi believes that the 25-member Iraqi council, although it constitutes a ‘‘major step forward’’ in self-governance, remains subordinated to the authority of US representative Paul Bremer.

On the other hand, if a council invitation was backed up by a UN Security Council resolution that mandated an outside force to keep the peace in Iraq — on the lines of what NATO is doing in Afghanistan — then New Delhi would be happy to send a division-level force to the Iraqi northern sector, the sources said.

‘‘In India’s eyes, that would constitute an ‘explicit UN mandate’ as the Cabinet Committee on Security’ wanted about a month ago,’’ they added. It was unclear as of now what the US precisely wanted from a new resolution. Diplomatic sources said it could constitute a call to the international community to help Iraq out in its hour of need, as well as allow for some changes in the ‘‘command and control structure’’, something that would be of direct interest to India.

It was also not clear whether the US would bow enough to accommodate major naysayers like France and Russia in the Security Council. Both veto powers have insisted that the ‘‘occupying powers’’ label pinned on the US-UK coalition by UNSC resolution 1483 must first be abolished and the Iraqis allowed to truly govern themselves, before they can participate in any multilateral operation on Iraq.