LONDON (Reuters) - As President Bush rallied a global coalition for ``war'' after the attacks on the United States, he heard encouraging sounds of solidarity on Sunday but also fretful caution against hasty retaliation.In Europe, where NATO allies could offer military support in any action against the Islamic extremists suspected of the strikes, British Prime Minister Tony Blair vowed loyal backing. (Read photo caption below)
France, Germany and others, including former Cold War foe Russia, are also supportive. But there were anxious pleas, too, that Bush avoid setting the wider Muslim world against the West and critical voices were raised against U.S. foreign policy.
In Asia and the Middle East, where a war could turn hot, Muslim states kept an eye on radical Islam within their own borders but pledged logistical and moral backing -- including Saudi Arabia as well as Pakistan, which faces a particular dilemma if attacks are launched on its Afghan Taliban proteges.
Japan, still smarting from diplomatic embarrassment during the 1991 Gulf War, struggled to reconcile its post-World War Two constitutional neutrality with loyalty to its key American ally.
Nuclear-armed India, dogged by tensions with Pakistan and with a big Muslim minority at home, has offered intelligence and facilities as relations with Washington, long frosty, warm up.
China has said it is ready to join the U.S. superpower in fighting ``terrorism'' but pointedly insisted that peace, not war, is the best option and asking to be consulted on any response.
Bush declared a ``war'' Saturday on the still unidentified ''barbarians'' who launched Tuesday's suicide hijack attacks on New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington.
CRITICS SPEAK OUT
``The evil must be punished,'' Russian President Vladimir Putin said. ``But we should not liken ourselves to bandits.''
His defense chiefs have ruled out hosting NATO forces in former Soviet Central Asia or joining U.S. military action, although Moscow, with memories of its disastrous 1979-88 occupation of Afghanistan, says it will help with intelligence.
Around Europe, regular critics of U.S. domination of world affairs, of its support for Israel and policies toward Arab nations like Iraq and Libya, were also speaking out.
``I'm filled with dread,'' said George Galloway, a left-wing member of parliament for Blair's Labor Party, warning that Western military action could create ``10,000 bin Ladens.''
``You have to deal with the sense of injustice and grievance felt by millions of Muslims,'' he said on British television.
``The terrorism-war-terrorism spiral risks imprisoning the world in a destructive logic,'' Italy's Communist Party leader Fausto Bertinotti wrote in a newspaper article.
Conservative French newspaper Le Figaro said at the weekend: ``America,...blinded by its own strength, risks succumbing to a rigidity which would lead to terrible consequences.''
A poll for Sunday's Journal de Dimanche found that, while 68 percent of French people would support it, 21 percent opposed France being involved in any U.S. military response.
Commentators warned solidarity among America's allies could diminish as time passed after the shock of Tuesday's events and that a poorly targeted response would undermine any coalition.
Paddy Ashdown, former leader of Britain's centrist Liberal Democrats and an ex-soldier said a key element in holding it together would be for Washington to provide convincing evidence that those it targeted were definitely responsible.
``If you make this revenge, if you make this retaliation, then the chances of holding this coalition together are less.''
PHOTO CAPTION:
As President Bush rallied a global coalition for 'war' after the attacks on the United States, he heard encouraging sounds of solidarity on September 16, 2001 but also fretful caution against hasty retaliation. In Europe, where NATO allies could offer military support in any action against the Islamic extremists suspected of the strikes, British Prime Minister Tony Blair vowed loyal backing. Blair is shown here outside Number 10 Downing Street in London on September 12, 2001. (Ferran Paredes/Reuters)