Obama: Nukes 'Not on the Table'

Democratic presidential hopeful, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., delivers a speech about terrorism, Wednesday, Aug. 1, 2007, at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. Obama said Wednesday that he would send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists even without local permission if warranted _ an attempt to show strength when his chief rival has described his foreign policy skills as naive. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak - AP)

Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee along with Obama, also took his rival to task.

"Over the past several days, Senator Obama's assertions about foreign and military affairs have been, frankly, confusing and confused. He has made threats he should not make and made unwise categorical statements about military options," Dodd said in a statement.

Pakistan has nuclear weapons and is politically unstable, raising concerns that the current military leadership could be replaced by religious fanatics who would be less cautious in using the weapons.

Obama warned that terrorists in the mountains of Pakistan are planning another attack on the United States, after already killing 3,000 Americans in their 2001 attacks.

"It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005." he said. "If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf will not act, we will."

In an AP interview Thursday, the governor of Pakistan's largest province said Obama's comments undermine crucial efforts to win Pakistanis' support for the fight against terrorists.

Baluchistan Gov. Owais Ahmed Ghani, whose province shares a long border with Afghanistan, said Pakistanis watch their soldiers being killed in the fight against militants and say, "If that is the sort of signal that is coming out of Washington, why bother?"

"Nothing must be said or done which will undermine the vital public support that Pakistan needs, the world needs," he said.

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Associated Press writers Devlin Barrett and Foster Klug contributed to this report.