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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- North Korea must be punished for its test of a nuclear device, but the United States has no intention of attacking the communist nation, President Bush said Wednesday.
"In response to North Korea's actions, we're working with our partners in the region and the United Nations Security Council to ensure there are serious repercussions for the regime in Pyongyang," Bush said during a news conference in the White House Rose Garden.
"Together we will ensure that North Korea understands the consequences if it continues down its current path," he said.
Bush said the United States will respond to North Korea's reported Monday test by increasing its diplomatic efforts and bolstering regional allies' defenses, particularly in Japan and South Korea.
"The United States remains committed to diplomacy," Bush said. "The United States also reserves all options to defend our friends and our interests in the region against the threats from North Korea."
That includes helping allies with their ballistic missile defense and finding ways to ensure North Korea doesn't export its missiles and nuclear technology, Bush said.
"Our goals remain clear: peace and security in northeast Asia and a nuclear-free Korean peninsula," he said.
Bush took a veiled shot at the Clinton administration's 1994 "bilateral arrangement" with North Korea, in which the communist nation "agreed that there would be no program whatsoever toward the development of a weapon."
"And yet we came into office and discovered that they were developing a program, unbeknownst to the folks with whom they signed the agreement, the United States government," he said, emphasizing that the United States should not try to handle the situation in North Korea by itself.
Numerous nations must get involved to show North Korean leader Kim Jong Il that "when he walks away from the agreement, he's not just walking away from the table with the United States as the only participant. He's walking away from a table that others are sitting at," Bush said.
Committed to staying in Iraq
Bush also addressed the war in Iraq, saying he is committed to his strategy, despite a recent suggestion from former Secretary of State James Baker that the U.S. strategy in Iraq may have to change course soon.
Asked if he thought his strategy needed to change, Bush responded, "We're constantly changing tactics to achieve a strategic goal. Our strategic goal is a country which can defend itself, sustain itself and govern itself."
Bush rejected the idea that U.S. troops should be pulled out of Iraq because "if we were to leave before the job is done, the enemy would come after us."
"If we were to abandon that country before the Iraqis can defend their young democracy, the terrorists would take control of Iraq and establish a new safe haven from which to launch new attacks on America," the president said.
"We can't tolerate a new terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East with large oil reserves that could be used to fund its radical ambitions or used to inflict economic damage on the West," he said.
Bush also dismissed a Wednesday survey that states 655,000 Iraqis have died since the Iraq war began in 2003. The president said Gen. George Casey, the top-ranking U.S. military official in Iraq, told him the report lacks credibility.
"The methodology is pretty well discredited," Bush said.
Asked if he wanted to amend his own death toll, which was about 30,000 as of December, Bush said only, "I stand by the figure [that] a lot of innocent people have lost their life. Six-hundred thousand or whatever they guessed at is just -- it's not credible."
Bush said the violence in Iraq has spiked because of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, and because U.S. and Iraqi troops have more actively engaged insurgents there, especially in Baghdad.
"The violence is being caused by a combination of terrorists, elements of former regime criminals and sectarian militias," Bush said. "Attacks and casualties has risen during the Ramadan period. A rise in violence has occurred every Ramadan period in the last three years."
U.S. troops have increased their presence in Baghdad, and "together with Iraqi forces, they're working to ensure that terrorists and death squads cannot intimidate the local population and operate murder rings."
Wednesday's news conference comes as Bush and the GOP see their polls numbers significantly dipping with fewer than four weeks before the November midterm elections. The GOP also is ensnared in the scandal surrounding former Rep. Mark Foley's sexually explicit Internet exchanges with teen congressional pages.
In a CNN poll this week that found 75 percent of Americans feel Republicans handled the Foley matter inappropriately. Americans also voiced their overall displeasure with the GOP.
Fifty-eight percent of likely voters said they plan to vote Democrat in November, compared to 37 percent who say they'll cast ballots for Republicans, according to the poll conducted by Opinion Research Corp. The 21-point gap was five points wider than it was in a CNN poll the week before.
Other developments
• Bush said he was confident his party could retain control of the House and Senate in the November 7 elections. He said he expects voters to rally around Republicans because of economic strides that have added 6.6 million jobs since 2003 and pushed the unemployment rate to 4.6 percent. Security is another issue that will propel the GOP ahead in the polls, he said, as Democrats have voted against measures that would allow the CIA to interrogate detainees and allow the government to listen to phone calls involving al Qaeda operatives or their affiliates.
• Budget numbers for the fiscal year ending in September indicate the deficit has been chopped in half three years ahead of schedule, Bush said. He attributed the accomplishment to "pro-growth economic policies" that have restrained spending in Washington and allowed Americans to keep more of their income. He said he will continue to push Congress to make tax cuts permanent.
• Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has announced a plan to unite Sunni and Shiites, in a bid to end the sectarian violence plaguing the nation, Bush said. The plan will include a network of local and neighborhood committees that "will work directly with Iraqi security forces to resolve tensions and stop sectarian strife." Al-Maliki also met with tribal leaders in Anbar province who are prepared to fight al Qaeda and suspended a brigade of his national police after learning it was not intervening in violence around Baghdad, Bush said.
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