Even before the fighting stopped, the three European powers were moving to build bridges to the United States and Britain to ensure their companies get a share in rebuilding the infrastructure in Iraq.

France says it wants to be pragmatic, Germany says it is an honest broker because it has no economic interests in Iraq, and Russia says it will consider Washington’s call to forgive some $8 billion in Soviet-era debt.

All three have sounded conciliatory in the past week, while saying they want to see the United Nations play the lead role in postwar reconstruction — tactics widely seen as an effort to avoid being locked out of business deals by the United States.

Their fears are understandable, especially after the US House of Representatives passed a measure last week to bar French, Russian and German companies from winning business in Iraq after the war they resisted. The measure did not become law.

“Nobody in France is under any illusion about France’s place in the reconstruction of Iraq in terms of the contracts that will be awarded,” said Barthelemy Courmont, researcher at the French Institute for International and Strategic Relations. “Even before the outbreak of hostilities, we knew we would get nothing.”

France led the drive to prevent a war and threatened to use its veto at the UN Security Council to block any resolution authorizing military action against Iraq. But Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin recently warned against a “victor’s spoils” attitude in Iraq. “The idea that Iraq can be a sort of Eldorado, a cake that states can carve up, seems to me contrary to good sense.”

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who opposed an Iraq war in his 2002 re-election campaign, has been out of favor with President George W. Bush ever since. He has tried to tap his friend, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, to repair the damage.

“It’s always good for mankind when a dictator is removed,” said Schroeder, in the midst of a remarkable metamorphosis, at a meeting with Blair in Hanover. “No matter what the differences of opinions were before, it goes without saying healthy transatlantic relations are necessary and we’ll work toward that aim in the future.”

Blair, eager to help Schroeder out of the “Non-Nyet-Nein” axis, called the German leader “a good friend of mine”.

“Whatever the differences were before the war, the state of our bilateral relations is extremely strong,” Blair said.

Britain and Germany agree the United Nations should play a “key role” in the reconstruction of Iraq, Blair said after talks with Schroeder. “In principle, the UN must have a key role,” in rebuilding Iraq, said Blair. “The important thing is to agree the principle of that role, then discuss between us, diplomatically, the details of how that role must be fulfilled.”

“In principle at least we agree on, that the United Nations should have the role of an umbrella in that situation, whether you call it a vital role, or a central role, I think that is all words and terminology,” said Schroeder.

“We agree on the fact that there has to be this United Nations umbrella and I think it is ... up to the diplomats to then sit down and nail down the whereabouts and the specifics of that umbrella,” he said.

Prior to their meeting in Schroeder’s hometown of Hanover, the chancellor had only employed the term “central role” to describe how the United Nations should operate in the war-torn country.

Indeed his stance yesterday echoed words used by Blair himself in Belfast following the British leader’s summit there last week with US President Bush, when he said it was important not to get into “some battle about words of the precise role ...”

President Chirac and Bush held a 20-minute telephone conversation — their first contact in two months — bridging their deep differences over the war in Iraq.

The French president told Bush of “France’s willingness to act in a pragmatic way” on issues relating to the postwar reconstruction of Iraq, his spokesman Catherine Colonna.

In Washington, Bush administration officials have made clear the president will attend a G8 summit of industrialized nations in Evian, France on June 1.

But US officials have made clear in recent days that Bush is unlikely to reach out to mend diplomatic ties with the anti-war coalition, and they may well feel the sting of retribution.

The likely result is that those who opposed the US-led war in Iraq may well take a back seat when a new Iraqi government hands out business such as valuable oil contracts, and may be left out of the discussion in future international crises.

Schroeder has rejected suggestions that German firms were lined up to win lucrative deals in Iraq and seems mainly interested in repairing tattered relations with the United States. He has ignored calls in Germany to fight for business deals in Iraq.

“I think the discussion about who gets which orders is a bit strange,” he said. “That will be up to a democratically elected Iraqi government. To talk about that now is a bit macabre.”

Gernot Erler, a senior member of Schroeder’s Social Democrats, was more robust when addressing speculation that Germany will be asked to help fund Iraq’s rebuilding: “If we pay for reconstruction, German companies must get business deals.”

Defense Minister Peter Struck agreed, saying: “It would be absurd to demand Europe help finance reconstruction, then insist that certain European countries are not given contracts.”

Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said Germany should play a role because unlike Russia and France, “We don’t have any direct economic interests. We can act in a more balancing way.”

Political analysts said Schroeder’s evident discomfort at a St. Petersburg meeting last week with the Russian and French presidents showed their alliance was effectively dead and that each would pursue his national interest from now on.