LONDON — President Chirac of France was accused of robbing French foreign policy of credibility yesterday after he hastily retracted a public claim that a nuclear-armed Iran would “not be very dangerous.”

Mr. Chirac, visibly muddled and bemused, told a group of journalists that France would not be concerned if Iran acquired one or two nuclear bombs.

“What is dangerous about this situation is not the fact of having a nuclear bomb,” he said. “Having one or perhaps a second bomb a little later, well, that’s not very dangerous.

“But what is very dangerous is proliferation. This means that if Iran continues in the direction it has taken and totally masters nuclear-generated electricity, the danger does not lie in the bomb it will have, and which will be of no use to it.”

Mr. Chirac told journalists from the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, and Le Nouvel Observateur that Iran would suffer massive retaliation if it ever launched a nuclear weapon.

“Where will it drop it, this bomb? On Israel?” Mr. Chirac asked. “It would not have gone 200 meters into the atmosphere before Tehran would be razed.” Mr. Chirac added that both Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the largest Sunni powers in the Arab world, would probably seek nuclear weapons if Iran’s Shiite regime acquired this capability.

The president’s interview, at the Elysée Palace on Monday, appeared to contradict France’s longstanding policy toward Tehran. Paris officially opposes any attempt by Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. As a member of the “EU-3” group that includes Britain and Germany, Mr. Chirac’s government has been urging Iran to stop enriching uranium, a process that could produce the essential material for making a nuclear bomb.

During the interview, Mr. Chirac, 74, appeared confused and distracted. Climate change was supposed to be the primary topic, and he spoke about this subject by referring to notes printed in large letters and highlighted in yellow and pink.

The French premier’s health has been a subject of public debate since he was secretly admitted to hospital in September 2005, suffering from a neurological problem affecting his vision and causing headaches. Despite this, Mr. Chirac’s official position is that he may stand for re-election in April’s presidential polls.

Barely 24 hours after the interview, the journalists were summoned back to the Elysée. Mr. Chirac, appearing more in command of his words, retracted many of his earlier remarks about Iran.

“I retract it, of course, when I said, ‘One is going to raze Tehran,'” he said. Mr. Chirac added: “I should rather have paid attention to what I was saying and understood that perhaps I was on the record.”

The newspaper Le Monde called the incident a “radical turning point” and said: “One asks what credibility the French position will now have?”