PRESIDENT Bush has admitted for the first time that he misjudged the mood of post-war Iraq.
With the violent insurgency wildly at odds with White House predictions that US troops would be welcomed with open arms, Mr Bush conceded that he had made a “miscalculation of what the conditions would be”.
But in an interview with The New York Times he argued that opposition from armed militias was one of the unintended results of the coalition’s “swift victory”.
He also insisted that US strategy had been “flexible enough” to respond to events on the ground. His comments came ahead of the Republican convention, where Mr Bush will try to pull away from John Kerry, his Democratic challenger. Even before his keynote speech accepting his party’s nomination next Thursday, Mr Bush received more good news yesterday.
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A second poll in two days showed him ahead of Mr Kerry. The Gallup poll gave him a narrow lead on who was better equipped to deal with Iraq and a substantial lead on handling terrorism.
Other polls showed him ahead in Ohio, Wisconsin and Missouri, three key battleground states, although Mr Kerry leads in others and the contest in most swing states is deadlocked. The polls suggest Mr Bush was helped by the advertising blitz against Mr Kerry from Vietnam veterans.