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Washington: President George W. Bush said the biggest regret of his presidency was flawed intelligence that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and told ABC World News in an interview airing on Monday that he was unprepared for war when he took office.
Bush leaves the White House on January 20 with public approval ratings near record lows partly due to the unpopular Iraq war.
"The biggest regret of all the presidency has to have been the intelligence failure in Iraq. A lot of people put their reputations on the line and said the weapons of mass destruction is a reason to remove Saddam Hussain," Bush said.
But he declined to speculate on whether he would have gone to war if the intelligence had said Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction. "That's an interesting question. That is a do-over that I can't do," Bush said, according to excerpts from the recent ABC interview at Camp David.
Bush said the issue he was most unprepared for when he became president was war. "I think I was unprepared for war. In other words, I didn't campaign and say, 'Please vote for me, I'll be able to handle an attack'."
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