Bush 'commits great blunder' over missing explosives

DEMOCRATIC presidential hopeful John Kerry yesterday accused President Bush of committing "one of the greatest blunders" of his administration in failing to secure hundreds of tons of explosives that have been stolen in Iraq.

Kerry said the Republican incumbent did not deserve to be commander in chief.

Eight days before the November 2 election, a potentially damaging report in The New York Times said that almost 380 tons of explosives vanished from an Iraqi military installation amid widespread looting after the US-led invasion.

"George W Bush, who talks tough and brags about making America safer, has once again failed to deliver," Massachusetts senator Kerry told supporters in Dover, New Hampshire.

"After being warned about the danger of major stockpiles of explosives in Iraq, this president failed to guard those stockpiles."

Kerry said terrorists could use the material "to kill our troops, our people, blow up airplanes and level buildings".

The New York Times reported that the interim government of Iraq had told Washington and international inspectors that nearly 380 tons of conventional explosives were missing from al Qaqaa, a sensitive former military installation.

The newspaper cited White House and Pentagon officials - as well as at least one Iraqi minister - as acknowledging that the explosives vanished from the site shortly after the invasion in March 2003.

Bush administration officials said the Iraq Survey Group, the CIA task force that searched for unconventional weapons, has been ordered to investigate the disappearance.

The Bush campaign dismissed Kerry's criticism of the missing explosives without responding to the allegations.