The US intervention in Iraq was hampered early on by a lack of adequate forces and effort to contain looting after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, according to the former US administrator in Iraq.
"We paid a big price for not stopping it because it established an atmosphere of lawlessness," Mr Paul Bremer said in a speech reported by the Washington Poston Tuesday. "We never had enough troops on the ground."
Mr Bremer's comments echoed charges by administration critics who argue that the US government failed to plan adequately to maintain security in post-war Iraq, the newspaper said.
In the speech yesterday at an insurance conference in West Virginia, Mr Bremer said US plans for the postwar period erred in projecting what would happen after Saddam's demise, focusing on preparing for humanitarian relief and widespread refugee problems rather than a bloody insurgency now being waged by at least four well-armed factions, according to the Post.
"There was planning, but planning for a situation that didn't arise," Mr Bremer was quoted as saying.
A Bremer aide told the newspaper that those comments, as well as similar remarks last month at DePauw University, were for private audiences and were supposed to have been off the record.
In a statement e-mailed to the Washington Postlate yesterday, Mr Bremer stressed that he fully supports the Bush administration's plan for training Iraqi security forces as well as its overall strategy for Iraq.
"I believe that we currently have sufficient troop levels in Iraq," he said in the statement.
According to the newspaper, Mr Bremer's statement said all references in recent speeches to troop levels related to the situation when he arrived in Baghdad in May 2003 "and when I believed we needed either more coalition troops or Iraqi security forces to address the looting."