US: President George Bush's former chief of staff tried twice to persuade the US leader to fire defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld but failed, the Washington Post reported yesterday, citing a new book, State of Denial, by investigative reporter Bob Woodward.
Woodward wrote that White House chief of staff Andrew Card urged Mr Bush to replace Mr Rumsfeld with former secretary of state James Baker following the 2004 election, the Post reported on its website.
Mr Bush decided not to do so after the vice-president, Dick Cheney, and political adviser Karl Rove convinced him the move would be seen as an expression of doubt about the direction of the war and expose him to criticism, according to the book.
Mr Card, with the backing of first lady Laura Bush, tried a second time to persuade Mr Bush to fire Mr Rumsfeld around Thanksgiving 2005, the book says. But the president again refused to act.
The book raises more questions about the administration's handling of the Iraq war only days after a government intelligence report suggested it was doing more to endanger US security than bolster it.
The book, written by the Post's assistant managing editor well known for his role in forcing President Richard Nixon to resign in 1974 in the Watergate scandal, put the White House on the defensive. Press secretary Tony Snow was besieged by questions at his daily briefing and said he had been unable to reach Mr Card, who resigned as chief of staff in March of this year.
A group of top senate Democrats promptly renewed calls for Mr Rumsfeld's resignation. "We believe, many of us, that he has to go and we are going to be renewing our efforts in a number of ways to urge the president to find a new secretary of defence," said Senator Charles Schumer of New York.
The book says officials in the White House and the Pentagon voiced concern about the conduct of the war in Iraq in reports and internal memos, even as Mr Bush, Mr Rumsfeld and other senior officials insisted publicly the situation was going well.
Secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and Mr Rumsfeld have both been repeatedly warned about worsening conditions in Iraq, Woodward wrote in the book. He said that a secret intelligence report circulated in May predicted violence would continue for the rest of 2006 and increase in 2007.