Republican Jeb Bush reversed course on Thursday and said that based on information now known, had it been up to him he would not have waged war against Iraq, putting some distance between himself and his brother, former President George W Bush.
Bush, who is expected to run for the Republican nomination for president, told Fox News in an interview broadcast this week that he would have authorized the invasion, referring to the drive into Iraq ordered by his brother in 2003.
But on Thursday, after a week of criticism, Bush revisited the issue saying, “Knowing what we know now, I would have not engaged, I would have not gone into Iraq.”
Bush’s earlier comment fed a notion that there is little difference between him and his brother. George W Bush left office in 2009 with his popularity weakened by the Iraq war and a faltering U.S. economy. Jeb Bush, a former Florida governor, later said he misinterpreted the question.
Bush said he had been reluctant to speak his mind about the invasion because as governor, he had called relatives of military personnel killed in Iraq.
“It’s very hard for me to say that their lives were lost in vain,” he said. “In fact, they weren’t. We have the greatest military on the face of the earth.”
Jeb Bush has repeatedly said he would be “my own man” if elected president, but he has struggled to deal with questions involving George W. Bush’s war legacy.
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