FORMER US PRESIDENT George W. Bush made an embarrassing slip of the tongue when he accidentally condemned the “wholly unjustified and brutal war in Iraq”.

Bush quickly corrected himself to say “Ukraine”, before joking “Iraq too” and reminding the crowd that he was 75-years-old. 

The two-term US president was making a speech in Dallas about Russia’s war on Ukraine and was speaking about Russia’s persecution of political opponents he made the gaffe. 

The result is an absence of checks and balances and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq, I mean Ukraine.

Bush was president when the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq toppled dictator Saddam Hussein and ushered in one of the bloodiest periods in the country’s modern history, marked by sectarian warfare and the rise of jihadists.

Between 2003 and 2011, when the US withdrew its troops, more than 100,000 civilians were killed, according to the Iraq Body Count tracker. The invasion cost the lives of nearly 4,500 Americans.

Video footage of the gaffe has since gone viral online, with one post on Twitter having been viewed more than 14 million times in less than half a day.

It was also picked widely up by Arab media, stoking anger among Iraqis.

“The spectre of Iraq’s invasion and destruction haunts Bush Jr. His subconscious exposed it when it took over his tongue,” Iraqi journalist Omar al-Janabi tweeted.

“Yes it is a brutal and unjustified invasion which will remain your worst nightmare”, he added.

The US-led invasion of Iraq was launched on 20 March, 2003 after accusations that the Saddam regime had weapons of mass destruction. None were ever found.

With reporting by © – AFP 2022