WASHINGTON, Oct 5: Iraq's former American administrator Paul Bremer has said that the Bush administration made two major mistakes in Iraq: not deploying enough troops and not containing the violence and looting immediately after the fall of Baghdad.

Mr Bremer, who governed Iraq after the US invasion and transferred power to an US-installed interim government on June 28, said Washington did not anticipate a widespread insurgency when it invaded Iraq.

The Bush administration, he said, had only prepared for a law and order situation and for a major displacement of refugees within Iraq. We never had enough troops on the ground to deal with a large scale insurgency, he told an insurance conference in West Virginia.

The looting that followed Baghdad's fall established an atmosphere of lawlessness and the US-led administration had to pay a big price for not stopping it, he said.

Mr Bremer said as Iraq's American ruler, he had advised Washington to revise its security plan but his suggestions were ignored. "The single-most important change that would have improved the situation would have been having more troops in Iraq at the beginning and throughout the occupation," Mr Bremer said. But the former American governor of Iraq said now he fully supports the Bush administration's plan for training Iraqi security forces and its current strategy for staying engaged with the interim Iraqi government.

"I believe that we currently have sufficient troop levels in Iraq," he said in an e-mailed statement. He said all references in recent speeches to troops 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".

Mr Bremer also said he believes winning the war in Iraq is an "integral part of fighting this war on terror". In his speech to insurance agents, Mr Bremer said US plans for the post-war period erred in projecting what would happen after Saddam Hussein's collapse, focusing on preparing for humanitarian relief and widespread refugee problems rather than a prolonged insurgency. "There was planning, but planning for a situation that didn't arise," he said.