WASHINGTON, Nov 1: President George Bush saw his solid footing on Iraq and the "war on terrorism" erode just a day before the election, as a stunning new poll out on Monday showed his support in those areas had plummeted.

The issues had long been terra firma for Mr Bush, as he traditionally had enjoyed a hefty lead over Mr Kerry on both terrorism and the war in Iraq in most polls.

But a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll showed him with just an 11-point lead over Kerry's 43 per cent backing on terrorism among likely voters, narrowing the gap from a 22-point lead in an October 22-24 poll.

On the situation in Iraq, Mr Bush's backing slid to 51 per cent against Kerry's 47 per cent among likely voters, leaving him with a slim four-point lead, down from a 14-point advantage in the October 22-24 survey.

The Oct 29-31 poll of 1,573 likely voters has a three-per centage-point margin of error.

The shift suggested that bin Laden's reappearance, which most analysts had predicted would help Mr Bush, might have hurt him. It also came after Mr Kerry spent a week hitting Mr Bush over 350 tons of missing explosives in Iraq.

But there was no immediate indication what impact it would have on the heated presidential race, which four national polls reported as dead even and six others showed Mr Bush barely leading by one to three points.

After eight months and a billion dollars of campaigning, Gallup had the contest tied at 49-49 per cent, the Washington Post and American Research Group at 48 per cent and Fox News at 46 per cent.

NBC News, Zogby and Rasmussen pollsters gave Mr Bush a statistically insignificant 48-47 per cent edge, ABC News put the margin at 49-48 per cent, the New York Times/CBS News at 49-46 per cent and Pew Research Center at 48-45 per cent.

Independent Ralph Nader generally polled one per cent but still held the potential to siphon off crucial votes from Mr Kerry in some of the swing states, while the number of undecided voters was placed at between two and seven per cent.

The race was also maddeningly unpredictable on the state level, where both camps vied for a majority of the 538 electoral votes that decide the presidency and are awarded in separate, mostly winner-take-all, contests.

POTENTIAL REPLAY: Both sides braced for a potential replay of the cliffhanger in 2000, when Mr Bush won the Electoral College 271-266 after a bitter recount battle in the southeastern state of Florida that was settled by the US Supreme Court.