NEW YORK, March 15: President George Bush has asked US Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld and the Secretary of State Colin Powell not to participate in the election campaign now full swing although elections are to be held in November.

In an interview with CBS programme "Face the Nation" on Sunday Mr Rumsfeld when asked whether he expected to be involved in the president's re-election campaign. "There won't be a role," he said. "The president has specifically asked Colin Powell and me not to be involved in the campaign," Mr Rumsfeld said.

Mr Bush and his aides are being pounded very day on the US led war in Iraq on the pretext that Saddam Hussein's regime had stockpiles of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, which were found.

With Friday (March 19) marking the one-year anniversary of the start of the war, the administration is aggressively defending its handling of the war. It blanketed the Sunday network news shows with its top military and diplomatic officials, who stressed the danger posed by Saddam and highlighted progress in rebuilding Iraq.

The war has become a top issue in the presidential campaign. Democrats say President Bush's poor planning and failure to build a broader international coalition have left the United States mired in a conflict with an extraordinary cost in lives and tax dollars.

Asked on CNN's "Late Edition" if the war in Iraq was worthwhile given that 564 US soldiers have died there, Rumsfeld said, 'Oh, my goodness, yes. There's just no question ... 25 million people in Iraq are free."