Portraying himself as stronger on national security than the opposition Democrats is becoming a key campaign theme for Bush as his Republicans fight to keep control of both houses of Congress in November 7 voting.
Starting Thursday with a series of speeches on the war on terror, Bush will build up to this year's fifth anniversary of the September 11 al-Qaeda attacks on the United States and an address to the United Nations General Assembly eight days later.
As polls show that most Americans believe invading Iraq was a mistake, Bush has been increasingly candid about the problems with winning a conflict in which more than 2,600 US troops have died.
But he has rejected Democratic calls to set a date for a US troop pullout, saying that would encourage more violence.
On Wednesday, Bush said he wants to 'make it clear that, if we retreat before the job is done, this nation will become even more in jeopardy.'
As his first audience, he chose the annual meeting of the American Legion, the largest group representing US war veterans.
Bush's approval ratings have hit all-time lows because of public discontent over the bloodshed in Iraq.
But they bounced up after Britain recently said it foiled a plot to blow up US-bound jetliners in flight, a fact analysts believe was not lost on White House strategists looking ahead to Election Day.
'The key is that all of this violence and all of the threats are part of one single ideological struggle,' White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said Wednesday.
Democrats accuse the administration of whipping up doomsday scenarios to divert from strategic failures, setbacks and a lack of planning in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Democratic senator Charles Schumer charged that Donald Rumsfeld, Bush's combative defence secretary, 'doesn't have answers ... and we continue to lose ground when we are fighting the war on terror, whether it's in Iraq or anywhere else.'
Bush has sought to avoid portraying the Democrats as unpatriotic, saying he acknowledges their misgivings about his strategy but does not share them.
Rumsfeld was more direct. He incensed Democrats by warning Tuesday against 'moral and intellectual confusion' over the Iraq war and the US-declared war on terrorism, all of which presented a stark choice between 'right or wrong.'
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