By SUZANNE GAMBOA
The Associated Press
Friday, October 20, 2006; 7:43 PM

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, one of President Bush's most ardent loyalists on the war in Iraq, voiced her strongest criticism yet of the administration's reasons for going to war.

In a debate with her challenger in the Nov. 7 election, Hutchison, R-Texas, said she would not have voted for war had she known there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. But she also made it clear she does not support troop withdrawal.

"If I had known then what I know now about the weapons of mass destruction, which was a key reason that I voted to go in there, I would not vote to go into Iraq the way we did," Hutchison said. "But I have to say, I don't think the president would have asked for that vote, either. We had intelligence that we relied on."

Her comments Thursday night come as a small but growing number of Republicans are suggesting a change in the Iraq strategy may be necessary.

She recently has been edging slightly away from President Bush on the war. This week she told Texas newspapers the option of partitioning Iraq into semiautonomous regions should be considered.

The White House said it has rejected that option.

In July 2004, the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee found key U.S. assertions leading to the Iraq war _ that Saddam Hussein had chemical and biological weapons and was working to make nuclear weapons _ were wrong or based on faulty CIA analyses.

A September report by a Democratic Senate panel said the White House painted a portrait of Iraq of having ties to al-Qaida based in part on intelligence it knew was flawed.

Republicans attacked the report as recycled information and accused Democrats of election-year politicking on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks.

Hutchison's opponent, Democrat Barbara Radnofsky criticized the senator's debate statement, saying it was evidence the U.S. should not be in Iraq.

"It's clear the Senate papers reflect a lack of consensus or decisiveness that there was weapons of mass destruction. They were there, she just didn't read them," Radnofsky said.

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On the Net:

Hutchison campaign site: http://www.texansforkay.com

Radnofsky campaign site: http://www.radnofsky.com/