Bush's Iraq troop increase a doomed gamble-Zawahri

DUBAI, Feb 13 (Reuters) Al Qaeda's second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri said U.S. President George W. Bush's troop build-up in Iraq was a gamble bound to fail, according to an Internet statement posted today on a US-based security Web site.

''(Bush's) addiction to gambling ... motivates him to continue to place losing bets until he goes completely bankrupt,'' the SITE Institute's Web page quoted Zawahri as saying in an audio recording posted on the Internet.

''(This) is the obvious psychological motivation behind his Iraq policy ... were the Americans to leave him alone, he would continue to send their forces to Iraq until the Mujahideen kill the last one of their soldiers,'' he said.

Bush has announced plans to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq, a move Iraqi insurgent groups saw as a sign of their ''victory''.

The authenticity of the statement could not be verified. The SITE Institute is a private U.S. organisation that tracks militant activities and often publishes militants' statements.

Addressing American and British people, the Egyptian militant cleric said: ''With every delay you make in resorting to wise and realistic policies, your losses will increase.'' Zawahri said the people of nations that took part in wars against Muslim nations could not be ''absolved'' of blame because they supported the leaders who made the decision to fight.

''You are not facing individuals or organisations, but are facing the jihadist uprising of the angry and alert Muslim nation,'' he said.

In his statement, marking the late January start of the Islamic lunar year, Zawahri said one of the most important events of the past year had been an admission of failure by ''the notorious liar'' Bush.

The US-allied governments of Iraq and Afghanistan should think about their fate after U.S. troops had left their countries, he said.

''These traitors in Iraq and Afghanistan must face their inevitable fate, and face up to the inescapable facts. America ...

is about to depart and abandon them, just as it abandoned their like in Vietnam,'' he said.

''If the mujahideen have ... broken the back of America, will its agents hold their own against them in the absence of America? If tanks and planes were of no help to America, what, for the traitors, will take the place of the foreign aid and backing?'' He also vowed reprisals against Arab and Muslim countries that supported the US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

''As for the states which colluded with the crusaders in their invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, they must reap their bitter harvest.'' REUTERS SSC KN2243