WASHINGTON —  In his speech in San Francisco Monday, former Vice President Al Gore, lambasting the current President Bush for trying to distract attention to failings in the war on terror by launching an attack on Iraq, said the first President Bush ended the 1991 Gulf War too soon.

"Back in 1991, I was one of a handful of Democrats in the United States Senate to vote in favor of the resolution endorsing the Persian Gulf War, and I felt betrayed by the first Bush administration's hasty departure from the battlefield," Gore told an enthusiastic crowd at the Commonwealth Club.

However, on April 18, 1991, Gore felt differently, according to his own remarks. Speaking on the floor of the Senate, of which he was a member, Gore said then-President George H.W. Bush acted correctly in ending the Persian Gulf War when he did.

"I want to state this clearly, President Bush should not be blamed for Saddam Hussein's survival to this point. There was throughout the war a clear consensus that the United States should not include the conquest of Iraq among its objectives. On the contrary, it was universally accepted that our objective was to push Iraq out of Kuwait, and it was further understood that when this was accomplished, combat should stop."