NASHUA, N.H. -- Despite campaigning as the candidate who can win the war on terror, President Bush said in a broadcast interview Monday he didn't believe such a war could ever be won, but must be fought to make terrorism "less acceptable."

"I don't think you can win it," Bush said in an interview on NBC's "Today" show. "But I think you can create conditions so that those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."

The comments by the president, recorded during a campaign stop with the television network on Saturday in Ohio, were immediately assailed by Democrat John Kerry's campaign as defeatist.

"After months of listening to the Republicans base their campaign on their singular ability to win the war on terror, the president now says we can't win the war on terrorism," Kerry running mate Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) said in a statement.

"This is no time to declare defeat. It won't be easy and it won't be quick, but we have a comprehensive long-term plan to make America safer. And that's a difference," Edwards said.

Bush has long maintained that victory against terrorism could take generations and has urged Americans to be patient.

Still, Bush's campaign speeches to rallygoers and campaign materials distributed to supporters have been peppered for months with references to winning the war on terror.

Even after describing such a war as unwinnable, Bush told a crowd in suburban Detroit on Monday evening that "we've got more to do to wage and win the war on terror."

Earlier in the day, as he campaigned in the battleground state of New Hampshire, Bush said, "I believe it's our duty…to lead the world toward peace and that's exactly what I intend to do over the next four years."

As long ago as April, at a formal White House news conference following the fall of Iraq, Bush declared: "I plan on telling the American people that I've got a plan to win the war on terror, and I believe they'll stay with me. They understand the stakes."

But in his latest comments, the president for the first time termed the fight unwinnable and instead cast the battle as necessary to portray strength to the world while fostering the expansion of democracy. He also used the fight as justification for his pre-emptive strategy.

"Let's put it that way. I have a two-prong strategy. On the one hand, it's to find them before they hurt us. And that's necessary. I'm telling you, it's necessary," Bush said.

"The long-term strategy is to spread freedom and liberty, and that's really kind of an interesting debate. You know, there are some who say, well you know, certain people can't self-govern and accept, you know, a form of democracy. I just strongly disagree with that. I believe that democracy can take hold in parts of the world that are now non-democratic. And I think it's necessary in order to defeat the ideologies of hate."

Bush made the comments just days away from accepting re-nomination for the presidency Thursday at the Republican National Convention in New York.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan on Monday sought to clarify the president's remarks, suggesting Bush was talking about winning the war against terror in the conventional sense that might happen in a war against a nation.

"You've often heard him talk about how this is a different kind of war," McClellan said. "We face an unconventional enemy. I don't think you can expect that there will ever be a formal surrender or a treaty signed like we have in wars past."

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