"It's a recognition that we were provided faulty information," said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle.

"And I think it's all the more reason why a full investigation of all of the facts surrounding this situation be undertaken -- the sooner the better."

Limited reviews of past intelligence are currently underway in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, but Democrats have said a broader bipartisan investigation is needed to determine whether the White House manipulated prewar intelligence on Iraq's weapons program -- a move Republicans have blocked so far.

"Bipartisan investigations of this kind have been done in the past, to great success. Now is the time to do one in this case," the South Dakota Democrat said.

"It ought to be the subject of careful scrutiny ... with regard to what it was we knew, what actions were taken, what statements were correct and which ones were incorrect. The sooner we can acquire that information, the better for the country."

The Bush administration backed away from assertions that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein tried to purchase "yellow cake" uranium from Africa to kickstart Iraq's idled nuclear weapons program. Bush included the allegation in his State of the Union speech in January, but the White House said Monday it regretted having done so.

Michigan Senator Carl Levin, top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, said the White House admissions raised more questions than they answered.

"The reported White House statements only reinforce the importance of an inquiry into why the information about the bogus uranium sales didn't reach the policymakers during 2002 and why, as late as the president's State of the Union address in January 2003, our policymakers were still using information which the intelligence community knew was almost certainly false."

Levin recently initiated his own investigation into US intelligence on Iraq's banned nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs after the committee's chairman, Republican Senator John Warner, declined to do so.

Until now Democrats have generally tread gently in requesting a full-fledged bipartisan investigation, fearing a public backlash should evidence of banned weapons actually turn up in Iraq.

They pulled no punches however in faulting the White House for relying on the faked intelligence -- or for waiting so long to acknowledge the fraud.

"The quality of that intelligence has been known ... from the very beginning," Jay Rockefeller, top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said. "It was all discredited, early and often."

The revelation speaks to other potential intelligence lapses, Rockefeller said, but problems with the particular information on Iraq-Niger ties "rates high because it was so patently false.

"It had been so patently a forgery. It was debunked everywhere."

And Senator Dianne Feinstein said the overall quality of US intelligence has been called into question.

"There were many of us that voted for use of force based on what we learned in intelligence and other areas," she said. "The fact that the yellow cake uranium from Niger was a forgery demonstrates a real problem with bogus intelligence."

Republican leaders accused Democrats of exploiting a relatively minor issue.

"It's very easy to pick one little flaw here, one little flaw there. The overall reason we went into Iraq is ... morally sound," House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said.

The issue of whether "somebody forged or made a mistake on whether Saddam Hussein was looking for nuclear material from Niger or wherever," does not negate the justness of the US-led invasion, DeLay said.

"The overall reason that we went into Iraq is sound. The American people understand that and they support it."

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