WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 — The triumphal "Mission Accomplished" banner was the pride of the White House advance team, the image makers who set the stage for the president's close-ups. On May 1, on a golden Pacific evening aboard the carrier Abraham Lincoln, they made sure that the banner was perfectly captured in the camera shots of President Bush's speech declaring major combat in Iraq at an end.

BUSH TRIES TO BLAME TROOPS FOR WHITE HOUSE PHOTO OP Bush said the "Mission Accomplished sign, of course, was put up by the members of the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished. I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man from my staff. They weren't that ingenious, by the way." (DOD Photo)

But on Tuesday in the Rose Garden, Mr. Bush publicly disavowed the banner that had come to symbolize what his critics said was a premature declaration that the United States had prevailed.

"The `Mission Accomplished' sign, of course, was put up by the members of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished," Mr. Bush told reporters. "I know it was attributed somehow to some ingenious advance man from my staff. They weren't that ingenious, by the way."

Well, yes and no. After the news conference, the White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, carefully elaborated on the president's words.

The banner "was suggested by those on the ship," he said. "They asked us to do the production of the banner, and we did. They're the ones who put it up."

The man responsible for the banner, Scott Sforza, a former ABC producer now with the White House communications office, was traveling overseas on Tuesday and declined to answer questions. He is known for the production of the sophisticated backdrops that appear behind Mr. Bush with the White House message of the day, like "Helping Small Business," repeated over and over.

Mr. Bush's Democratic competitors for president immediately pounced on his disavowal.

Gen. Wesley K. Clark, for one, said that Mr. Bush's comments blaming the sailors "for something his advance team staged" were "outrageous."

Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

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