President Donald Trump says the US "never" should have withdrawn its troops from Iraq after invading that country in 2003.
Trump made his remarks at a White House meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al Abadi.
"We should never ever have left," Trump told reporters after meeting alone with Al Abadi.
His comments go one step farther in his criticism of the 2011 withdrawal of US troops from Iraq after in the past saying that the withdrawal was made too early, that it was handled badly and that it should have been accompanied by seizing Iraqi oil.
During the election campaign, Trump accused former President Barack Obama of being the "founder of the Islamic State" terrorist group because of the vacuum left in Iraq by the US troop withdrawal, contradicting the position he espoused in 2011 when he had said in an interview that the US should have left that country sooner.
Trump also spoke with Al Abadi about the military campaign against the IS, and in particular about the offensive by Iraqi forces against the city of Mosul, which the US leader said is "moving along."
Trump also said he spoke with Al Abadi about the 2015 nuclear agreement among the US, Iran and five world powers, saying, "One of the things I did ask is, 'Why did President Obama sign that agreement with Iran?' because nobody has been able to figure that one out."
Al Abadi, meanwhile, said that he was seeking "more cooperation" with the US in the anti-terrorism fight and thanked Trump for exempting Iraqi nationals from his revised immigration order, which now affects refugees and citizens of six other Muslim-majority nations but the implementation of which has been blocked by a judge.
