George W. Bush poses with Paul Doran of Rochester, New York, during the graduation ceremony at the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (AFP)

Colorado Springs (Colorado), June 3 (Reuters): President George W. Bush yesterday quoted the famous D-Day words of General Dwight Eisenhower — all but one of them: “crusade”.

In a speech in which he likened the war on terror to the Allied struggle against the Nazis in World War II, Bush cited Eisenhower’s message to US troops 60 years ago but skipped a word that would have been sure to spark controversy in the Muslim world.

Entitled the “Great Crusade,” Eisenhower’s message urged on the troops as they prepared to storm the Normandy coast in the first Allied landing in Nazi-occupied France.

The original version went: “Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Forces: You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of a liberty-loving people everywhere march with you.”

Speaking at the US Air Force Academy commencement yesterday, Bush quoted the initial salutation and the second and third sentences but left out the part about embarking on a great crusade.

Days after the September 11, 2001, attacks on America, Bush described the US intent to retaliate as a “crusade” — a reference that offended Muslims who associate it with the Christian crusades against Islam in the Middle Ages. Eisenhower was popularly known as Ike.