What did I say thatbindicated I was envisaging Bush planning to bring in "international partners" or do anything remotely sensible?

What I envisage - whoever is in charge of the USA - is that there's going to be a stage during which the USA persists in trying to construct a regime that will act as its agent and which will do what it is told, and yet somehow be acceptable to the various elements within Iraqi society. And that is going to be accompanied by efforts to keep down the opposition - and that is probabaly going to mean continuing and escalating bloodshed on the streets.

I doubt very much if that effort can be successful - and at some stage domestic political considerations are going to mean that the USA will pull the rug from under it, and pull out its forces, probably in a hurry.

And my hope is that the signs of rapproachment between different strands within Iraq might mean that a viable united oppositioin might be able to take over at that time, rather than there being a collapse into civil war. Looking towards that, Iraqis refusing to fight other Iraqis on behalf of the occupation is a good sign.