I hope Robomatic & Co find time to read that Guardian article for which Wolfgang gave the link. Those who view the Iraq adventure as a wonderful triumph will dismiss it as just retired US generals spouting forth from their armchairs, but it's hard to imagine any military mind seeing it any other way.

Significant parts of Iraq are now no-go areas for US troops, and this will provide invaluable breathing space for insurgents to regroup and consolidate. Kofi Annan is stating the patently obvious when he says fair elections would be impossible in the present climate. All evidence on the ground is that the insurgency is growing, so what grounds are there to hope stability will have been achieved by January?

Iraq has been reduced to exactly the ungovernable mess that was so widely predicted before the invasion. Syria, Turkey and Iran must be looking on with barely disguised glee. And many potentially troublesome regimes around the world will have noted with interest America's abject failure to get a grip in Afghanistan and Iraq, neither of which had any infrastructure to speak of, and little in the way of advanced weapons systems.

The criticism directed at Kofi Annan re Darfur, Rwanda etc could more fairly be aimed at those constituent members of the UN, most notably America, that have done their best to undermine that organisation, and indeed the whole concept of consensus in international affairs. Oh, and at France, which ahs some direct culpability. Annan's remarks have brought yelps from Washington and London (I know Canberra chipped in too) mainly because they thought he was their man. The US went to some lengths to ensure that he served another term. No wonder they're smarting, but it's a dead cert they won't want to prolong the squabble.

Annan was asked point-blank two or three times whether the invasion was legal, and in the end he gave an honest answer. Anyone with an ounce of decency, who heard Negroponte urging support for 1441 with assurances that it did not give authority for a war, would have done the same.