Things Are Looking Bad in Bush's Baghdad

The Independent looks at how bad things have become in central Badghad, which is experiencing "a growing sense of anarchy":

"Insurgents stopped all oil exports from Iraq yesterday by blowing up the one remaining pipeline to the Gulf, and assassinated the head of security for Iraqi oilfields in the north.

A bomb blast early yesterday morning destroyed a pipeline in the desolate Fao peninsula south of Basra, where saboteurs had struck the previous day. Crude oil gushing from the broken pipe formed deep black ponds in the sand. All crude oil exports from terminals in Basra and Khor al-Amaya have been stopped.

The attacks show that anti-government guerrillas now have the skill and the organisation to cripple permanently Iraq's oil exports. This will seriously damage the prospects of the new Iraqi interim government.."

The article also notes that the US may have difficulty "in stomaching an Iraqi military force consisting of the same military units that it triumphantly defeated 14 months ago. Officials here suspect that the US would prefer to create an army in Iraq which would be like Latin American security forces, easily influenced by Washington and independent of the civil government.

Although the US has said for a year that it is trying to build up an Iraqi army it has provided no budget for communications, ensuring that all messages will have to be passed through the US military forces."