Blimey, I actually seem to have a readership, even if it is just the two buggers that I work with. The 15,000 figure was a stab in thedark, I admit. One of the neo-cons in the Independent claimed something even lower (if you can consider 15, 000 "low")- I vaguely remembered looking at the iraqidead site a few months ago and seeing 12, 000. Of course that was a few months ago, and the scale of destruction in the meantime has pushed it up to a level I wouldn't even have dared to suggest without checking. 33, 000 people............. why are phrases like "a city the size of Peterborough" only used regarding immigration and not this ?

It was screamingly obvious right from the start that Britain and America didn't have a post-war plan. They had to mobilize quickly to exploit the momentum of the all the dodgy "evidence" of WMD they had, in lieu of UN backing. What a lethal combination- the American desire for a quick fix and the British ability to implement a discreet bodge.