So who, objectively, is to blame for the fall of Baghdad? Clearly the bulk of responsibility falls on to the shoulders of the Stop the War Coalition. After the brilliant, massive, inspiring, five million strong march in February, the Coalition had a golden opportunity to actually do what it claimed to exist for and STOP THE WAR! Yet instead of taking the logical next step of calling for a nationwide general strike, (as genuine marxists such as myself were demanding), the unholy alliance of the SWP and CPB bureaucrats running the coalition instead held back the struggle by limiting protest to more futile demonstrations and the implicitly reformist and decidedly Stalinist-sounding People’s Parliament.

In doing so they betrayed the Iraqi people and played into the hands of the war-mongers. Yes, they kept their new found friends at the Guardian, Independent and Daily Mirror happy by playing along in this game of lets-pretend pacifist protest, but they did so at a price. In effect STWC was incorporated by the capitalist state and became the acceptable ‘left’ face of the war. Instead of calling for the creation of an International Brigade, which could have united with the Republican Guard in a heroic defence of Baghdad, the STWC clung to its pacifist, neutral non-interventionist position in order to keep fatcats like Charles Kennedy and Robin Cook happy. The left should learn the lesson of this betrayal. In the short term STWC should now be demanding the nationalisation of the top 200 monopolies in Iraq and the creation of a workers militia to defend the remaining statues. But don’t hold your breath comrades…..