The US has not been able to fool people across the world, in particular in the Middle East that "full sovereignty" has been passed on to the interim government. Although the interim government appears to run the country, their very survival depends on the presence of 138,000 American troops. The legitimacy of the interim government is in serious doubt and its sovereignty is highly qualified, but this has not been reflected in the speeches made by the US and the head of the interim government. This seems to be a classic example of the dictum that truth is the first casualty of war.

Nothing will change from June 28 because the US will run Iraq with an "Iraqi face".

This is demonstrated by the following facts:

The US will control Iraq's vital oil industry, despite the fact that the interim government is paraded in many Western electronic media as having "full sovereignty". Although Saddam Hussein will be in the legal custody of the Iraqi government within a week, his physical security will be manned by the US troops. Furthermore the interim government cannot make long term policies or international agreements.

The Coalition forces have been renamed as "the Multi-National Force" but it does not change the composition of the forces. The same armed forces will control Iraq under the new sanitized version of its name. Essentially it is principally the US force that looks after the security situation in the country. It reminds me of what Shakespeare once said that a rose is a rose whatever name you call it.

On June 28, the US administrator Paul Bremer left Baghdad hurriedly and secretly. Meanwhile two changes have been made by the Bush administration in respect of its personnel in Iraq. The US strong man in Baghdad will be the US Ambassador Negroponte, replacing Paul Bremer. Another is the replacement of three-star Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez (who has been allegedly involved by the Abu Ghraib prisoner scandal) by a four-star General George Casey. The very fact that a higher officer from the army has been assigned to Iraq demonstrates clearly that the resistance in Iraq has become such a serious problem for the Bush administration that it needs a full army General.

The new US Army General Casey, who will head the US armed forces in Iraq, came out with a statement that the US was surprised at strength of Iraqi resistance. Appearing before the Senate, General Casey conceded that "the insurgency is much stronger than I certainly would have anticipated."

Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi cannot hide the fact that the US is sending another 15 thousand US soldiers to Iraq after more than one year since its occupation. Before the Iraqi invasion, it was reported that the neo-conservative and one of the architects of Iraqi war Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz firmly told the Jordanian government that "We have a plan. Iraq will be up and running in a year. One Year! One Year!" Now Jordan and Iraq's other neighbours view American arrogance as its nemesis.

Confronted by the daily attacks by the resistance forces, interim Prime Minister has now declared amnesty for Iraqis who led the resistance against the US occupation. Obviously he wants to distinguish Iraqis from foreign fighters in Iraq in order to pacify them. To most Iraqi Allawi has no credibility because he lived in exile and no one knows him except the US and British intelligence.

The interim government is loudly thinking to postpone "holding of direct democratic elections to a Transitional National Assembly, by 31 December, 2004 if possible and in no case later than January 31, 2005" as envisaged by the UN Security Council resolution (1546) of 8 June.

Furthermore, the US Secretary General Kofi Annan decided not to send UN team to Baghdad because of the serious security situation in the country. Obviously he does not wish to be blamed again to send UN team in Iraq after his senior colleague Sergio De Mello was killed in August last year in bomb attacks to the Baghdad UN Office. The UN has been entrusted with the task of assisting the Iraqi authorities on the process for holding elections.

Meanwhile, the plea for sending NATO troops to Iraq by President Bush at the EU meeting in Ireland and at the NATO Summit in Istanbul was rejected by France and Germany. But as a face-saving device for the US President, NATO agreed "in principle" to train Iraqi security forces. It is not clear whether Iraqi forces will be trained inside Iraq or abroad.

The impact of Iraq's volatile situation has reverberated on Iraq's neighbours. Turkey, a key US ally, is scared that the Kurds in northern Iraq will declare autonomy or independence, setting a precedent for its own 15 million Kurds. In Saudi Arabia, the royal family sits atop a simmering volcano dissent and opposition that is fuelled by images of turmoil and torture in Iraq. At a recent programme on CNN with Arab media and others, it was clear that no one supported the US policy in Iraq and they all agreed that it was a mistake for President Bush to invade Iraq. In fact terrorism has increased across the world because of it.

The US planned its post-war planning poorly and has failed to meet many of its own goals. There is not enough electricity or sewerage facilities in cities, unemployment is unacceptably high and most importantly people don't feel safe. Iraq's interim Public Works Minister Nasreen Berwari admitted, "The reconstruction story has not been all we hoped for." Rick Barton, a co-director of the Post-Conflict Reconstruction Project at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington reportedly said: "We haven't done what we said we would do."

In recent days, life in Iraq has reportedly come to standstill. Dozens of new security checkpoints have been thrown up across the country and foreigners were told to stay in their fortified compounds, Iraqis are being advised not to leave their homes and local curfews are being imposed. There is now a speculation that martial law may be declared in Iraq. People are asking whether martial law is a new form of democracy and freedom as assured by the Bush administration for new Iraq.

Barry Rubin, the director of the Global Research Centre in International Affairs in Israel reportedly says that the US blundering in Iraq has discredited the idea of democracy itself and set back for years the prospects for democracy in the region.

To restore infrastructures in Iraq, the World Bank said that it could cost US$47 billion. A revised estimate figure is now thrown at US$150 billion. This amount is far in excess of the US$12 to 15 billion, Iraq will receive in yearly oil revenue. But frequent sabotage of oil pipes both in the south and in the north of Iraq exposes the vulnerability of oil revenues.

It is reported that 54 per cent of Americans also believe that it is an error of judgment for President Bush to attack Iraq, a jump from 41 per cent early this month. About 55 per cent said that war had not made the US any safer from terrorism. US military deaths passed 850 since the war began and well over 5000 have been wounded. An estimated 11,000 Iraqis died and up to 40,000 are believed wounded.

Iraq has become a "hot potato" that President Bush is eager to toss to other hands. But he can't because from the very beginning Iraq's war had no approval of the UN. It is an illegal war under international law. Former President Clinton could not remain silent when he criticised President Bush for not allowing UN weapon inspectors to complete their search for Iraq's suspected weapons of mass destruction. Many believe that had there been no halting of Florida vote counting during the 2000 President election by the US Supreme Court, history would have been different for the US and Iraq.

Harun ur Rashid is a former Bangladesh Ambassador to the UN, Geneva.