WAR ON IRAK

Independent: Robert Fisk in Baghdad: 'Iraq will become a quagmire for the Americans'

Iraq stunned the Americans and British last night by broadcasting video tape of captured and dead American troops – the nightmare of both George Bush and Tony Blair.

The body of one American soldier was seen with a great red gash on his neck, while five US prisoners appeared on screen. One, a black female soldier, had been wounded, while a male serviceman said he had been "only following orders".

The film will increase internal support for Saddam Hussein, because it will be regarded as proof that the American-British force will be beaten.

All day, Baghdad felt like Kuwait in 1991 after the Iraqis had set fire to the oil wells. The oil-filled trenches torched by the Iraqi army around Baghdad on Saturday are ablaze. And regardless of whether they really hinder the incoming American cruise missiles, they have placed this city under a sinister, dark canopy. The skyline is black, the sky grey. Only by looking directly upwards can you catch sight of the sun. The Tigris moves sluggishly under a dun-coloured mist. If the people of Baghdad could pretend, a few days ago, that the war did not exist, yesterday they were living in its shadow.