Iraq war "could be new Suez"

Could an Iraqi war be as ill-fated as the Suez intervention?

When it comes to war and its likely consequences, military officers are often more cautious than civilian politicians - they, after all, know the cost of battle.

There have been reports this week that some of the US military command are decidedly less hawkish about the prospect of a war with Iraq than the politicians and civilians in the Bush administration.

In Britain, there have also been powerful interventions: first in the House of Lords in April, and then in a letter to the Times last week, one of our most distinguished soldiers posed some awkward questions for the government.

Field Marshall Lord Bramall has been a serving officer since 1943.

He was Chief of the Defence Staff from 1982 to 1985. He remembers the UK's ill-fated venture in invading Egypt in 1956, after President Nasser seized the Suez canal.

Lord Brammell told The World this Weekend that there are "ominous similarities" to the situation in Iraq, which we ignore at our peril.