The reaction to President Bush's latest speech, delivered late on Thursday, among ordinary Iraqis was that he has wiped out any hope they had that the United Nations could stop him attacking.
There was no official reaction to his remarks that diplomatic efforts to disarm Iraq were almost exhausted, but Baghdadis said yesterday's reports from UN arms inspectors Mr Hans Blix and Mr Mohamed ElBaradei would not change the course of events.
Mr Bush said on Thursday he would force a vote in days seeking UN authorisation to invade Iraq.
But he said he did not need UN approval to act. Dismissing Iraq's destruction of banned missiles in recent days as a charade, Mr Bush reiterated he could launch a war without UN approval because US security was paramount.
"If we need to act, we will act and we really don't need the UN's approval to do so," Mr Bush said in only the second prime-time news conference of his presidency. "When it comes to our security, we really don't need anybody's permission." Asked if he was close to a war decision, Mr Bush said he was still in the final stages of diplomacy.
He said he would spend only a matter of days trying to persuade nations to support a new UN resolution before bringing the issue to a vote regardless of its chances of passage. - (Reuters)