Over the weekend, for the third time in two months, rebels from the opposition Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy have fought their way into Monrovia's suburbs. The country's demagogic President Charles Taylor, now an indicted war criminal, has promised to fight them to the last drop of his troops' blood.
The renewal of killing comes despite the signing in Ghana on June 17th of a ceasefire between the country's warring factions, the supposed voluntary exile of Mr Taylor to Nigeria, and the imminent arrival of peacekeeping troops drawn from the 15-nation regional group, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). The 1,500-strong contingent is supposed to lay the basis for a fully-mandated UN mission once peace has been restored and its success is widely seen as predicated on a US contribution, albeit small, which has been pledged by President Bush in the last few days. Mr Bush, however, says he will not send troops until Mr Taylor goes into exile, while the latter says he will not go until troops arrive. Meanwhile, the ECOWAS advance mission has again been delayed.
The dangerous limbo in which Liberia now finds itself is likely to spark further bouts of looting and killings by the uncontrolled, heavily armed, drug-crazed thugs who plague the battered country.
Every step of the peace process has been dogged by delay. Technical and political problems, and excuses and prevarications - above all, the lack of urgency and political will manifest on all sides - are a stark contrast to the urgency and ability to act manifested by the US and its allies in Iraq only too recently.
True, President Bush well remembers the US's last engagement in Africa - the bloody trap that an "easy" 1993 mission to Somalia turned into. Wary American voters, increasingly alarmed by the Vietnamisation of the Iraq mission, recall all too well the TV images of the 18 dead marines in Mogadishu and their country's inglorious retreat.
But the US has a special relationship with the country which owes its existence to the assisted resettlement of freed slaves in the middle of the 19th century. Its forces will be warmly received, unlike in Iraq, and its involvement will be seen internationally as an important and welcome signal of willingness to work in a multilateral security framework. And Mr Taylor's departure after eight years in office will not come a day too soon. A brutal and corrupt megalomaniac, who has stoked the bloody chaos in his own and neighbouring countries, his immediate exile is his country's only slim hope.