I've never been embedded with American soldiers or British soldiers or Iraqi soldiers or any other.

It is always an eerie experience to sit among Bashar al-Assad's soldiers.

When I visited Syrian special forces along the front lines, I was given extraordinary amounts of detail. They gave me the code numbers for the various positions they've got, told me where the rebels were - about 800 meters away in a forest. I met soldiers who had been wounded but were still serving.

The Americans may think they have 'liberated' Baghdad but the tens of thousands of thieves - they came in families and cruised the city in trucks and cars searching for booty - seem to have a different idea what liberation means.

American power in the Middle East is collapsing. It doesn't need much more than a shove, and it will - and that's not going to be a good thing.

When you have a crime against humanity that is so awesome in scale and death, it is more than permissible to look around and say, who recently has been declaring war on the United States? Of course, the compass points straight to bin Laden.