Talking to Fox News, the conservative broadcaster, on his visit to Baghdad on Thursday, Dick Cheney said: “We didn’t get elected to worry just about the fate of the Republican party. Our mission is to do everything we can to prevail ... against one of the most evil opponents we’ve ever faced.”

Back in Washington Mr Cheney’s Republican colleagues are showing growing irritation with the vice-president’s Iraq war logic. On Tuesday 11 moderate Republican lawmakers warned George W. Bush that their support for his Iraq “surge” was rapidly running out. Tom Davis, a congressman from northern Virginia, told the US president that in one portion of his House district just 5 per cent supported his Iraq strategy.