In other circumstances Paul Dundes Wolfowitz, US deputy defence secretary, would be a much less controversial choice for president of the World Bank. The man George W. Bush likes to call "Wolfie" has served under six presidents in various national security and diplomatic roles, has run a prestigious foreign policy school and large swaths of government bureaucracy, and has more experience living in developing countries than any former World Bank president.

But circumstances always matter. Within the Bush administration, Mr Wolfowitz was the driving intellectual force behind the decision to invade Iraq, the most controversial US war since Vietnam. He has also been the loudest advocate for the bold use of military force to up-end tyrannical regimes, earning himself an international reputation - rightly or wrongly - as a zealot.