After international outrage at the failure of U.S. troops to protect hospitals and the looting of the famous National Museum, Baghdad’s National Library and Archives went up in flames yesterday. Almost all the contents of the library are destroyed. British war correspondent Robert Fisk reports the library was a “priceless treasure of Ottoman historical documents,” including the old royal archives of Iraq. He saw pages blowing in the wind of handwritten letters between the court of Sharif Hussein of Mecca, who started the Arab revolt against the Turks for Lawrence of Arabia, and the Ottoman rulers of Baghdad. Fisk also saw the Qur’anic library burning nearby, which includes one of the oldest surviving copies of the Qur’an. He rushed to the offices of the Marines’ Civil Affairs Bureau. He gave the map location and said it would take only five minutes to drive there. Half an hour later, there wasn’t an American at the scene. Meanwhile, nine British archaeologists published a letter in the London Guardian yesterday charging that private collectors are persuading the Pentagon to relax legislation that protects Iraq’s heritage by prevention of sales abroad. The Guardian reports Pentagon officials are denying accusations that the U.S. government is succumbing to pressure from private collectors to allow plundered Iraqi treasures to be traded on the open market.