The post you are reporting:
1-When Parliament was recalled it was already widely known that a vote of the Security Council, to sanction such action as was envisaged, was never going to materialise.
2-It was decided that military action (ostensibly to punish somebody/anybody for crossing some proclaimed Red-Line) would still be possible under separate provisions of the UN Charter - to defend a population in immediate danger.
3-All involved in UK Politics are acutely aware that rash action was political suicide. Better to; seek cross-party support, debate the issue - and thereby give full voice to 'our' principled objections to CW etc., and gain Parliaments backing for action, with the knowledge of the issues outlined in '2' above.
4-Such cross-party support initially looked likely, (here we enter The Twilight Zone), it appears that it was thought Dave was having it all too much his own way, the opposition needed a platform of it's own.
5-New Labour's motion, although immediately accommodated by Govt, did give voice to those who 'messed'-up over Iraq, to underline their new found reasonableness to Joe Public. It need not have done more.
6-[If I hadn't witness this I would be utter incredulous, but we all know this is so.] Many MPs could not be bothered to turn-in on the day, many Govt MPs lost the plot and voted either against or both ways and two were in deep discussion (perhaps about affairs in Uganda) even Govt whips, in a whipped vote, voted against.
Let me clear about where I stand. This vote should have been won, and won handsomely. The next vote should have failed.