That's the fight (a "civil war" to the extent that our occupying army has sided with a minority of Iraqis to thwart the will of the majority of their fellow citizens, whether Shiite, Sunni or Kurd) in which we are fully engaged - right now - in Iraq. A fight for the future of Iraq that the (unspoken) objectives behind our invasion played an enormous role in instigating, and which we continue to foment in Iraq behind the facade of Iranian-allied Shiite Iraqi proxies like al-Maliki (and his allied militias in the Iraqi army and police forces) who are propped up to do our bidding as the Green Zone Iraqi "government."

What's more, that's been the basic lay of the land in Iraq for years now, varying tactics aside. Fundamentally, the motivation for both sides is drawn from Iraq's enormous resources of oil, and the conflict is between those who want a nationalized oil industry (and full sovereignty) for the future benefit of Iraqis (the nationalists) and those who want to privatize Iraq's oil wealth for the benefit of private corporate shareholders and the politicians who love them (the separatists).

I cannot recommend highly enough the following two descriptions of what we are doing in and to Iraq, both posted today. The first is short, the second long, the order doesn't matter, but please, read them both, and distribute them to as many people (especially to Members of Congress and members of the media) as you can:

http://firedoglake.com/2008/03/27/moment-of-silence/

Today we received word that Ali, the brother of Mohammed Ibn Laith of Gorilla's Guide and nephew of Dr. Maryam, died in Baghdad of burns he received very early this morning in an airstrike on Sadr city. He had recently recovered from injuries he received last year in a US airstrike that killed his parents.

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He was 9 years old.

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/80580/?page=entire

One of the ironies of the reporting out of Iraq is the ubiquitous characterization of Muqtada al-Sadr as a "renegade," "radical" or "militant" cleric, despite the fact that he is the only leader of significance in the country who has ordered his followers to stand down. His ostensible militancy appears to arise primarily from his opposition to the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq.

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He has certainly been willing to use violence in the past, but the "firebrand" label belies the fact that Sadr is arguably the most popular leader among a large section of the Iraqi population and that he has forcefully rejected sectarian conflict and sought to bring together representatives of Iraq's various ethnic and sectarian groups in an effort to create real national reconciliation -- a process that the highly sectarian Maliki regime has failed to accomplish.

It's vitally important to understand that Sadr's popularity and legitimacy is a result of his having a platform that's favored by an overwhelming majority of Iraqis.

[snip]

As in Vietnam, the United States is backing an unpopular and decidedly undemocratic government in Iraq, and that simple fact explains much of the violent resistance that's going on in Iraq today.

[snip]

Every headline this week has featured some variation of the storyline of "Iraqi security forces" battling "Shiite militias." But the reality is that it is a battle between Shite militias -- separatists and nationalists -- with one militia garbed in Iraqi army uniforms and supported by U.S. airpower, and the other in civilian clothes.

It has always been the great irony of the occupation of Iraq that "our" man in Baghdad is also Tehran's. Maliki heads the Dawa Party, which has long enjoyed close ties to Iran, and relies on support from SIIC [aka SCIRI, aka ISCI], a staunchly pro-Iranian party, and its powerful Badr militia.

[snip]

The United States, for its part, continues to take sides in this conflict -- in addition to providing airpower, U.S. forces are enforcing the curfew in Sadr City -- rather than playing the role of neutral mediator. That's because the interests of the Bush administration and its allies are aligned with Maliki and his coalition. That they are not aligned with the interests of most Iraqis is never mentioned in the Western press, but is a key reason why Bush's definition of "victory" -- the emergence of a legitimate and Democratic state that supports U.S. policy in the region -- has always been an impossible pipedream.