Respectable Position

From an Andrew Sullivan reader.

The fighting in Iraq was not between Sunnis and Shiites per se, as much as between parties that sought a confessional war (al Qaeda, the Iranian special groups, elements of Moqtada al Sadr's Jaish e Mahdi) and those parties that sought to prevent one (the Iraqi government, the US Marines, the Anbar Awakening). The anti-competitive-genocide alliance won. The forces that sought civil war are either destroyed (al Qaeda) or reconciled to the new order of things (most of JAM).

A good way to frame the second stage of the Iraq war.

Obviously, the Iraq War has been a much bigger mess than anyone who supported it anticipated. But one thing I think we say about Iraq - we're standing on the right side.