Merip, the Middle East Report, has written a superb backgrounder on Iraq. It's 16 pages long and it's as good as a book. It's intelligent, concise, and can in no way be construed as being soft on Saddam. You can print it out at
http://www.merip.org/iraq_backgrounder_102202/iraq_bckground_merip_screes.pdf
and feel free to reproduce and circulate it -- they specifically produced for that purpose and are even distributing it free in hardcopy to the extent that their funds allow.
The only fault it has, if any, is that it might conceivably be accused of being too objective. Although it is against the impending war, it studiously refrains from doing more than a teeny amount of speculating on why an invasion might be bad. I think because they wanted to stay away from speculation and keep their entire account scrupulously close to the facts.
But it's certainly a good briefing paper if you yourself want to book up for an argument ahead.
Michael