"What's clear is that those who have taken up arms against the occupation are divided multiply: some are Shi'i militiamen, like the Mahdi Army; others are Sunni guerrillas of diverse political tendencies; and yet others are foreign jihadists. Among them, the only faction whose political program we know even a little about is the Mahdi Army. The conditions in Iraq are so dangerous that it is impossible for us to get reliable accounts about who's who of combatants in Iraq."
But it seems more likely that the lack of clarity is in the movement, not in the conditions. I think you are imposing a logic of resistance and oppression to conditions that do not support it. Of course it is true that Western propaganda paints every resistance as sectarian, just as it seeks to divide and rule. But here it does seem to be the case that what divides the Iraqis is more pertinent than what unites them.
You say they take up arms against the occupation, but they seem to take up arms against each other. Is this a bloody process of political clarification, like the FLN's struggle against the Messalists in Algeria, at the outset of the war against France? I don't think so (though, like you say, we are all a bit ignorant here). They are not clashing over strategy, but over territory. They are emboldened by the coalition's declining authority, but that has not led to the emergence of a decisive leadership, just a bloody competition.
I don't accept any responsibility (I don't identify so closely with the British government as you seem to the the American). I do think that the coalition is the greatest problem. I don't think one can set conditions on how the Iraqi people should exercise their right to self-determination. But until there is an Iraqi resistance (as opposed to internecine violence) I don't feel the need to wish one into existence to support it.
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