Civil War in Iraq?

[pete]

Iraq seems to be off the radar a bit recently with goings on in Lebanon. Will it get worst before it gets better in Iraq? Will there be fully fledged civil war when/if the Aermicans leave?

Death figures

Total civilian deaths now at 40,000+

[ken foree]

stratfor has it that it's a civil war already:

"The Shia, instead of reciprocating the Sunni and American gestures, went into a deep internal crisis. Shiite groups in Basra battled over oil fields. They fought in Baghdad. We expected that the mainstream militias under the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) would gain control of the dissidents and then turn to political deal-making. Instead, the internal Shiite struggle resolved itself in a way we did not expect: Rather than reciprocating with a meaningful political gesture, the Shia intensified their attacks on the Sunnis. The Sunnis, clearly expecting this phase to end, held back -- and then cut loose with their own retaliations. The result was, rather than a political settlement, civil war."