The Sunnis 

The Sunnis

Juan Cole very judiciously explains that the U.S. is now fighting in Fallujah with the support of international law--the Allawi regime is recognized as the government of Iraq, and a series of Security Council resolutions now support the attempt to defeat those who are trying to prevent the establishment of a democracy--or even of a stable state.

He also says there is no real comparison, much less a moral equivalence, between what a specific Marine did in killing someone who had recently been an enemy combatant, and what the insurgents did in slaughtering a famous aid worker (Margaret Hassan).

Cole is still worried that U.S. actions have been rife with incompetence from the beginning. He worries about ongoing violations of international law by the U.S., and he worries that Mosul will actually be a bigger fight than Fallujah. But his words about Sunni insurgents ring out strongly:

But the basic idea of attacking the guerrillas holding up in that city is not in and of itself criminal or irresponsible. A significant proportion of the absolutely horrible car bombings that have killed hundreds and thousands of innocent Iraqis, especially Shiites, were planned and executed from Fallujah. There were serious and heavily armed forces in Fallujah planning out ways of killing hundreds to prevent elections from being held in January. These are mass murderers, serial murderers. If they were fighting only to defend Fallujah, that would be one thing; even the Marines would respect them for that. They aren't, or at least, a significant proportion of them aren't. They are killing civilians elsewhere in order to throw Iraq into chaos and avoid the enfranchisement of the Kurds and Shiites.