This is a good overview of Iraq.

Burn Baby Burn

The security situation in Iraq appears to have deteriorated rapidly over the past few days -- not so much because of the insurgents (although the toll of dead and wounded Americans continued to grow) but because the accumulated anger and frustration is beginning to boil over among a number of groups and in an number of places.
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Loss of control in the Iraqi streets increasingly is mirrored in the palace suites. The Interim Governing Council, notionally an arm of the American occupation goverment, today rejected the idea of allowing Turkish troops into Iraq -- even as the Turkish parliament was voting to send them. (It's amazing what $8.5 billion in loans will do for a country's fighting spirit.)
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But an actual Tet-style offensive seems very far fetched. This isn't Vietnam, and the Sunni insurgents, whoever they are, don't appear to have the men, the resources or the command-and-control networks needed to launch anything so ambitious.

A more plausible risk would seem to be something comparable to the 1968 urban riots here in America -- a wave of civil unrest that breaks out in many cities at once, and quickly spirals out of control. The insurgents, no doubt, would be happy to fan the flames any way they can.

Such a scenario could leave the Coalition with two choices: Crack down very hard, with indiscriminate use of lethal force, or, let the riots burn themselves out before trying to restore order. Either way, the Bush administration would be looking at a PR disaster, one that would make it impossible to pretend that things are gradually "getting better" in Iraq.
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INSIDE THE SUNNI TRIANGLE
Iraqi raids fostering fresh enemies
Once-supportive, critical villagers now openly anti-American

Five months after President Bush declared the end of "major combat" in Iraq, the war may indeed be over for most of the country.

But not for Sheikh Mishkhen al Jumaili. Last month, American troops killed nine of his relatives, including his son, in the span of just four days.

"They mean to kill as many Iraqis as possible," said al Jumaili, weeping silently as his younger relatives quietly lowered Beijiya's coffin into the parched yellow cemetery ground.

Bowing slightly over the red velvet cloth that draped the coffin of his cousin Beijiya, al Jumaili said a solemn prayer and wiped his eyes. Then he turned his back and stepped away, unable to watch yet another member of his extended family vanish under heavy chunks of dry clay.
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  thanks to The Agonist