Storm in Iraq

The NY Times reports that the Saudi family is deeply concerned that Iraq is falling apart. It is the bleakest assessment of Iraq I have heard from any ally.

Prince Saud al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, said Thursday that he had been warning the Bush administration in recent days that Iraq was hurtling toward disintegration, a development that he said could drag the region into war.

"There is no dynamic now pulling the nation together," he said in a meeting with reporters at the Saudi Embassy here. "All the dynamics are pulling the country apart." He said he was so concerned that he was carrying this message "to everyone who will listen" in the Bush administration.

Combine this with statements from former Iraq prime minister Allawi (which I quoted on an earlier post) that Iraq is "practically in stage one of a civil war," and the Sunni/Shia religious-ization (what is the word?) of the conflict, with al-Zarqawi leading thousands or more, and things are looking grim. While Katrina and Rita wreak devestation, is the storm in Iraq upgrading to a Category Four?