respected politician in the land at present; from
the Sunni emerged Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born psychopath and
sectarian killer who, because of the barbarous force of the assaults he
unleashed on the Shia, in turn brought misery to the Sunnis; and there is
Moqtada, the canny heir of an influential family who has come to dominate to
a great extent the Shia of Iraq - or at least the downtrodden amongst them.

While Talabani is undoubtedly a force for good and
al-Zarqawi a force for evil, Moqtada is an enigma. Were one to listen to the UK and US government line, then he is
also very much a villain. But Patrick Cockburn's careful inspection reveals a
much more complex character.

Among the Sunnis of Iraq and among his Shia rivals,
it is common to dismiss Moqtada as a 'zatut' - Iraqi slang for idiot
child of the family, a fool who lacks the depth and intellect of his famous
father and older brothers. Which is exactly wrong.

Moqtada is in fact a shrewd leader, manipulator and politician
with the cunning of Coalition Authority and the Iraqi Government sit; the
rest of the country is of course the 'Red Zone' - is to what extent Moqtada
is the dupe or puppet of Iran.

On this, Cockburn's book is invaluable: it reveals one of
the great fallacies of reactionary Middle Eastern political conspiracy
theories and is worth reading it for this reason alone.

Moqtada is in fact the leader of a section of the Iraqi
people who were at the bottom of the pile for generations. Now they find
themselves at the top of the heap, blinking in the light, and with no idea on
earth what to do with the power handed to them by events and by the advent of
democracy - the latter the biggest irony of all for the US neo-cons.

Of course there is Iranian influence - how could there not be?
The only Shia nation on Earth is Iran. (Shia are a minority in
Islam - only nine per cent - and form a tiny proportion of Arab Muslims.)
But, as Cockburn makes clear, other Iraqi Shia groups have embraced Iranian
influence, and enjoyed far more backing from Iran than Moqtada's Sadrists -
and, because of that, they are mistrusted by ordinary Shia.

Instead of appreciating this, the Bremer regime rejected
Moqtada and repressed his newspaper and broadcasts; inevitably, it was the
Iranians who stepped into the void and provided the funding for Moqtada's
media to flourish once more. The Iranians also made every effort with weapons
supply and training to hook Moqtada and his supporters into reliance on them
and loyalty to their 'brand'.

I take the view that Moqtada al-Sadr, like Gerry Adams in Ireland, is
someone we need to talk to and to understand. To fail to do so could have
historic consequences.

For here is the great conundrum; who and what is Moqtada
al-Sadr? Is he more powerful in the shadows, or in parliament? Is he more
influential alive, or dead? Is he someone we should seek to deal with, or
destroy? Is he as feared in Tehran as in Washington and Baghdad?