It looks to me like Zarqawi’s (peace be upon him) strategy was as follows:
Murder lots of Shia civilians to prod them into retaliating against their Sunni neighbors.
Which in turn will prod the Sunnis into retaliating against their Shia neighbors.
Which will raise the level of sectarian violence all over Iraq.
Which will scare the weak-willed, decadent Americans into withdrawing from Iraq.
The bombing of the Golden Mosque was the capstone of this strategy. The Sunni, Baathist insurgents got fed up with Zarqawi and turned him in, but by then it was too late. He was no longer necessary. His strategy appears to have been a grand success, resulting, perhaps, in a Democratic victory in the upcoming election and ubiquitous talk of withdrawal across the American political spectrum. It seems that Zarqawi’s assessment of the character of both the Iraqis and the Americans was devastatingly accurate.
The one fly in the ointment is that America doesn’t have a parliamentary system, so Bush will still be Commander in Chief for two more years, but it has become almost politically impossible for him to escalate, and there is enormous pressure on him to withdraw. What really needs to happen at this point is for the U.S. to send another 100,000 troops to Iraq. Where would they come from? I don’t know, but presumably they would have to come from places where they aren’t needed, like Europe and South Korea. The chances of this happening are close to nil. We are on the verge of a major defeat and a vindication of the Al Qaeda master plan.
If only Al Gore and John Kerry had not had the elections stolen from them, none of this would have happened.