It was this Sunni hegemony – and not merely that of Saddam’s Ba’athist regime – that was toppled by the United States. But, given Iraq’s history and demography, the American attempt to refashion the country as a functioning democracy has foundered on three shoals: the Shia majority’s empowerment, the Kurds’s refusal to give up their hard-won de facto mini-state in the north, and the Sunnis’ violent campaign to undermine any system that they do not lead.
被美国人推翻的不仅仅是萨达姆的社会党政权，更是这种逊尼派的霸权。然而，鉴于伊拉克的历史和人口组成，美国将该国重塑为一个真正的民主国家的企图至少在三方面阻碍重重：占大多数的什叶派的赋权，库尔德人拒绝放弃他们来之不易的北部既成事实的迷你国家 ，以及逊尼派破坏任何不以他们为主导的制度的暴力运动。