Sunnis electing to vote

Not a day goes by when there isn't some kind of clash between Iraqi Shiites and Sunnis.

For instance, Sunni militants ambushed and killed 14 Shiite militiamen southeast of Baghdad Thursday. The incident happened after the Shiites raided a Sunni-held house in Nahrawan to free a militiaman being held hostage.

So far, the battles have largely been confined to radicals on both sides - especially the Sunnis, who are a minority in the country but who used to have the Shiites under their thumb when Saddam Hussein was in power. They are having a tough time adjusting to their reduced political status, and consequently account for much of the indigenous anti-democratic insurgent activity.

The question is, will the insurgents pick up enough support from the broader Sunni population to escalate the skirmishes into a full civil war? If that happens, the U.S.-led coalition will have failed in its mission. If not, then despite the incessant caterwauling of the cut-'n-run left, the mission could succeed, possibly even beyond Iraq to the rest of the Arab world.

Hence, it's good news, indeed, that the vast majority of Sunnis are rejecting the insurgents to participate in the fledgling democratic process. After boycotting the first election in January, they've been stepping up involvement ever since.

They turned out in large numbers to vote on the draft constitution Oct. 15 - and though most voted against it, not enough Sunni-majority provinces garnered the two-thirds "No" vote needed to kill it. It helped that the Sunnis' largest political party urged that the constitution not be rejected.

Now three influential Sunni Arab groups also have formed a coalition to get even more of their numbers to the polls in the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections.

As more Sunnis prefer to vote than fight, the less likely it is that the insurgency will escalate to a civil war. Could peace be in the air?