Counterterrorism Blog: The Shi’ite-Sunni Divide and Our Ignorance
He wasn’t even asking basic theological differences, rather, just for a basic understanding of who was where on the chess board. This is akin to fighting a war against Christianity and not knowing, several years into the conflict, whether the Pope is Catholic or Protestant.

I also read an interesting article in the Herald Tribune on this. The counter terrorism people, Congressmen etc. in the US don’t have a clue.