Product Description

A National Book Critics' Circle Award Finalist: A compelling, masterly portrait of a country ravaged by foreign occupation.

In March 2003, Patrick Cockburn traveled secretly to Iraq just before the invasion, and has covered the war from inside the country ever since. In this devastating, courageous and highly acclaimed book, he describes the fighting on the ground as Saddam's armies collapsed, the looting of Baghdad, the many failures of the US occupation, the springs of the resistance and how it turned into a full-scale uprising, and the country's collapse into civil war. In this new edition, brought completely up to date in a new chapter, Cockburn explores the impact of the "surge" of US forces into the country. Book of the Year for 2006 in the Guardian, Observer, Evening Standard, Mail on Sunday and Glasgow Herald.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #33715 in Books
• Published on: 2007-09-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Christopher Hitchens
Probably the most readable and certainly the only one that—even if only in the driest possible way—manages to be amusing.

About the Author
Patrick Cockburn, Middle East correspondent for the Independent, has been visiting Iraq since 1978. He was awarded the 2005 Martha Gellhorn prize for war reporting. He is the author of The Broken Boy, a memoir, and, together with Andrew Cockburn, Saddam Hussein: An American Obsession.

Customer Reviews

Anecdotal, but a compelling depiction nonetheless
The danger and confusion of Iraq probably make anything other than an anecdotal account of the occupation impossible. So perhaps this sort of is book is the best we can hope for. The book succeeds in presenting bits and pieces of narratives of the Iraqi situation directly contradicting the US Aministration's spin. For example while the administration has claimed that the resistance is largely a matter of a small number of Baath loyalists and foriegn sponsored paramilitary groups, Cockburn show the extent to which the resistance permeates most strata of Iraqi society. The book also presents wide ranging points of view of Iraqis to help the reader form an impression of what the Iraqi take on their political situation is.
The book is lacking in two ways. First, it could have benefited from an editor. It reapeats itself in a few places, and there are a few awkward back references here and there that could have been clearer. Second, the genre of the book - a book of anectodes and bits of interviews with little analysis - makes it of limited value. While it's certainly worthwhile to hear the various points of view voiced in the book, it's not clear that they represnet a dominant, average, or even significant viewpoint in Iraq.
Overall it's a valuable book, but more as a prelude to serious study of the situation than as a resource to be relied on.

Outstanding
Excellent review of events in Iraq from the invasion through 2006, by a journalist who knows Iraq like few others. He reviews not just the key political events, but the practical impact on the daily lives of Iraqis.

His continuing reports in the Independent and Counterpunch are second to none.

Resist War
The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq

I thought this book lived up to all the reviews I had read about it in various magazines.

For anyone who is interested in facts, not fiction, about the U.S. occupation of Iraq, this book will more than suffice. It is filled with relevant, and verifiable facts, and if you believe, as I do (and have from the very beginning) that the U.S. invasion of Iraq was a mistake, this will just add fuel to your fire.