The Iraq War
-
-
5.0 • 2 Ratings
-
-
- £5.99
-
- £5.99
Publisher Description
The Iraq War remains highly controversial, but in all the uncertainty about weapons of mass destruction, the use and misuse of intelligence, it remains an awesome military and political event and a formidable exercise in American power aided by the British army. Throughout the war and beyond it, John Keegan's analysis proved more accurate than any other commentator's, and now he brings his unrivalled knowledge of military history to bear on the war, its conduct and consequences. Written with special access to new sources of information, this book is the most authoritative and challenging account of a war which could both set the pattern for military conflicts in the 21st century and significantly affect the world political order.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Ubiquitous military historian Keegan (Intelligence in War) offers a reportage-based account of a "mysterious war." Keegan addresses the war's anomalies 200,000 soldiers took a country of almost 30 million in three weeks; the war's justification (WMD) never materialized; the Iraqi army "melted away" and the populace tried only to stay out of the way by surveying the post World War I origins of Iraq, Saddam's rise to power, the nature of his rule and his external ambitions. The result is a work with broader scope than Murray and Scales's TheIraqWar (2003), and one that makes a case for the war as justified in moral, legal and practical contexts. Saddam emerges, predictably enough, as a particularly nasty regional despot and the architect of his own destruction through his intransigent failure to satisfy the demands of an increasingly frustrated international community. Keegan divides his account of the campaign itself into "American" and "British" chapters, and he praises the skill of the planners and commanders of both armed forces. His accounts of British operations in the Shiite south and the U.S. drive on Baghdad affirm the high morale and fighting power of the troops involved. Keegan in particular demonstrates the U.S. mastery of mechanized maneuver war, but underplays the problems of control and pacification that have been making headlines since the turn of the year.
