Iraq History

In 1999, Munjed Al Muderis was a surgical resident working in Baghdad when the military police marched into the operating theatre and ordered the team to mutilate army deserters. When the head of surgery refused, he was executed. Munjed's choices were stark - comply and breach the medical oath, refuse and face death or flee. That day, Munjed's life changed forever. He escaped to Indonesia and boarded a boat to Australia.

Over a 35-year career, Daniel Bolger rose through the army infantry to become a three-star general, commanding in both theaters of the U.S. campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. He participated in meetings with top-level military and civilian players, where strategy was made and managed. At the same time, he regularly carried a rifle alongside rank-and-file soldiers in combat actions - unusual for a general.

The U.S. government spends enormous resources each year on the gathering and analysis of intelligence, yet the history of American foreign policy is littered with missteps and misunderstandings that have resulted from intelligence failures. In Why Intelligence Fails, Robert Jervis examines the politics and psychology of two of the more spectacular intelligence failures in recent memory: the belief that the Shah in Iran was secure and stable in 1978, and the claim that Iraq had active WMD programs in 2002.

Master Sergeant Marc Youngquist has served for over 40 years in the military and law enforcement. Over those years, he has met many unsung American heroes. These are men and women who have served our country with limited resources and support while being separated from friends and loved ones for months at a time, often while living in hostile environments.

A captain in 29 Commando, Johnny Mercer served in the army for 12 years. On his third tour of Afghanistan, he was a joint fires controller, with the pressurized job of bringing down artillery and air strikes in close proximity to his own troops. Based in an area of Northern Helmand that was riddled with Taliban leaders, he walked into danger with every patrol, determined to protect them. Then, one morning, in brutal close-quarter combat, everything changed....

Four weeks after Navy SEALs had killed Osama bin Laden, the President of the United States stood in Arlington National Cemetery. In his Memorial Day address, he extolled the courage and sacrifice of the two young men buried side by side in the graves before him: Travis Manion, a fallen US Marine, and Brendan Looney, a fallen US Navy SEAL. Although they were killed three years apart, one in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, these two best friends and former roommates were now buried together - "brothers forever".

We March at Midnight is award-winning author Ray McPadden’s chronicle of his experience as a highly decorated Ranger officer leading some of the most dangerous missions during the height of the Iraq and Afghan wars. In 2005, Ray joined the army in search of what he calls “the moment” - a chance to prove to himself and his brothers in arms that he is a true leader. His job is to establish the first outpost in the Korengal, Afghanistan’s deadliest valley, and his decisions and mistakes will have a permanent impact on the men he commands.

Chris Hunter has the most dangerous job in the world in the most dangerous place in the world: he's responsible for bomb disposal in the British sector of Iraq, pitted against some of the most ruthless and technically advanced terrorists in the world. It is a 24/7 job; his team defused over 45 bombs in the first two months alone. And the people they're up against don't play by the Geneva Convention. For them, there are no rules, only results.

They put a price on his head. They did everything they could to disrupt his mission. Finally, when an antitank mine tore off his right foot, the warriors of jihad in Iraq thought they had neutralized one of their most resourceful, determined foes.

The AC-130 gunship was quickly developed in 1968 to provide fire support for ground forces in Vietnam. Twenty-eight C-130 cargo aircraft were converted into AC-130s for night attack operations. The AC-130 was crude, ugly, ad hoc, and detested by many within the USAF...but it worked, and it worked well. Likewise, AC-130 crews were deemed unruly “biker gangs” but performed magnificently in every major US military operation from 1976 to 1995. Most of these combat operations were cloaked in secrecy, but records once classified for up to 20 years have now been opened.

Peu de gens connaissent vraiment le rôle de l'Irak dans la Première Guerre mondiale. Ce mémoire explore la vie et le devoir de Frank Wooten, un Américain, servant comme officier britannique dans le Corps mésopotamien des mitrailleuses à moteur. Racontant la vie quotidienne de Frank sur le front, ses fonctions tout au long de la guerre et les personnes incroyables qu'il a rencontrées en cours de route, Voyage dans l'Eden est un livre parfait pour quiconque s'intéresse aux histoires moins connues de la Première Guerre mondiale.

A fascinating account of an Army captain's unusual path through some of the most legendary seats of learning straight into a brutal fight with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, The Unforgiving Minute is, above all, an unforgettable portrait of a young soldier grappling with the weight of his hard-earned knowledge while coming to grips with becoming a man.

Pale Horse is the remarkable never-before-told true story of an army aviation task force during combat in the Afghan War, told by the commanding officer who was there. Set in the very valleys where the attacks of 9/11 were conceived and where 10 Medals of Honor have been earned since that fateful day the war began, the narrative races from ferocious firefights and bravery in battle to the quiet moments where the courageous men and women of Task Force Pale Horse catch their breath before they take to the skies again.

Some have called him "Lawrence of Afghanistan". To the Pashtun tribesmen he is "Commander Jim", leader of the "bearded ones". He is Army Special Forces Major Jim Gant, one of the most charismatic and controversial U.S. commanders of modern memory, a man who changed the face of America's war in Afghanistan when his critical white paper, "One Tribe at a Time", went viral at the Pentagon, the White House, and on Capitol Hill in 2009.

A legendary civilization vanished under the Fertile Crescent and escaped a fate worse than death until Sumerologists questioned widely accepted truths. The Sumerians reemerged onto the extraordinary timeline of human history. Their tales of kings and gods, including the Epic of Gilgamesh, and their fearless trade in distant lands, during the remarkable Bronze Age, centered in the world’s first city-states that chronicled ancient rivalries and their enduring impact.

How did the Islamic State attract so many followers and conquer so much land? By being more ruthless, more apocalyptic, and more devoted to state building than its competitors. The shrewd leaders of the Islamic State combined two of the most powerful yet contradictory ideas in Islam - the return of the Islamic Empire and the end of the world - into a mission and a message that shapes its strategy and inspires its army of zealous fighters.

Today, it is known by many names, like the First Iraq War, Kuwait War, and, most commonly, the Gulf War or the First Gulf War. It was a rather short conflict, lasting just shy of seven months between late 1990 and early 1991. Yet, it was still rather impactful because it showcased several essential innovations and changes in political and technological aspects of warfare, some of which are still part of modern conflicts.

The resignation of Scott Ritter as chief weapons inspector for UNSCOM in August 1998 made front-page news around the world. Now Scott Ritter draws on his seven years' experience hunting Saddam's weapons of mass destruction to take readers inside Iraq and show that country as it has never been seen by outsiders before. In Endgame, he dissects the failure of U.S. policy in Iraq and reveals a bold new approach to ending the ongoing Iraq crisis.

Amber Smith flew into enemy fire in some of the most dangerous combat zones in the world. One of only a few women to fly the Kiowa Warrior helicopter, Smith rose to pilot in command and air mission commander in the premier Kiowa unit in the army, repeatedly flying into harm's way during her 2005 and 2008 deployments with the 101st Airborne Division, the Screaming Eagles. Smith takes you into the heat of battle, enabling listeners to feel, hear, and smell the experience of serving as a combat pilot in high-intensity warfare

In 2011 a series of antigovernment uprisings shook the Middle East and North Africa in what would become known as the Arab Spring. Few could predict that these convulsions, initially hailed in the West as a triumph of democracy, would give way to brutal civil war, the terrors of the Islamic State, and a global refugee crisis. But, as New York Times best-selling author Scott Anderson shows, the seeds of catastrophe had been sown long before. In this gripping account, Anderson examines the myriad complex causes of the region's profound unraveling.