The best Iraq History books: Reddit reviews

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

True indeed. It lasted 8 years with a million casualties and an extensive use of modern weaponry but it was forgotten just like the Korean war.

I could advice you to read The Iran-Iraq War by Pierre Razoux or The Iran-Iraq War: A Military and Strategic History by Williamson Murray

100% I was introduced to this book some years ago. I learned a lot from it and it helped shape a lot of my views and doubts. All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror

If you’re at all interested in this case, I highly recommend the book Black Hearts, which investigates the incident and everyone involved in extreme detail. It’s an exhaustive, practically bottomless chronology of military incompetence and inhumanity. Oddly enough I was exposed to it because it was on the official reading list of the Marine Corps a few years ago, ostensibly as a lesson on the consequences of a poor command environment. But anyone who has served can tell you that everything the book catalogued is just business as usual for the military.

I think the term is Imperialistic Warmongering.

Source: Shock Doctrine

Scratch a liberal, a fascist bleeds. Neoliberal foreign policy is one of torture, of both the people and the economy. Would you like to know more?

There's this one by Pierre Razoux having an in-depth overview of the war and there's this one by Kevin M. Woods and Williamson Murray which uses a lot of unclassified Iraqi documents found after 2003.

Read Naomi Kleins book on the subject. It is a serious eye opener.

https://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0312427999

Short version here

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/06/naomi-klein-how-power-profits-from-disaster

Fuck off. Its a prosperous government for corporate interests and the wealthy, not the people. Which is exactly how neoliberal economies are designed to function (thanks Milton Friedman). Don't even talk about "converting through violence" after what Pinochet (with American help I might add) did to socialists and any nominally leftist people; thousands tortured and disappeared after a coup against a DEMOCRATICALLY elected socialist government under Salvadore Allende. You do some fucking research you lying ghoul.

This is probably up there... Mahmudiyah rape and killings

Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent into Madness in Iraq's Triangle of Death

That's actually the name of the book that the film is based on. Not sure why it wouldn't have the correct name though.

https://www.amazon.com/Horse-Soldiers-Extraordinary-Victory-Afghanistan/dp/1416580522

I think most "leadership" books are a waste of time if you are a regular human being that exercises empathy, pragmatism, and critical thinking.

What people ought to be reading are books of leadership failures like Black Hearts. You can learn far more from failure than success and I'm open to anyone changing my mind on that.

I would add Horse Soldiers to your list.

https://www.amazon.com/Horse-Soldiers-Extraordinary-Victory-Afghanistan/dp/1416580522

It is great that you are interested! If you would like to read more, I would recommend the book Destiny Disrupted by Tamil Ansary. It gives a good overview of Islamic history up to the modern day. Amazon link

Ok first I will explain why the war was just, then why it was necessary.

The war in Iraq was just because Saddam Hussein's government had basically forfeited Iraqi sovereignty by:

1. Genociding his own people
2. Repeatedly invading other countries to conquest them
3. Attacking coalition airplanes which violated the ceasefire from the Gulf War of 1991
4. Developing and using WMDs:

• Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons (which are WMDs) to genocide his own people and others in the 80s
• Saddam Hussein was trying to develop nuclear weapons at the time of the 2003 invasion. I admit the intelligence the US presented to the UN was fabricated, but after the war an Iraq Nuclear scientist wrote a book called The Bomb in my Garden in which he explained how Hussein told him to hide atomic equipment from international inspectors.

I am also going to admit that the war in Iraq was poorly managed, but the alternative was to let Hussein stay in power. Imagine having Hussein in power during the war on terror, and during the Arab Spring, possibly with a completed nuclear weapons project. Specifically imagine the war in Syria going on next door.

I didn't read it yet. It was recommended by Muslimmatters.org: http://muslimmatters.org/2014/07/30/book-review-lost-islamic-history/

Here is another book:

• <strong>[Book] Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes</strong> - Tamim Ansary, for people looking for a comprehensive-but-approachable way to look at world history through the lens of Islam.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmudiyah_rape_and_killings

There’s an excellent book about it.

Black Hearts: One Platoon's Plunge into Madness in the Triangle of Death and the American Struggle in Iraq

>In the 1930's there were senior US Army officers saying we'd never stop using man's best friend, the horse because automobiles were too unreliable and tanks didn't have the ability to travel at distance.

I mean... https://www.amazon.com/Horse-Soldiers-Extraordinary-Victory-Afghanistan/dp/1416580522

Yup lol.

If somehow people don't know about this already, I'd recommend &quot;All the Shah's men&quot; by Stephen Kinzer that explains it all

"Shock Doctrine"- basically bankrupt a country so they will be in debt and then "sell" you (to privatize) their countries natural resources (like water) to sell them back to you. At least what i remember.

https://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0312427999

I second this. It is well-written and a good introduction.

"World histories" have been criticized as being too Eurocentric. I agree.

Two books can help correct this myopia.

Destiny Disrupted: World History Through Islamic Eyes

Big History by David Christian. This history starts with the origin of the universe. This views human history in the biggest perspective. I listened to the author's Great Courses lecture series on the topic.

2001 they were used.

they used horses that were born and bred in the region and learned fast from the local who had generations of knowledge on using horses in that area.

we even built a statue. https://www.911memorial.org/connect/blog/horse-soldier-statue-dedicated-liberty-park

https://www.amazon.com/Horse-Soldiers-Extraordinary-Victory-Afghanistan/dp/1416580522

10 years or so prior i happend to work with one of the guys on that team the book is about. He had never rode a horse before that deployment. they figured it out on the fly and used the locals for care and feeding of the horses. helped that the horses are easy to replace so if one goes down two more are around to replace it with.

I recommend reading Destiny Disrupted.

Europe didn't catch up to the middle east and China until about the 16th - 17th Century.

See, it's funny because conservatives also do this, just more effectively. None of them cried about politicizing tragedy when it was creating the DHS after 9/11, for example.

>Enraged, XO, out of the blue, shouted at Cpl Shaw, “It’s your fucking fault your friends died in Iraq!”

This alone should have gotten him command of windsock observation duties in the most remote parts of Greenland.

I actually wonder if XO wasn't angling to provoke the Cpl into violence, in order to hit him up with a criminal charge.

This whole thing reminded of Lt. Col Thomas Kunk, commander of the 2/502 (101st ABN) as described in Black Hearts: One Platoon's Descent into Madness in Iraq's Triangle of Death. Dude was practically a study from the Capt. William Bligh School of Leadership, who continually exploded with rage and contempt for those under his command. According tot he book, he even showed up after the deaths of a respected Lt. and Sgt to berate them all for being scumbags, that they were all getting killed for not doing their jobs correctly, and basically that the two dead men had deserved it.

If you want to read a great book that follows this story read Black Hearts Platoons Descent into Triangle of Death. Well told absolutely brutal story. Top to bottom the entire chain of command is to blame. https://www.amazon.com/Black-Hearts-Platoons-Descent-Triangle/dp/0307450767

This is historical revisionism lmao. None of what you are saying is even remotely true. Please for the love of god read a fucking book. Start with this one, I'll even buy it for you https://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0312427999

I'm getting a sneaky suspicion that a lot of rich people in the West, the ones who secretly dictate major policies and legislations, and invest globally, they want a broken Ukraine so that they can rebuild it and make money off the rebuilding process. As described in The Shock Doctrine : Disaster Capitalism

Dope.

Look, I get you’re trying to come at this from more of a pragmatic standpoint, and yes, the disconnection from military higherups and their subordinates is an important thing. These are the people that you may be issuing down orders that’ll get some killed, after all. You can’t get attached to every joe.

That being said, I think the position that, overall, “Joes don’t matter” is the wrong standpoint here.

https://www.amazon.com/Black-Hearts-Platoons-Descent-Triangle/dp/0307450767

This is a book called “Black Hearts”, and it’s an excellent example of how this type of leadership can result in an enormous problem when it comes to the operational level. I really recommend you read it, since it goes pretty in depth on this subject, and is overall a good read in general anyhow.

I know mocking you won’t serve to convince anything, so this is my attempt to come at this from another point.

They wrote a book about it and now it’s taught as a “don’t fucking do any of this” case study.

Black Hearts

We are discussing a book called "Shock Doctrine: Rise of Disaster Capitalism," which I have linked below. The author, who is a long-time, credible journalist provides all sorts of sources and direct quotes, including from Friedman himself.

https://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0312427999