Book Reviewed: Fiasco, the American Military Adventure in Iraq by Thomas E. Ricks

Lately I have been reading more books about the American invasion of Iraq and its aftermath. Primarily it’s because I think enough time has passed to be able to get some useful insight into what actually happened without having to eat a side-order of hyperbole along the way.

This book was first released back in 2006 and was updated to reflect the changing situation in 2007 when the “surge” happened. The author outlines an almost unrelenting series of “misunderestimations” and outright screwups by the U.S. executive and the military in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Saddam. Mind you, with a title like this it’s pretty much what you would expect.

What is discouraging is that we seem, now, to be heading back to those days of car bombs and massive bloodshed that, in mid-2008 many pundits were hoping we were past. This book is useful but because the story isn’t finished in that unfortunate country, it can’t be definitive. What a fuck-up.

Book Reviewed: Eight Lives Down by Chris Hunter

You may have noticed that I have been reading a shit load of books lately. This is because I have been spending an inordinate amount of time either in various North American airports, budget airline seats and skanky hotels in crime ridden US cities. This week I was in that urban slum Atlanta, Georgia and as a side pursuit, when I got sick of being accosted in the main street by crack addicts, I worked my way through this tome, a memoir of a tour in Iraq by a British Army captain whose pursuit of happiness consisted of defusing roadside bombs in Basra. Fucking lovely.

The guy is not a professional writer and sometimes his military dependence on casual army-guy jargon is a bit jarring (“blues and twos” anyone?) but overall it was a quick and undemanding read with some great anecdotes (“what do you feel when you kill women and children? Recoil Ma’am, recoil”) so I found it a useful throwaway book. Not one to read twice but not one to tear into bits like that piece of shit Jeffrey Archer book I suffered through last year.