Review Iraq, Guide To Law And Policy

Mallat, Chibli, Iraq, Guide To Law And Policy, Austin, Boston, Chicago, New York, The Netherlands: Wolters Kluwer, 2009

 

Iraq, Guide To Law And Policy by Chibli Mallat is not your usual release. It follows the format of an American law book. It has primary sources like the Iraqi constitution and the Transitional Administrative law, short articles and U.S. government and international reports covering topics from Iraqi law to its economy to the security situation under the U.S. occupation. Those are followed by notes and questions by the author and other legal scholars. It’s probably best used as a reference source to give background to research into Iraq.

Review My Share of the Task, A Memoir

McChrystal, General Stanley, My Share of the Task, A Memoir, New York, Toronto, London, Dublin, Victoria, New Delhi, Auckland, Parktown North, Beijing: Penguin Books, 2013

 

My Share of the Task, A Memoir is about the military career of General Stanley McChrystal from when he attended West Point to when he was forced out of commanding forces in Afghanistan. The book is broken up into three main sections. The first is about his start in the military as he went from unit to unit hoping to become a Ranger. The second is about his time in Iraq running Special Forces operations against the insurgency and militias. The third is on the Afghan campaign. The main take away was that McChrystal was not a deep strategic thinker but focused upon tactical decisions.

Chilcot Inquiry Section 9.4 June 2005 To May 2006

From the summer of 2005 to the summer of 2006 the British were having trouble on two fronts in Iraq. First, despite Prime Minister Tony Blair still thinking positively about the war officials in his government still believed that the Coalition was failing. In the south which the U.K. was responsible for its own strategy was also not working and the focus turned to how it could withdraw as quickly as possible, which mimicked the American plan which the Brits were critical of.

Chilcot Report Section 3.5 Development of UK Strategy and Options September to November 2002 – Negotiation of Resolution 1441

From September to November 2002 the main issue before the Blair government was how to approach the United Nations and deal with the United States’ opposition to that move. Prime Minister Tony Blair’s only victory so far with the Bush administration was to convince the president to go to the U.N. to get a new resolution on Iraq. Now there were disputes over whether one or two resolutions were needed to go to war. The Blair government was told that two would be necessary, and the problems that would cause with the Americans, but Blair went ahead anyway taking the risk that things would work out.

U.S. Army History Iraq War Vol 1 - Chapter 21 Hope In Ramadi

Chapter 21 of the U.S. Army History of the Iraq War is about Ramadi in Anbar province finally being a turning point in the war against Al Qaeda in Iraq. Tribes in the governorate had been upset with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s ideology and leadership since 2004. In 2006 some sheikhs finally got the backing of the United States leading to the Anbar Awakening.

U.S. Army History Of Iraq War Vol 1 - Chapter 18 – Defeated By Democracy, Winter 2005-2006

The end of 2005 brought continued failure for the U.S. effort in Iraq which the American military was ironically completely unaware of. The commanding General George Casey actually thought his strategy was working and the U.S. could start withdrawing its troops soon. He couldn’t have been more wrong. The country was moving towards civil war as shown by not only violence, but the elections and constitutional drafting process. The U.S. was also ignoring Iran’s interference and England’s failure in Basra. It would take another year for the Americans to realize that things had gone tragically wrong in Iraq.

U.S. Army History of Iraq War Vol 1 - Chapter 16 – Going West, April-August 2005

Starting in the spring of 2005 Abu Musab al-Zarqawi launched his campaign to start a civil war between Iraq’s Sunnis and Shiites. That actually angered Al Qaeda who believed Zarqawi should be targeting the Americans instead. The new Jaafari government responded in kind by recruiting militiamen into the security forces and attacking Sunnis. The U.S. on the other hand completely missed what was going on as usual even though it had Zarqawi’s plan. Its new counterinsurgency approach was also failing because of the lack of troops. This period was the prequel to Iraq completely coming apart.

U.S. Army History Of Iraq War Vol 1 - Chapter 15 – Transformation In A Time Of War, January-April 2005

The start of 2005 was a transition period for both the United States and Iraqis. On the one hand the U.S. was trying and failing to implement its first strategy for Iraq. On the other Al Qaeda in Iraq was announced, other insurgent groups were breaking with Zarqawi, and Moqtada al-Sadr moved towards Iran.

U.S. Army History Of Iraq War Vol 1 – Chapter 14 Fighting To The Elections, August-December 2004

The 14^th chapter of the U.S. Army history of the Iraq War covers the end of 2004. At that time the U.S. military was focused upon securing major cities including Fallujah to allow the January 2005 elections to take place. On the other hand, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi was becoming the face of the insurgency while the first splits in the resistance were beginning to emerge.

U.S. Army History Of Iraq War Vol 1 – Chapter 11 The Gathering Storm

The eleventh chapter of the U.S. Army history of the Iraq War covers the events at the start of 2004. The American military thought the insurgency was waning and that it could withdraw as soon as the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) were rebuilt, while the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) was forced to bring in the United Nations to settle its dispute with Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani over elections. The U.S. was operating in a vacuum as it missed the maturation of the insurgency and was ignoring Iran’s growing influence in Iraq.

Review Inside The Resistance, Reporting From Iraq’s Danger Zone

Chehab, Zaki, Inside The Resistance, Reporting From Iraq’s Danger Zone, New York: Nation Books, 2005

 

Inside The Resistance, Reporting From Iraq’s Danger Zone is a completely rambling collection of thoughts by journalist Zaki Chehab about the first two years of the U.S. occupation of Iraq. From the title and the first few chapters the reader would think the book is about why there was an insurgency in Iraq. That would be misleading as after that the book goes in all kinds of directions from the Iraqi opposition to Saddam and the American neoconservatives to the regional impact of the war in Iraq to the role of Palestinians in the country, and then some ideas on how Iraqi government might turn out. There is little rhyme or reason to the chapters and lots of repetition. Zaki was a reporter who obviously dearly missed the aid of an editor when he wrote this book.

Review Zarqawi, The New Face of Al-Qaeda

Brisard, Jean-Charles, Zarqawi, The New Face of Al-Qaeda, New York: Other Press, 2005

 

Jean-Charles Brisard’s Zarqawi, The New Face of Al-Qaeda was one of the first two books written about the subject. Published in 2005 it does a very good job detailing Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s life in Jordan and his two trips to Afghanistan. The problem is it also used a lot of early information which later proved wrong. That means Zarqawi’s relationship with Al Qaeda and his role in the Iraqi insurgency is almost completely off. Not only that but Brisard claimed that Zarqawi was not a strategist and only relied upon ultra-violence missing the fact that was part of his plan all along. The book therefore is very up and down.

Review Black Flags, The Rise Of ISIS

Warrick, Joby, Black Flags, The Rise Of ISIS, New York, London, Toronto, Sydney, Auckland: Doubleday, 2015

 

Black Flags, The Rise Of ISIS by journalist Joby Warrick purports to be about Abu Musab al-Zarqawi the founder of Al Qaeda in Iraq and his legacy the Islamic State. The problem is that Warrick let his sources shape his writing, meaning the major players he talked with including people like Jordan’s King Abdullah, former U.S. Ambassador Robert Ford, retired General Stanley McChrystal and others determined what he wrote about whether they were relevant to his topic or not. It makes for a very uneven book that becomes more discordant as it progresses.

Review The Master Plan, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy For Final Victory

Fishman, Brian, The Master Plan, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy For Final Victory, New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2016

 

Brian Fishman’s The Master Plan, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy For Final Victory has an inherent problem. The start of the book tries to link a plan for the future jihad written by Al Qaeda’s security chief and the book The Management of Savagery with the Islamic State. The problem was the Islamic State came up with its own strategy and had a history of not listening to Al Qaeda. If that part was removed The Master Plan would be a very good book on how Zarqawism developed and IS’s relationship with other Islamists.

Review ISIS Inside The Army of Terror, Revised & Updated

Weiss, Michael, Hassan, Hassan, ISIS Inside The Army of Terror, Revised & Updated, New York: Regan Arts, 2015

 

Of all the early books on the Islamic State ISIS Inside The Army of Terror might be the best one. It covers the rise, fall, and then rise again of the group in Iraq, its expansion into Syria, and then overseas. It deals with why people were drawn to IS, its governance, financing, ideology, indoctrination, and its foreign terrorist attacks. It still has some faults, but overall, it sticks to the Islamic State unlike other releases which highlights authors Weiss and Hassan’s research.

Review The Terrorists of Iraq, Inside the Strategy and Tactics of the Iraq Insurgency 2003-2014

Nance, Malcolm, The Terrorists of Iraq, Inside the Strategy and Tactics of the Iraq Insurgency 2003-2014, Boca Raton, London, New York: CRC Press, 2015

 

The Terrorists of Iraq, Inside the Strategy and Tactics of the Iraq Insurgency 2003-2014 is an introduction to the Iraqi militants. It has the major groups involved, their organization, strategy, tactics, weapons and major battles. If it just stuck to that it would be a fine book for beginners. The problem is that it has two major problems with the origins of the insurgency and the history of the Islamic State.

Review Under The Black Flag, At The Frontier Of The New Jihad

Moubayed, Sami, Under The Black Flag, At TheFrontier Of The New Jihad, New York: I.B. Tauris, 2015

The rise of the Islamic State (IS) in 2014 led to a cottage industry of books on the topic. Under The Black Flag, At The Frontier Of The New Jihad was one of them. Author Sami Moubayed wrote that the purpose of Under The Black Flag was to explore the ideological history of IS. He was a Syrian historian, which shaped his work. That’s seen with the first half of the book being about the Islamic empires, the caliphate and the Islamist movement in Syria even though he admits that the Islamic State had little to do with that country until 2011. When IS is finally discussed in the second half it is full of inaccuracies. The lack of focus and the problems it has with its topic makes Under The Black Flag a book to avoid.

Review Insurgent Iraq, Al Zarqawi and the New Generation

Napoleoni, Loretta, Insurgent Iraq, Al Zarqawi and the New Generation, New York: Seven Stories Press, 2005

In Insurgent Iraq author Loretta Napoleoni attempted to write one of the first biographies of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. She tried to place him within the larger jihadist movement. Her main argument was that Zarqawi was created as a boogeyman by the U.S. and Iraqi governments to first justify the invasion of Iraq and then disparage the insurgency as a foreign rather than Iraqi effort. There are two major problems with the book. First, the author has a stream of consciousness style of writing, which means she skips from topic to topic some of which are not related to Zarqawi. The second, is that she discounts many events believing they were part of the propaganda campaign surrounding the Al Qaeda in Iraq founder. In the end Zarqawi’s story and importance gets lost.

Review The ISIS Reader, Milestone Texts of the Islamic State Movement

Ingram, Haroro, Whiteside, Craig & Winter, Charlie, The ISIS Reader, Milestone Texts of the Islamic State Movement, Oxford, New York, Auckland, Cape Town, Dar es Salaam, Hong Kong, Karachi, Kuala Lumpuer, Madrid, Melbourne, Mexico City, Nairobi, New Dehli, Shanghai, Taipei, Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2020

The ISIS Reader, Milestone Texts of the Islamic State Movement attempts to use primary sources from the Islamic State to document the group’s main features. According to authors Haroro Ingram, Craig Whiteside and Charlie Winter those are a strategic vision of what it wants and how to achieve it, the ability to reflect and learn from its experiences, pragmatism rather than being dogmatic, and emphasizing propaganda as being as important as armed struggle. The book uses a mix of speeches, statements, video recordings, etc. starting from Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi in 1994 all the way to the last speech by Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi in 2019 to present IS’s ideas in its own words followed by analysis. In doing so, The ISIS Reader argues that the Islamic State both maintained its major ideas and goals while being able to adapt to both its successes and failures.

Review Islamic State The Digital Caliphate

Review Atwan, Abdel Bari, Islamic State The Digital Caliphate, Oakland: University of California Press,2015

Islamic State The Digital Caliphate is a short introduction to the Islamic State. It covers its history, its leadership, its form of governance, its recruiting, its relationship with Al Qaeda and foreign affiliates, etc. It’s problems are twofold. First, author Abdel Bari Atwan constantly goes off on tangents. Second, he has a meandering style going back and forth between topics, which makes for a poor narrative. While there are some interesting parts to Islamic State The Digital Caliphate it has too many distractions.