Resources on the Iraq War
When my generation, Gen-Z, thinks about the Iraq War, it’s usually the visual images and videos like the infamous banner behind then US President George W. Bush which said “mission accomplished”, on the aircraft carrier, USS Abraham Lincoln, when he addressed US troops on May 1st 2003, celebrating the success of the US and coalition forces in getting rid of the regime of Saddam Hussein. Another famous meme made from the war was from a press conference where a US diplomat, Paul Bremer, said “Ladies and Gentlemen, We Got Him", and who couldn’t forget that one Iraqi journalist who threw the shoe at President Bush at a press conference back in 2008 (the orginal shoes were destroyed, but there was a statue of it at an Iraqi orphanage.)
While we smile and laugh about some of these moments, these images and memes overshadow for many the trauma and scars of the war that many Iraqis still deal with today. It’s also has dramatically shaped the way in which how the US is viewed around the world, at the end of the cold war, the US was seen as the lone superpower representing these values of liberal democracy, human rights and free market capitalism. However, the war shifted that perception of the US as being a “hypocrite” in not following it’s values or even when it was trying to implement those values it turned into one gigantic and catastrophic mess.
As today marks the 20th anniversary, I wanted to highlight some great articles and resources about the Iraq War. To be honest, I don’t know if I’m the best person to explain what had happened in Iraq. Because just like the Syrian civil war, once you read over details and details of everything that happened your brain will just implode with all of that information. It’s nearly impossible to find an unbiased source just because we all have biases which shape the way
#1: Basic Primers on the War in Iraq
For those of you who want to have a good summary and want a place to start in understanding the War in Iraq, I feel like videos are the best way for people to understand a lot of complex situations or historical events.
The first one is from Johnny Harris, a former journalist and filmmaker at Vox, who now has a YouTube channel. He did a brilliant primer of the Iraq War which I think does the best out of all the primers in explaining the war and the aftermath of how the war had affected the Iraq.
Another good primer was done by Al Jazeera, which gives a lot of the same information given by Johnny Harris, although it put’s much more of a special emphasis on the aftermath of Iraq and the mistakes that were made by both the US and Iraq when it came to the governance of Iraq after Saddam Hussein was overthrown
There is also another video from Al Jazeera where Sana Saeed takes a critical look at the media’s role when it came to their coverage of the Iraq war.
If you want a focus on more of the military strategy and the battles that take place this video is also a good explainer although it is longer than the other ones
#2: Reflections on the Iraq War:
This part will be more based on articles but I highly encourage you to check them out.
One of my favourite ones were from Spencer Ackerman, former contributing editor at the Daily Beast as well as National Security Correspondent for them as well. He now writes his own blog called the Forever Wars and columnist at The Nation. He recently wrote a few articles for the 20th anniversary which I think are some of the best written. There is one he wrote on Rolling Stone, The Iraq War Unleashed an Age of Grift. We’re Still Living in It. Another one was what he wrote in the Nation, The Unlearned Lessons From the War in Iraq.
If you’re interested in Ackerman’s further work, I suggest you read his book, Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump Where he touches on the Iraq War along with many other events which made up the war on terror.
There was also many good articles from the Guardian, such as Armando Iannucci, the Scottish writer and satirist who is famous for shows such as VEEP or the movie, The Death of Stalin, he wrote about how one of his shows, The Thick of It was inspired by his anger over the Iraq War. Another article was a column by Rose Gentle, a mother who lost her son, Gordon Gentle in the Iraq War, who reflects on the war through her loss of her son and the anger over the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, for allowing Britain to join the war. Another good reflection was from Stephen Wertheim a fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace who wrote “Two decades later, it feels as if the US is trying to forget the Iraq war ever happened”.
Another one was from Moustafa Bayoumi and his article “The Iraq war started the post-truth era. And America is to blame”. Which was an interesting way of looking at start of what is seen as “post truth” politics is from the Bush preisdency and then later being a centre front of the Trump presidency. Other good articles come from Patrick Wintour (Long shadow of US invasion of Iraq still looms over international order) and Martin Chulov (A bloody delusion: how Iraq war led to catastrophic aftermath in Middle East)
There has also been some interesting coverage from MSNBC on the 20 year anniversary especially from Mehdi Hasan:
There are many more sources I want to share with you guys, but I feel like I’ve given a good number of sources to sift over. I hope you learn more about the Iraq War.