Voices of the Iraq War
Contemporary Accounts of Daily Life
by Brian L. Steed, Editor
April 2016, 288pp, 8 1/2 x 11
1 volume, Greenwood

Hardcover: 978-1-4408-3674-9
$115, £89, 100€, A158
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eBook Available: 978-1-4408-3675-6
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Beyond the estimated 461,000 war-related deaths that resulted from the Iraq War, there is also the legacy of chaos, violence, and loss for those who lived through it.

The Iraq War (2003–2011) was the most significant conflict in the early 21st century. This book examines the ongoing importance of this war for the Middle East and the world today through first-person accounts of the war and primary source documents.

Voices of the Iraq War: Contemporary Accounts of Daily Life illuminates the complex and poorly reported realities of the conflict that those without direct experience cannot possibly fathom, presenting detailed personal accounts of what the conflict in Iraq was like across multiple disciplines and through a variety of viewpoints. The accounts are based on interviews with American, Iraqi-American, and British officers who deployed and fought throughout the country of Iraq.

The book begins with the story of an Iraqi boy who flees Iraq with his family after Desert Storm and then returns to Iraq as a translator to assist U.S. forces nearly 16 years later. The book is filled with personal accounts of combat and training as well as other real-world experiences that define what the Iraq War meant to thousands of U.S. and allied service members. These personal accounts are supported with national level policy speeches and official statements that help readers put the individual stories and events in national, regional, and global perspective. The book concludes by examining the impact of this war on thousands of young men and women that will last for decades to come.

Features

  • Provides readers with an understanding of the causes of successes and failures in Iraq and how these events contributed to the volatility of the Middle East in the early 21st century
  • Includes dozens of primary source documents, such as presidential speeches, congressional testimony, and interviews with U.S., Iraqi-American, and British officers who deployed and fought throughout the country of Iraq
  • Presents a thought-provoking, personal perspective on modern war that will enable students to have an intelligent dialogue on the complex, confusing experiences associated with the conduct of modern war
Brian L. Steed is a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and a military history instructor at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College as well as a Middle East foreign area officer. He served eight and a half consecutive years in the Middle East including assignments in the Levant, Mesopotamia, and the Arabian Peninsula. He served briefly in Iraq in 2005, a full year in 2010–2011, and again December 2014–February 2015. Steed was a Jordanian army officer as part of the Military Personnel Exchange Program for two and a half years, giving him an immersed perspective in Arab culture; his duty as liaison to the Israel Defense Force providing another immersed experience from a different regional perspective. He has written numerous books on military theory and military history and cultural awareness. His most recent book, Bees and Spiders: Applied Cultural Awareness and the Art of Cross-Cultural Influence, is about using cultural awareness to develop empathy and ultimately influence.

Reviews

"More than merely an oral or documentary history of the war, this title could well serve as a textbook for senior high school and undergraduate history courses. . . . Voices of the Iraq War does a commendable job in presenting that conflict from multiple perspectives, from the president of the United States to the soldiers doing the fighting and Iraqi citizens who were forced to watch their nation being torn asunder. Throughout, the text is both readable and informative."—ARBA, March 13, 2017
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