Written by the chief military correspondent of the New York Times and a prominent retired Marine general, this is the definitive account of the invasion of Iraq.\nA stunning work of investigative journalism, Cobra II describes in riveting detail how the American rush to Baghdad provided the opportunity for the virulent insurgency that followed. As Gordon and Trainor show, the brutal aftermath was not inevitable and was a surprise to the generals on both sides. Based on access to unseen documents and exclusive interviews with the men and women at the heart of the war, Cobra II provides firsthand accounts of the fighting on the ground and the high-level planning behind the scenes. Now with a new afterword that addresses what transpired after the fateful events of the summer of 2003, this is a peerless re-creation and analysis of the central event of our times.

A Wall Street Journal Best Nonfiction Book of 2012In this follow-up to their national bestseller Cobra II, Michael Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor deftly piece together the story of the most widely reported but least understood war in American history. This stunning account of the political and military struggle between American, Iraqi, and Iranian forces brings together vivid reporting of diplomatic intrigue and gripping accounts of the blow-by-blow fighting that lasted nearly a decade. Informed by brilliant research, classified documents, and extensive interviews with key figures—including everyone from the intelligence community to Sunni and Shi’ite leaders and former insurgents to senior Iraqi military officers—The Endgame presents a riveting chronicle of the occupation of Iraq to the withdrawal of American troops that is sure to remain the essential account of the war for years to come.

A top D.C. journalist tells the inside story of the U.S. war against the Islamic StateWhen the last U.S. combat troops left Iraq in 2011, President Obama took credit for keeping his promise to end one war. As savage violence flared in Syria that very same year, he resisted calls to intervene in another. His plan to reduce America’s provocative military presence in the Middle East would be faithfully executed. Five years later, the United States is again at war in the region―this time against the Islamic State, whose self-declared caliphate covers large tracts of Iraq and Syria. How did this happen? And how will the United States seek to prevail in this crucial return engagement?In Degrade and Destroy, Michael R. Gordon, the bestselling author and The New York Times’s national security correspondent, reveals the debates, diplomacy, and military strategy that have shaped the struggle against the Islamic State. With extraordinary access to the White House, the intelligence community, the State Department, and the Pentagon, Gordon offers a riveting narrative. We see Hillary Clinton trying to arm the Syrian rebels; John Kerry coaxing reluctant allies; and U.S. war planners at work even as Russians, Turks, and others complicate or frustrate every move. The result is a crucial work of contemporary history that also exposes the vexing choices that confront the next president. The State Department has recently said it expects the struggle with ISIS to last three to five years.

One of the New York Times' 100 Notable Books of 2015One of Financial Times' Books of the Year, 2015A New York Times Editors' ChoiceA New Statesman [UK] Essential Book of the Year 2015A Times [UK] Book of the Year 2015Shortlisted for the 2015 Samuel Johnson Prize for NonfictionShortlisted for the 2016 Orwell PrizeWhen Emma Sky volunteered to help rebuild Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003, she had little idea what she was getting in to. Her assignment was only supposed to last three months. She went on to serve there longer than any other senior military or diplomatic figure, giving her an unrivaled perspective of the entire conflict.As the representative of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Kirkuk in 2003 and then the political advisor to US General Odierno from 2007-2010, Sky was valued for her knowledge of the region and her outspoken voice. She became a tireless witness to American efforts to transform a country traumatized by decades of war, sanctions, and brutal dictatorship; to insurgencies and civil war; to the planning and implementation of the surge and the subsequent drawdown of US troops; to the corrupt political elites who used sectarianism to mobilize support; and to the takeover of a third of the country by the Islamic State.With sharp detail and tremendous empathy, Sky provides unique insights into the US military as well as the complexities, diversity, and evolution of Iraqi society. The Unraveling is an intimate insider's portrait of how and why the Iraq adventure failed and contains a unique analysis of the course of the war. Highlighting how nothing that happened in Iraq after 2003 was inevitable, Sky exposes the failures of the policies of both Republicans and Democrats, and the lessons that must be learned about the limitations of power.

A war memoir that will capture the hearts of its readers, just as one scruffy puppy sneaked his way into the hearts of hardened Marines just when they needed it most.

Plan of Attack is the definitive account of how and why President George W. Bush, his war council, and allies launched a preemptive attack to topple Saddam Hussein and occupy Iraq. Bob Woodward's latest landmark account of Washington decision making provides an original, authoritative narrative of behind-the-scenes maneuvering over two years, examining the causes and consequences of the most controversial war since Vietnam. Based on interviews with 75 key participants and more than three and a half hours of exclusive interviews with President Bush, Plan of Attack is part presidential history charting the decisions made during 16 critical months; part military history revealing precise details and the evolution of the Top Secret war planning under the restricted codeword Polo Step; and part a harrowing spy story as the CIA dispatches a covert paramilitary team into northern Iraq six months before the start of the war. This team recruited 87 Iraqi spies designated with the cryptonym DB/ROCKSTARS, one of whom turned over the personnel files of all 6,000 men in Saddam Hussein's personal security organization. What emerges are astonishingly intimate portraits: President Bush in war cabinet meetings in the White House Situation Room and the Oval Office, and in private conversation; Dick Cheney, the focused and driven vice president; Colin Powell, the conflicted and cautious secretary of state; Donald Rumsfeld, the controlling war technocrat; George Tenet, the activist CIA director; Tommy Franks, the profane and demanding general; Condoleezza Rice, the ever-present referee and national security adviser; Karl Rove, the hands-on political strategist; other key members of the White House staff and congressional leadership; and foreign leaders ranging from British Prime Minister Blair to Russian President Putin. Plan of Attack provides new details on the intelligence assessments of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction and the planning for the war's aftermath.

Acclaimed and celebrated in the Arab world for its vivid portrait of Iraq, this heartbreaking novel confronts the war-torn nation’s horrifying recent history Young Jawad, born to a traditional Shi'ite family of corpse washers and shrouders in Baghdad, decides to abandon the family tradition, choosing instead to become a sculptor, to celebrate life rather than tend to death. He enters Baghdad’s Academy of Fine Arts in the late 1980s, in defiance of his father’s wishes and determined to forge his own path. But the circumstances of history dictate otherwise. Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship and the economic sanctions of the 1990s destroy the socioeconomic fabric of society. The 2003 invasion and military occupation unleash sectarian violence. Corpses pile up, and Jawad returns to the inevitable washing and shrouding. Trained as an artist to shape materials to represent life aesthetically, he now must contemplate how death shapes daily life and the bodies of Baghdad’s inhabitants.\nThrough the struggles of a single desperate family, Sinan Antoon’s novel shows us the heart of Iraq’s complex and violent recent history. Descending into the underworld where the borders between life and death are blurred and where there is no refuge from unending nightmares, Antoon limns a world of great sorrows, a world where the winds wail.\n