“Remember the Law of the Cigarette,” says my fixer Mohammed as we approach a checkpoint on the outskirts of Mosul. We’ve spent the morning driving through a landscape scarred by the war against Isis. Villages are filled with ruined buildings …
Tony Blair lied from the start
It was a bright day in March, and the clocks were striking 13. Outside 10 Downing Street, Rishi Sunak stepped forward, bowed his head, and led his country in a minute’s silence. Above him, fluttering in the gentle breeze, was …
The betrayal of Baghdad
Baghdad. Winter is almost over. Traces of Saddam Hussain still litter the city. There is so much chaos, you’d think the Western coalition had never tried to rebuild the place. And, after all these years, it wouldn’t feel strange to …
Black gold fuelled the Iraq War
Even before the conspicuous absence of weapons of mass destruction shattered the pretext for the Iraq War, it was haunted by black gold. Whether oil motivated George W. Bush and his advisers’ decision to invade was part of the bitter …
Black gold fuelled the Iraq War
Even before the conspicuous absence of weapons of mass destruction shattered the pretext for the Iraq War, it was haunted by black gold. Whether oil motivated George W. Bush and his advisers’ decision to invade was part of the bitter …
The battle to control America’s mind
“How can a man in a cave out-communicate the world’s leading communications society?” wondered Richard Holbrooke, the dean of the American Diplomatic Corps, in the aftermath of 9/11. What startled Holbrooke, and presumably many of the readers of his Washington …
The cowardice of the far Left
The far Left exposed itself this week in a series of meetings and rallies and encounters about Ukraine, for a tyrant bombing civilians will get a fair hearing from them if he is not a member of Nato.
Putin needs …
Why Putin is no Hitler
Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is a barbarity. It is also an act of futility. That is not how many in Washington see it, and even Republicans who have become sceptical of foreign intervention may be shocked into thinking that …