Iraq

In the aftermath of the Gulf War, the United States, Britain, and France established no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq. The stated purpose was to protect Kurds and Shia from Saddam's attacks. The real purpose was to contain Iraq, to weaken the regime, to establish a permanent military presence in the country.

The no-fly zones were not authorized by the UN. They were imposed unilaterally. Iraqi aircraft were forbidden to fly in these areas. The coalition enforced the ban with regular patrols, and when Iraqi air defenses challenged them, they struck back. The low-intensity conflict lasted twelve years.

In Basra, Hajja Umm Ahmed watched the planes overhead. She had grown used to them—the sound of jet engines, the distant thump of bombs. Her grandson, now ten, asked her what they were. She said they were the sky's way of reminding them that the war was not over. She did not explain that the war would never be over.

In Kirkuk, Ahmed stared at the wall. The planes meant nothing to him. He was thirty-three now, still silent, still hollow. His mother had stopped hoping he would recover. She simply brought him food and cleaned his room. It was all she could do.

UNSCOM and the IAEA began inspections in 1991. Their mandate was to find and destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Over the next seven years, they conducted hundreds of inspections, discovered and destroyed large quantities of chemical and biological weapons, and dismantled Iraq's nuclear program. By 1998, most experts agreed that Iraq's WMD programs were effectively dead.

But the inspections were also a game of cat and mouse. Iraq concealed, delayed, and obstructed. The inspectors pushed, demanded, and reported. The regime feared that the inspections were a cover for espionage—and they were right. The inspectors shared intelligence with their home governments. The US used the inspections to gather information about Saddam's security apparatus.

In Baghdad, Layla treated patients and filled her notebooks. She was thirty-one now, a senior doctor. She had seen the inspectors come and go, had heard the rumors about what they were finding. She did not care about WMD. She cared about the children dying from contaminated water, from malnutrition, from the sanctions that the inspections did nothing to lift.

In Anbar, Sheikh Hamid watched the inspectors pass through his region. He knew that some of his tribesmen worked at suspected sites, that they lied to the inspectors when asked. He did not ask what they were hiding. He did not want to know.

Throughout the 1990s, Iraqi defectors trickled out of the country, bringing stories of Saddam's atrocities and hidden weapons. Some were genuine. Many were not. The Iraqi National Congress, headed by Ahmed Chalabi, fed stories to Western intelligence and journalists. Chalabi was a SAM—a Starry-Eyed Aspirant to Majorship—who believed he could control the machine. He was wrong.

The defectors' stories were often sensational, impossible to verify, exactly what the anti-Saddam camp wanted to hear. They claimed hidden WMD stockpiles, mobile labs, secret programs. Western intelligence agencies, eager to justify their budgets and their hostility to Iraq, lapped them up.

In Kirkuk, Ahmed's mother heard the rumors on the radio. She did not believe them. She had lived under Saddam for thirty years. She knew that he was brutal, that he killed his own people, that he had used chemical weapons. But she also knew that the Americans exaggerated, that they had their own reasons for demonizing him. She said nothing. Silence was survival.

The most damaging fabricator was Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, codenamed "Curveball." He arrived in Germany in 1999, claiming to have worked on mobile biological weapons labs—trucks and railcars that produced anthrax. The German intelligence service was skeptical, but the Americans were not. They took his story at face value.

Years later, Curveball admitted he had fabricated the entire tale to gain asylum. By then, his story had been used to justify a war that killed hundreds of thousands.

In Baghdad, Layla did not know about Curveball. She knew only that the Americans were talking about weapons that no one had seen. She asked her patients: Did they know anyone who worked on such things? They laughed. The idea was absurd. Iraq was a broken country, struggling to feed itself. The regime was brutal, but it was not building secret weapons. It could barely keep the lights on.

By 2002, the Bush administration was determined to invade Iraq. Intelligence was gathered, cherry-picked, and presented as proof of imminent threat. The aluminum tubes story—Iraq trying to buy tubes for centrifuges—was debunked by experts but repeated by officials. The Niger yellowcake documents were crude forgeries, exposed within hours by the IAEA, but not before they were used to build the case.

In Washington, Briefcase Men like Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz pushed for war. They had a vision: a democratic Iraq, a beacon for the Middle East, a strategic ally. They ignored the intelligence that contradicted them. They bullied the analysts who disagreed.

In Anbar, Sheikh Hamid watched the news. He saw Colin Powell at the UN, holding up a vial of white powder, talking about mobile labs. Hamid knew his country. He knew there were no such labs. He knew that whatever Saddam had once possessed was long gone. He knew that the Americans were lying—or were being lied to. He did not know which was worse.

For the neo-conservatives in Washington, 9/11 was the catalyst. Saddam was not involved in the attacks, but that didn't matter. The goal was to reshape the Middle East, to demonstrate American power, to create a democratic Iraq that would inspire the region. War was not a last resort; it was an opportunity.

In Baghdad, Layla listened to the BBC. She heard the rhetoric, the threats, the drumbeat of war. She was thirty-two years old. She had lived through two wars, through sanctions, through the deaths of thousands of children. She knew what was coming. She did not know how to stop it.

In Basra, Hajja's grandson was now eleven. He asked her why the Americans wanted to attack. She told him that some men always want more. They have power, but they want more power. They have money, but they want more money. They will never stop. He did not understand. He was too young. She hoped he would never have to.

In November 2002, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1441, offering Iraq a "final opportunity" to comply with disarmament. Iraq accepted, allowed inspectors back, and cooperated to an unprecedented degree. But it didn't matter. The decision to invade had already been made.

Hans Blix, the chief inspector, reported that Iraq was cooperating, that no WMD had been found, that the process was working. The Bush administration dismissed his reports. They wanted war, not inspections.

In Baghdad, Layla watched Blix on television. She saw a man who seemed honest, who seemed to believe in his mission. She knew it wouldn't matter. The machine was too strong. The war would come.

On February 5, 2003, Colin Powell addressed the UN Security Council. He presented satellite photos, intercepted communications, and intelligence reports—including Curveball's claims about mobile labs. It was a masterful performance, and it convinced many Americans that war was justified.

Powell later called it a "blot" on his record. He had been misled by the intelligence community, and he had misled the world.

In Kirkuk, Ahmed's mother heard the news. She did not understand the details. She understood only that the Americans were coming. She went to her son's room, sat beside him, and held his hand. He did not respond. He never did. But she held on anyway.

In Anbar, Sheikh Hamid gathered his tribe. He told them to prepare—store food, water, medicine. The war was coming, and it would be unlike anything they had seen. He did not tell them that he had no idea how to survive it.

In Baghdad, Layla went to the hospital. She did not know when the bombing would start. She only knew that she would be needed.