In the autumn of 2002, Atlantic Monthly national correspondent James Fallows wrote an article predicting many of the problems America would face if it invaded Iraq. After events confirmed many of his predictions, Fallows went on to write some of the most acclaimed, award-winning journalism on the planning and execution of the war, much of which has been assigned as required reading within the U.S. military. In Blind Into Baghdad , Fallows takes us from the planning of the war through the struggles of reconstruction. With unparalleled access and incisive analysis, he shows us how many of the difficulties were anticipated by experts whom the administration ignored. Fallows examines how the war in Iraq undercut the larger ”war on terror” and why Iraq still had no army two years after the invasion. In a sobering conclusion, he interviews soldiers, spies, and diplomats to imagine how a war in Iran might play out. This is an important and essential book to understand where and how the war went wrong, and what it means for America. Fallows' series of articles for the Atlantic Monthly between 2002 and 2005 that won the magazine a National Magazine Award are collected in this book, offering a backward look on the analysis that criticized the administration's plan for a preemptive war in Iraq and its woefully inadequate planning for the aftermath of war. Fallows' article "The Fifty-first State," published in November 2002, conveyed the complexity of dealing with Iraq after the war and the likelihood that the responsibility would be long term and consuming. The collection examines the questionable reports of Iraq's cache of weapons of mass destruction and how the administration could have known of the internal tensions within Iraq that would make managing the occupation extremely difficult. Fallows explores why Iraq has no army two years after the invasion and the threats posed by Iran. The collection provides an interesting perspective on the war, looking back on what was anticipated with uncanny accuracy, which raises even more questions about the administration's inability to foresee the difficulties of occupying Iraq. Footnotes provide additional information, background, and commentary since the articles first appeared. Vanessa Bush Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved “No one was more prescient than James Fallows about the war in Iraq and what it would entail.” –Andrew Sullivan “The Iraq imbroglio has produced some amazing and, for war supporters, painful essays. . . . Blind Into Baghdad . . . show[s] that most of what happened in postwar Iraq was predicted prewar by government analysts. It's just that their reports were suppressed or ignored by the people making the decisions.” –David Brooks, The New York Times James Fallows is The Atlantic Monthly's National Correspondent, and has worked for the magazine for more than twenty years. His previous books include Breaking the News: How the Media Undermine American Democracy, Looking at the Sun, More Like Us and National Defense, which won the American Book Award for non-fiction. He and his wife live in Washington DC. THE FIFTY-FIRST STATE? NOVEMBER 2002 Through the summer of 2002 I interviewed several dozen people about what could be expected in Iraq after the United States dislodged Saddam Hussein. An assumption behind the question was that sooner or later the United States would go to war--and would go with at best a fraction of the support it enjoyed eleven years ago when fighting Iraq during the Gulf War. Most nations in the region and traditional U.S. allies would be neutral or hostile unless the Bush administration could present new evidence of imminent danger from Iraq. A further assumption was that even alone, U.S. forces would win this war. The victory might be slower than in the last war against Iraq, and it would certainly cost more American lives.* But in the end U.S. tanks, attack airplanes, precision-guided bombs, special-operations forces, and other assets would crush the Iraqi military. The combat phase of the war would be over when the United States destroyed Saddam Hussein's control over Iraq's government, armed forces, and stockpile of weapons. What then? The people I asked were spies, Arabists, oil-company officials, diplomats, scholars, policy experts, and many active-duty and retired soldiers. They were from the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. Some firmly supported a preemptive war against Iraq; more were opposed. As of late summer, before the serious domestic debate had begun, most of the people I spoke with expected a war to occur. I began my research sharing the view, prevailing in Washington through 2002, that forcing "regime change" on Iraq was our era's grim historical necessity: starting a war would be bad, but waiting to have war brought to us would be worse. This view depended to some degree on trusting that the U.S. government had information not available to the public a