During the thirty years that award-winning journalist Robert Fisk has been reporting on the Middle East, he has covered every major event in the region, from the Algerian Civil War to the Iranian Revolution, from the American hostage crisis in Beirut (as one of only two Western journalists in the city at the time) to the Iran-Iraq War, from the Russian invasion of Afghanistan to Israel’s invasions of Lebanon, from the Gulf War to the invasion and ongoing war in Iraq. Now he brings his knowledge, his firsthand experience and his intimate understanding of the Middle East to a book that addresses the full complexity of its political history and its current state of affairs.
Passionate in his concerns about the region and relentless in his pursuit of the truth, Fisk has been able to enter the world of the Middle East and the lives of its people as few other journalists have. The result is a work of stunning reportage. His unblinking eyewitness testimony to the horrors of war places him squarely in the tradition of the great frontline reporters of the Second World War. His searing descriptions of lives mangled in the chaos of battle and of the battles themselves are at once dreadful and heartrending.
This is also a book of lucid, incisive analysis. Reaching back into the long history of invasion, occupation and colonization in the region, Fisk sets forth this information in a way that makes clear how a history of injustice “has condemned the Middle East to war.” He lays open the role of the West in the seemingly endless strife and warfare in the region, traces the growth of the West’s involvement and influence there over the past one hundred years, and outlines the West’s record of support for some of the most ruthless leaders in the Middle East. He chronicles the ever-more-powerful military presence of the United States and tracks the consequent, increasingly virulent anti-Western–and particularly anti-American–sentiment among the region’s Muslim populations.
Fisk interweaves this history with his own vividly rendered experiences in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Algeria, Israel, Palestine and Lebanon–on the front lines; behind the scenes; in the streets of cities and villages; and inside military headquarters, the hideouts of guerrillas, the homes of ordinary citizens. Here, too, are indelible portraits of Osama bin Laden, Ayatollah Khomeini and Yassir Arafat, among others–all of whom he has met face-to-face–revelatory in their apprehension of the individuals and the ideologies they represent.
Finally, The Great War for Civilisation is the story of journalists in war: of their attempts to report the first, impartial drafts of history, to monitor the centers of power, to challenge authority (“especially . . . when governments and politicians take us to war”) and to battle an increasingly partisan worldwide media in their determination to report the truth.
Unflinching, provocative, brilliantly written–a work of major importance for today’s world.
The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East FROM THE PUBLISHER Acknowledgements
List of Maps
Preface
1. "One of Our Brothers Had a Dream . . ."
2. "They Shoot Russians"
3. The Choirs of Kandahar
4. The Carpet-Weavers
5. The Path to War
6. "The Whirlwind War"
7. "War against War" and the Fast Train to Paradise
8. Drinking the Poisoned Chalice
9. "Sentenced to Suffer Death"
10. The First Holocaust
11. Fifty Thousand Miles from Palestine
12. The Last Colonial War
13. The Girl and the Child and Love
14. "Anything to Wipe Out a Devil . . ."
15. Planet Damnation
16. Betrayal
17. The Land of Graves
18. The Plague
19. Now Thrive the Armourers . . .
20. Even to Kings, He Comes . . .
21. Why?
22. The Die Is Cast
23. Atomic Dog, Annihilator, Arsonist, Anthrax, Anguish and Agamemnon
24. Into the Wilderness
Notes
Select Bibliography
Chronology
Index
FROM THE CRITICS Stephen Humphreys - The Washington Post In short, The Great War for Civilisation is a book of unquestionable importance, given Fisk's unmatched experience of war and its impact in the contemporary Middle East and his capacity to convey that experience in concrete, passionate language. … The Great War for Civilisation is also a deeply troubling book; it may well confirm the conviction of many that the Middle East is incurably sunk in violence and depravity and that only a fool would imagine it could ever be redeemed. As tragic as the last three decades have been, there are different lessons to be learned -- one must hope so, at least. Geoffrey Wheatcroft - The New York Times This is really several books fighting each other inside the sack. It could have been an intelligent young person's guide to Western Asia, or a concentrated, closely structured polemic against American policy in the region, or just a memoir…At least in part, The Great War for Civilisation is a stimulating and absorbing book, by a man who speaks Arabic, who has known the region better than most and has met the leading players, from bin Laden to Ahmad Chalabi…It is a formidable production; and as Dr. Johnson said of Paradise Lost, no man ever wished it longer. Publishers Weekly Combining a novelist's talent for atmosphere with a scholar's grasp of historical sweep, foreign correspondent Fisk (Pity the Nation: The Abduction of Lebanon) has written one of the most dense and compelling accounts of recent Middle Eastern history yet. The book opens with a deftly juxtaposed account of Fisk's two interviews with Osama bin Laden. In the first, held in Sudan in 1993, bin Laden declared himself "a construction engineer and an agriculturist." He had no time to train mujahideen, he said; he was busy constructing a highway. In the second, held four years later in Afghanistan, he declared war on the Saudi royal family and America. Fisk, who has lived in and reported on the Middle East since 1976, first for the (London) Times and now for the Independent, possesses deep knowledge of the broader history of the region, which allows him to discuss the Armenian genocide 90 years ago, the 2002 destruction of Jenin, and the battlefields of Iraq with equal aplomb. But it is his stunning capacity for visceral description-he has seen, or tracked down firsthand accounts of, all the major events of the past 25 years-that makes this volume unique. Some of the chapters contain detailed accounts of torture and murder, which more squeamish readers may be inclined to skip, but such scenes are not gratuitous. They are designed to drive home Fisk's belief that "war is primarily not about victory or defeat but about death and the infliction of death." Though Fisk's political stances may sometimes be controversial, no one can deny that this volume is a stunning achievement. (Nov.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal Fisk (Middle East correspondent, the Independent) hardly needs introduction. A veteran journalist who has received multiple awards and is respected by his peers and experts on the Middle East, he is uniquely qualified to write this book. He has produced what amounts to the most comprehensive survey of 25 years of Middle Eastern conflict in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Israel, and Lebanon by dint of his research and analysis of over 350,000 documents and eyewitness accounts. Many respected reporters, such as Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw, have written on this subject but not as thoroughly. Furthermore, this work is more than just a chronology of events or a predictable political analysis. In each well-annotated and provocative chapter, Fisk's impartial reports of torture, executions, political manipulations, and human loss are not mere reportage but instead aim to arouse us from apathy and challenge us to hold those in authority responsible. Strongly recommended for academic and public libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 7/05.]-Ethan P. Pullman, Univ. of Pittsburgh Lib. Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
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