Journal From Iraq

In the most dramatic and intimate account of battle reporting since Michael Herr's classic Dispatches, NBC News's award-winning Middle East Bureau Chief, Richard Engel, offers an unvarnished and often emotional account of five years in Iraq. Engel is the longest serving broadcaster in Iraq and the only American television reporter to cover the country continuously before, during, and after the 2003 U.S. invasion. Fluent in Arabic, he has had unrivaled access to U.S. military commanders, Sunni insurgents, Shiite militias, Iraqi families, and even President George W. Bush, who called him to the White House for a private briefing. He has witnessed nearly every major milestone in this long war. War Journal describes what it was like to go into the hole where U.S. Special Operations Forces captured Saddam Hussein. Engel was there as the insurgency began and watched the spread of Iranian influence over Shiite religious cities and the Iraqi government. He watched as Iraqis voted in their first election. He was in the courtroom when Saddam was sentenced to death and interviewed General David Petraeus about the surge. In vivid, sometimes painful detail, Engel tracks the successes and setbacks of the war. He describes searching, with U.S troops, for a missing soldier in the dangerous Sunni city of Ramadi; surviving kidnapping attempts, IED attacks, hotel bombings, and ambushes; and even the smell of cakes in a bakery attacked by sectarian gangs and strewn with bodies of the executed. War Journal describes a sectarian war that American leaders were late to understand and struggled to contain. It is an account of the author's experiences, insights, bittersweet reflections, and moments from his private video diary -- itself the subject of a highly acclaimed documentary on MSNBC. War Journal is the story of the transformation of a young journalist who moved to the Middle East with $2,000 and a belief that the region would be "the story" of his generation into a seasoned reporter who has at times believed that he would die covering the war. It is about American soldiers, ordinary Iraqis, and especially a few brave individuals on his team who continually risked their lives to make his own daring reporting possible.

An explosive conflict, as seen through the eyes of a war artist. Bagdad Journal is the outstanding culmination of four voyages to war-torn Iraq by artist Steve Mumford. In the long tradition of war artists, particularly Winslow Homer's work for Harper's Magazine, Mumford meticulously documents the everyday scenes of Iraq in bold, breathtaking watercolors and drawings and paints a human side of the war that can be lost in the immediacy of photographic and broadcast images. Not overtly political, Bagdad Journal presents portraits of life from all sides of the polarizing conflict. With sketch pad and notebook in hand, Mumford illuminates the routine activities of a nation in turmoil-from the individual soldiers of American platoons to Baghdad residents going about their daily lives amid the chaos surrounding them. There will be a traveling exhibit of artwork from Baghdad Journal and presentations by Mumford on his Iraq experience in conjunction with the publication of this book.

"A Captain's Journal is a personal account of events from Balad Air Force Base Hospital in Iraq during a six month period from 2006 - 2007. The stories are told from the personal perspective of Eric Charles, an Anesthesiologist. Eric recounts his patient encounters that range from pleasant to gut-wrenching and from laughable to tear-jerking. The descriptions of the events are occasionally graphic, but strike a realistic chord. Eric also weaves into the narrative many personal and philosophicalohical interactions from the every day events of living in the midst of the Iraq War"--Back cover.

A soldier's account of the Iraq War as told though his journal and letters.

Documenting the U.S.-led military campaign in Iraq from the perspective of some of the world's most renowned and respected photojournalists, Witness Iraq offers an extraordinary first-hand account of this controversial war. Beginning with the assassination attempt of Saddam Hussein and continuing through the massive roll out of tanks and troops in the desert, on to the fight of the Kurds in the North, and culminating in the fall of Baghdad, these images, many never-before-seen, reveal both the horrors of war and the triumph of the human spirit. With 150 full-colour photos.

This isn't your little sister's diary. Greg Foley's personal journal provides a rare look into the heart, mind, and soul of a young Army officer during his yearlong deployment in Iraq. Kept in the original format, thought for thought, Greg's journal offers a unique reading experience that will take you past many of today's popular military clichés and will challenge you to see him as he saw himself: a soldier undeserving of God's grace. Throughout the book, Greg expounds on his journal entries, giving readers additional insight and perspective into some of the greatest experiences and lessons learned from his time spent as a combat leader. If you have ever wanted to go deeper into the life of a modern day soldier, then this book is for you. May reading this Journal of a Christian Soldier inspire and bless you. "Greg lends unique insight into the thought processes of a soldier committed to serve his nation in ways the rest of us can never imagine. Forthright and honest, he shares himself as he is -not necessarily the image some may have of a soldier, but the reality of a courageous though fallible young man who is altogether human. He is willing to reveal himself that others may benefit from his experiences and be pointed toward the God he serves." - A READER Greg Foley was a newly commissioned 2nd Lieutenant in the Field Artillery when he began this journal prior to leaving for Iraq in 2004. While attached to the 1st Calvary Division, he served with the Oregon Army National Guard's 41st Infantry Brigade, 2-162 Infantry, Alpha Company. He first served as the Company Fire Support Officer and then later assumed command of 2nd Platoon. Greg is a 2003 graduate of Western Oregon University, where he also earned an ROTC commission from Oregon State University. In 2007, Greg earned his MBA from George Fox University. He is currently working in the private sector as a business manager. He and his wife Melissa recently celebrated 5 years of marriage. They have two young children, Michael and Miley.

Since the fall of Bagdad, women’s voices have been largely erased, but four months after Saddam Hussein’s statue fell, a 24 year-old woman from Baghdad began blogging. In 2003, a twenty-four-year-old woman from Baghdad began blogging about life in the city under the pseudonym Riverbend. Her passion, honesty, and wry idiomatic English made her work a vital contribution to our understanding of post-war Iraq—and won her a large following. Baghdad Burning is a quotidian chronicle of Riverbend’s life with her family between April 2003 and September of 2004. She describes rolling blackouts, intermittent water access, daily explosions, gas shortages and travel restrictions. She also expresses a strong stance against the interim government, the Bush administration, and Islamic fundamentalists like Al Sadr and his followers. Her book “offers quick takes on events as they occur, from a perspective too often overlooked, ignored or suppressed” (Publishers Weekly). “Riverbend is bright and opinionated, true, but like all voices of dissent worth remembering, she provides an urgent reminder that, whichever governments we struggle under, we are all the same.” —Booklist “Feisty and learned: first-rate reading for any American who suspects that Fox News may not be telling the whole story.” —Kirkus