"In the Wake of the Surge" is a gripping first-person narrative
that tells the story of the Kurds, the Arabs, and the Americans in
Iraq during one of the most violent and wrenching periods in that
country's history. Award-winning foreign correspondent Michael J.
Totten visited Iraq seven times between 2005 and 2009, first as a
"unilateral" freelance journalist without a gun in the Kurdish
autonomous region, and then as an embedded reporter with the U.S.
Army and Marine Corps in Baghdad, Sadr City, Ramadi, and Fallujah.
He was there at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of
General David Petraeus' "surge" of combat troops to Iraq and saw
first-hand how young men from places like Florida and Texas
pacified a relentless insurgency-an insurgency that most people,
during the darkest days of the war, assumed would be
victorious.
"In the Wake of the Surge" is a bracing story of war in a
tormented country by a writer who has spent enough time in the
Middle East to know there are few happy endings, but who
nevertheless was a witness when Iraqis and Americans drove each
other to the brink of the abyss before managing, against all odds
and at the very last second, to pull back and save themselves from
utter catastrophe.
Praise for Michael J. Totten
"I think of only a certain number of people as having risen to
the intellectual and journalistic challenges of the last few years,
and Michael J. Totten is one of them." - Paul Berman, author of
"Terror and Liberalism"
"Michael J. Totten...practices journalism in the tradition of
Orwell: morally imaginative, partisan in the best sense of the
word, and delivered in crackling, rapid-fire prose befitting the
violent realities it depicts. An unabashed classical liberal,
Totten brings his political commitments and emotional intelligence
to bear on the dramatic events he witnesses. As a result, he ends
up far more clearsighted than the many analysts who claim
'objectivity' but share neither his love of the region and its
inhabitants nor his concern for its future." - Sohrab Ahmari,
"Commentary"
"Michael J. Totten is a one of a rare breed. Moving from front
to front, he brings experience and context and the willingness to
go where few men dare." - Michael Yon, author of "Moment of Truth
in Iraq"
"Michael J. Totten, to my mind, is one of the world's most acute
observers of Middle East politics. He is also an absolutely
fearless reporter, both physically-he has explored the darkest
corners of Middle East extremism-and morally." - Jeffrey Goldberg,
author of "Prisoners: A Story of Friendship and Terror"
Praise for "The Road to Fatima Gate"
"A terrific book about a terrifying and beautiful part of the
world." - Benjamin Kerstein, "Jewish Ideas Daily" columnist
"It is extremely rare to read such an accurate account of
anything to which one was oneself a witness." - Christopher
Hitchens, author of "God is Not Great"
"A thriller in which a daredevil reporter puts himself in harm's
way in search of the inside story of some of the most dangerous
outfits in the world." - Amir Taheri, "Asharq al-Awsat"
"Outstanding...it grabbed me so quickly that I ended up lost in
it." - Claire Berlinski, "Ricochet"
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