# Good books about Afghanistan or Iraq? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 20, 2009, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116 "2009-08-20T20:20:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2009, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/1 "2009-08-20T20:20:54Z")
I have a friend who wants to become an “RAF Medic”, which is the airforce in the British Army. To start off with she would work in hospitals in England or in Europe, but she says that eventually RAF medics could end up going out on air rescue missions in Afghanistan, and that type of thing. She’s going for interviews soon so she wants to try and get a good idea of the politics and wars the British Army has been involved with recently: so that’s Iraq and, particularly, Afghanistan. Can anyone recommend any good and easy-to-read books about the war in Afghanistan? I think a personal or autobiographical account would be best, and if there are any books about serving the British army or written by medics who have served out there that would be even better! ---
**Author:** ![Manwich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e480ec/32.png) [@Manwich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manwich)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/2 "2009-08-21T02:28:35Z")
Not exactly what you want but it may be helpful. I am currently reading _Descent Into Chaos_ by Ahmed Rashid and it can recommend it as a guide to the war in Afghanistan. I didn’t know much about the situation there before I started reading but I am having little problem following the book. The only difficultly is the inherent complexity of the situation - keeping track of the ethnic groups, tribal leaders, political parties and government organisations is tough. It might be a bit depressing and dry for someone who actually has to go there however. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3ec8ea/32.png) [@The\_Great\_Philosopher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Great_Philosopher)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/3 "2009-08-21T13:05:40Z")
Yes that’s quite a good suggestion. Another good book I’ve heard of is “The Places in Between” by Rory Stewart - he walked from one side of Afghanistan to the other in 2002 staying only with local villagers along the way, and wrote a book about it which won a lot of prizes. Any other suggestions? Surely some soldiers have written accounts of their time in Iraq or Afghanistan? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/4 "2009-08-21T13:20:09Z")
Well the best on IMV would be “Ghost Wars” by Steve Coll. That explains the political situation in Afghanistan from the Soviet invasion to the present in exquisite detail. It’s incredibly dense material, he packs a lot into a single chapter, but it’s not a tough read. It largely focuses on the CIA involvement, but I think that’s probably fairly relevant. Also, ‘Iraq Since 1958’ is not a bad book. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/5 "2009-08-21T14:51:48Z")
“Three cups of tea”, very nice read. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2009, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/6 "2009-08-21T15:04:21Z")
For Iraq, I suggest “Assasin’s Gate” about the lead up to the war. I was in Iraq at the time and the book does a very good job of explaining what happened. ---
**Author:** ![dynamitedave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ed655f/32.png) [@dynamitedave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dynamitedave)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/7 "2009-08-22T07:32:42Z")
There’s Ed May’s [Apache](http://www.edmacy.com/#/the-book/) (warning: music). He was an Apache pilot in Afghanistan for the BA and is a build up to the action at Jugroom Fort. ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2009, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-books-about-afghanistan-or-iraq/507116/8 "2009-08-22T07:47:36Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > “Three cups of tea”, very nice read. I was going to suggest that. Good book, although the author can be frustratingly clueless. I just saw the film Kite Runner tonight on cable and liked it a lot…and have heard the book is far better.