Ahmad's War, Ahmad's Peace by Michael Goldfarb is one of those books which is so interesting and pertinent now but will probably soon be relegated to the back shelves of any library or book store in which it is found.
Michael Goldfard needed an interpreter for his work as a radio correspondent in pre-war Iraq. Ahmad Shawcat was fortunately available and thus a relationship was born that led to this book. Ahmad was an educated man, a man who wss most comfortable among intellectuals and students, sharing with them his experience and knowledge about his ethnic Kurdish culture as well as his beloved Mosul in the greater Iraq which was his home his entire life. Although he survived under the Sadam Hussein regime, he was always looked on with suspicion because he spoke his mind. And because he spoke his mind, he was also arrested and tortured several times under Sadam's authoritarian government.
He lived to see his dream of Sadam Hussein's overthrow only to see his dream vanish in the smoke and gunfire of the uncontrolled aftermath of the U. S. invasion. He saw the worst of the pre-invasion politicians being handed the reigns of the post-invasion government in Iraq. The infighting, both political and physical, made him a suspected stranger in Kurdish territory and led to his assassination in Mosul. No one in Iraq is capable (or very anxious) to solve his murder.
Although primarily a biography of Ahmad, this book gives the reader a real flavor of life in Iraq. It does not give the reader a feeling that things will get better there for a long, long time.
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