Product Description
New York Times and international bestselling author Edwin Black uncovers Iraq's hidden economy and the companies that profit from its upheaval
Big business and global warfare have long been fiery and symbiotic forces in Iraq. Banking on Baghdad tells the dramatic and tragic history of a land long the center of world commerce-and documents the many ways Iraq's recent history mirrors its tumultuous past. Tracing the involvement
of Western governments and militaries, as well as oil, banking, and other corporate interests in Iraq, Black shows that today, just as yesterday, the world needs Iraq's resources-and is always willing to fight and invade in order to acquire and protect them.
While demonstrating that Iraq itself is partially to blame for its current state of turmoil, Black does not shy away from the uncomfortable truth that war and profit have also played an equal part in creating the Iraq we know today. Just as he did in IBM and the Holocaust, Black exposes the hidden associations between leading corporations, war, and oil-such as the astonishing connections between Nazi Germany, Iraq, and the Holocaust.
He exposes the war and race-based profiteering by some of the world's most prestigious corporations, as well as the political and economic ties between the Bush administration and the companies that gain handsomely from its foreign policy. Just as he did in War Against the Weak, Black offers a compelling blend of history and contemporary investigative journalism that spans a century and eschews easy answers for complicated questions.
Edwin Black (Washington, DC) is the award-winning New York Times bestselling author of IBM and the Holocaust, The Transfer Agreement, and War Against the Weak. His journalism has appeared in the Washington Post, The Village Voice, The Sunday Times (of London), and The Los Angeles Times.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 16 reviews)

50 out of 7000

Banking on Baghdad claims to tell the story of Iraq for the last 7000 years. It is very light on the first 6900 and the last 50. Over 99% of recorded history is reduced to meaningless cliche laced with pointless adjectives and adverbs - "the inherent prize of greater Mesopotamia essentially powered all the death and destruction that wracked the land" - and mind numbing repetition - "Mesopotamia never recovered from the Mongols. Never. Its civilisation had been robbed for the last time. This time it was permanent. After Hugalu, Mesopotamia descended into an age of desolation." The story begins and ends with the US invasion of 2003 as experienced by a certain Lieutenant Colonel Hughes, who is something of an orphan in that he has no discernable relationship to anything or anyone else in the book.

The real focus is on the period from the late 19th century to the end of WW2, when the oil industry was getting off the ground and the Great Powers were jostling for position. And it is a great story - the British, French, and Germans all jockeying for position as the Ottoman Empire falls apart, and "Mr 5%" Calouste Gulbenkian getting a piece of the action no matter who ends up on top. Especially interesting is the quick shift from Ottoman imperialism and the resented policy of "Turkification" of the Arab population, to British imperialism and a policy of "Indianization" (rule by the Indian Civil Service and plans to repopulate the region with Muslims from India). Thus many Iraqis rapidly switched from supporting the British in WW1 to the Germans in WW2.

Even in this period, though, Black makes some disturbing errors. Greece and Serbia were not Ottoman territories during the Balkan Wars, and Asquith was not British Prime Minister in 1918. These mistakes do not bolster confidence in Black's supposedly painstaking archival research. (Did you know that the Internet allowed people on opposite sides of the world to cooperate? Amazing, isn't it. And he tells you all about it.) "MP George Lloyd", though, is actually a real person, not a reversal of the true British PM in 1918.

If you are still interested, my advice is to borrow the book from your local library, and read the middle half.

May 23, 2008

banking on bagdhad

excellent, readable history of Iraq. A must read for anyone interested in understanding today's situation in the Middle East.
August 23, 2007

fascinating but a 'hard read'

I found the information to be extremely worthwhile, although i found EB's writing style to be dry... not in the 'droll' sense, in the 'boring' sense... still in all, I do recommend the book, very much!
October 18, 2006

Great read but not particularly satisfying as a comprehensive history...

Black's fascinating account, as Patrick Clawson stated, brings Iraq's rich history vividly to life. The author has a wonderful ability to turn historical events, obscure to most Western readers, into a gripping story. He does this by giving the color of an important episode then racing forward to the next event he chooses to highlight--which makes Banking on Baghdad a great read but not particularly satisfying as a comprehensive history. A first part skips lightly from Hammurabi to the Mongol conquests and the Ottoman era, ending in the late nineteenth century. Next comes a detailed account of the pre-1914 great-power maneuverings to gain access to Iraq's oil resources, carried forward with an equally detailed description of World War I and the chaos that marked the transition to British rule. The story then skips forward, first to the Iraqi dalliance with Nazis in World War II and next to the anti-Semitic persecution that led Jews to flee to Israel soon after that state was established. The last twenty-five years seem not to interest Black, as he devotes less than ten pages to them.

Implicit in his account are themes that Black should have spelled out more clearly. He paints Mesopotamia--the Land between the Rivers--as a place with a unique history, one not particularly tightly bound into an "Arab world." He treats Islam as a rather small part of Iraq's history while conflict over resources is central to his tale. His Iraq is more shaped by oil--and especially by disputes over oil--than by Shi`ism, which seems appropriate given that few Iraqis were Shi`ite until the mid-nineteenth century (and Shi`ism then was strikingly different from today, with little role for ayatollahs). That being so, the opening chapter set in Najaf as the U.S. troops arrive in 2003 is jarringly out of place: Black's account is neither about modern Iraq nor about Islam's impact.

The standard of scholarship is excellent with ample use made of primary sources although Black offers some questionable judgments on matters peripheral to his main story.
July 30, 2006

A good history of Iraq

Although this book is described as a history of Iraq's last seven millennia, it would be more accurate to describe it as a history of Iraq's last 300 years with a few additional chapters. I read this book because I greatly respect Edwin Black's other phenomenal work as a historian, and was surprised to read a book of his that really doesn't differ much from other thorough histories of Iraq.

In fact this is the first book of Black's that I've read with which I have quibbles. Black accurately documents that Winston Churchill whole-heartedly approved the use of tear gas and poison gas to suppress Iraqi insurgents, but leaves it open whether the British actually did use poison gas against "recalcitrant" Iraqis. Another respected author writes that the British did use poison gas against querulous Iraqis. This would cast the Iraqis' hatred of the British in quite a different light. It also makes Black's book seem incomplete.

I am not sure that Iraq's history was so much more bloody than that of most other nations as Black posits, but rather suspect that Iraq has just been a little slower than most to leave that epoch of human history behind. If you need an introduction to Iraq's history in 400 pages or less, this is worth reading. But I am surprised, even shocked, to write that there are other books that I found to be better than Black's book.
July 10, 2006

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Format C:
by Edwin Black