The Iran-Iraq War

World Washington Initiates Rapprochement with Baghdad Iranian Kurdistan Chapter 14. The Iranians Recapture Their Territory The Liberation of Khorramshahr Strategic Withdrawal Rafsanjani and Khomeini Agree to Continue the War Iranian Troops Enter Iraq Oil Blockade Autumn Offensives Moscow and Beijing Hone Their Strategies Chapter 16. Bloody Dawns War of Attrition Dawn 1 Return to Kurdistan Chapter 17. Saddam's Ace in the Hole The Iraqi Equivalent of Enigma Accelerated Training Human Intelligence Bargaining Chip The Iranians Seize the Majnoon Islands Chapter 18. The Lebanese Hostage Crisis France in Iran's Crosshairs Raid on Baalbek American Retaliation Tehran Punishes Washington France Changes Course Paris Negotiates with Tehran Chapter 19. Money Has No Smell Business Is Business The Luchaire Scandal Chemical Weapons under Scrutiny The War of the Cities Raid on Bushehr The Tanker War The Fahd Line The Air Force on the Front Line Mines in the Red Sea Maintaining Troop Morale The Kurdish Independence Movement Forces Turkey into a Rapprochement with Iraq Chapter 21. The Year of the Pilot The Second Battle of the Marshes Another War of the Cities Guerilla Warfare in Iraqi Kurdistan The Presidential Election in Iran Chapter 22. Oil and the War Machine Washington and Riyadh Agree on a New Oil Policy The Soviets Change Tactics Again Objective Kharg The Sacrifice of the Basijis The Iranians Capture the Al-Faw Peninsula The Iraqis Counterattack Combat Shifts to Iraqi Kurdistan Hafez Al-Assad Ups the Ante On the Road to Karbala Escalating Tension between Tehran and Ankara Hunting Season Begins The Mirages Strike in the Gulf Chapter 25. The Iran-Contra Affair The Israeli Connection Arms for Hostages Conflicts of Interest in Tehran A Disastrous Outcome for Washington Chapter 26. All-Out Offensives The Assault on Basra The "Mother of All Battles" At the Gates of Basra Chapter 27. Iran Changes Strategy Military, Diplomatic, and Commercial Maneuvers The Attack on the USS Stark Mines in the Gulf The Al-Anfal Campaign The Gordji Affair Forces France to Intervene in the Gulf Operation Prométhée Chapter 28. The Gulf Set Ablaze The United States Takes Direct Action Iran Defies the U.S. Navy The American Navy Retaliates The Iraqi Army Ups the Ante Tehran Starts the War of the Capitals The Gassing of the Kurds The Iraqi Army Recaptures the Al-Faw Peninsula Chapter 30. The Destruction of Iran Air Flight 655 Air and Sea Battle in the Gulf The Iraqis Recapture Their Other Lost Territories The Destruction of an Iran Air Airbus Revenge, Iranian Style Ayatollah Khomeini Approves the End of Hostilities Final Clashes Paris and Tehran Settle Their Accounts A Terribly Deadly War Epilogue A New Geopolitical Situation What Military Lessons Can Be Retained? Are the Political Lessons Applicable Today? A. Chronology B. Iraq and Iran in 1980 C. Military High Command D. Military Forces E. Armed Opposition F. Foreign Military Assistance G. Oil H. International Naval Presence in the Gulf I. War Losses J. Financial Cost Notes Sources Acknowledgments Index

links the conflict to the regional and Great Power politics of the period... Thus the Iran-Iraq war led directly into post-Cold War geopolitics and conflict. Razoux has produced the best book available on this important war.
-- Jeremy Black Military History
Although it was the longest war of the 20th century and caused over a million casualties, the Iran-Iraq War is largely forgotten by the Western world outside of a few military analysts and Middle East scholars...In spite of the ramifications of this war, a complete and readable single volume narrative has not been written in the West, until now. Razoux...has written a comprehensive and engrossing account of this war. Using a wealth of new or untapped sources, including the complete set of transcripts of the American debriefing of Saddam Hussein after his capture in 2004 and numerous interviews with Iranian and Iraqi commanders, Razoux provides unique insights into the strategic and operational thinking of both sides throughout the war...What makes this book so useful to both military historians and students of Middle Eastern politics is that Razoux is able to incorporate a complete look at the ripples caused by this conflict throughout the Middle East and within the Cold War as a whole...There is almost nothing occurring in the Middle East today that wasn't somehow influenced by this virtually unknown war. It has been long overdue for a comprehensive single-volume history, which this book ably fulfills. This is definitely a volume that both military historians and Middle Eastern scholars should have on their bookshelf.
-- Jerry D. Lenaburg New York Journal of Books
The Iran-Iraq War marked a turning point in the history of the Middle East. One cannot comprehend the situation in the Gulf today-the Iranian nuclear program or the political crises in Baghdad and Tehran-without understanding the frustrations and fears that sprang from that war.
-- Diplomatie
This is an important book, not least for the time devoted to it: ten years' work by the author, with hundreds of meetings and interviews, unpublished archives, and the deciphering of the famous audiotapes of Saddam Hussein and his staff. And for the first time, Iranian sources are included as well... Razoux examines the military dimension with a knack for detail and a commanding narrative sense, but also addresses the political, diplomatic, and economic aspects.
-- Libération Week-End
The chapter on the tribulations of the Iranian child-soldiers is poignant, the one on the torment of the Kurds gassed at Halabja overwhelming... It is impossible to grasp the Iraqi and Iranian crises of the twenty-first century without going back to this first, brutal war in the Gulf.
-- Le Monde
Razoux's detailed, wide-ranging and elegantly written account is the best hope we have of seeing this epoch-defining conflict for what it was. Drawing on a decade of research, during which he accessed Saddam's audio records of military and political meetings, investigated Iranian sources and conducted countless interviews with military, political and business figures from around the world, Razoux gives the reader a uniquely broad and deep look at the conflict...One of the most fascinating insights this book offers is its illustration of the impact the conflict had on the Islamic Republic of Iran and how that nation moved from fledgling revolutionary state to an established Islamic theocracy...Razoux's excellent and lucidly translated study does this awful conflict justice in an even-handed and professional manner. It is a must read for anyone with an interest in Iran, Iraq and the region as it stands today.
-- C. P. W. Gammell Literary Review
Using published Western sources, interviews, still-classified French intelligence reports, and the translated transcripts of the audio tapes Saddam kept of all his meetings, Razoux...has produced a blow-by-blow military history which is the first significant reappraisal of the war since the downfall of Saddam...Razoux writes well on the interplay of war and politics (and has been translated well and sympathetically); there are many insights and telling anecdotes.
-- James Barr Times Literary Supplement