Wars are fought not only on the battlefield but also in domestic political debates and in histories written after the fact. In the case of the US invasion of Iraq 20 years ago, we are still in this final phase, seeking an elusive consensus about the war's legacy.
NEW YORK – One advantage that historians have over journalists concerns time, not so much in the sense that they are free from urgent deadlines, but that they have the deeper perspective conferred by the years – or decades – between events and the act of writing about them. Twenty years is not a lot of time in historical terms, of course. But when it comes to understanding the war that the United States launched against Iraq in March 2003, it is all we have.
NEW YORK – One advantage that historians have over journalists concerns time, not so much in the sense that they are free from urgent deadlines, but that they have the deeper perspective conferred by the years – or decades – between events and the act of writing about them. Twenty years is not a lot of time in historical terms, of course. But when it comes to understanding the war that the United States launched against Iraq in March 2003, it is all we have.