This book is a personal history of Iraq, told from the point of view of a family man living there during Saddam Hussein's reign and its aftermath. It examines all the factors leading to the current situation and challenges the misunderstandings currently fuelling the media: for example, a Sunni belonging to the Ba'ath Party is expected to be an extremist Saddam loyalist. He knew friends among Saddam's government ministers, who suffered under Saddam and regularly plotted to overthrow him. It contain 1.A brief history of the city of Baghdad, which during its golden age was a great centre of culture and learning. It was a setting for the One Thousand and One Arabian Nights, in which Queen Scheherazade called it the City of Peace. 2.A picture of Baghdad in the year 2000. At first glance, it is a new golden age, but there is much suffering here. An overview of my family life and of the racial and religious harmony in which we live, and of the day-to-day effects of the 13th years US trade embargo. In 2003, when war with the U.S. & its allies becomes inevitable, my neighbourhood prepares for evacuation. I flee across the Tigris with my wife and children. We are caught right in the middle of the Shock and Awe campaign. When the attack dies down, I drive home under a rain of missiles 3.A history of the races and religions of Iraq. The Western media suggests that Saddam's Iraq comprised a ruling Sunni minority and a serving Shi'ite majority. This was not the case. Iraq is not solely Muslim, and its Muslims are not all of the Sunni or Shi'ite faiths. The Sunnis were not the majority, and most were ordinary people, as downtrodden as everyone else. The media say that Iraq comprises two opposing races: Arabs and Kurds. This, too, is wrong, as it has many indigenous races and we are used to living in harmony. 4.Details of The Kurdish conflict. 5.Saddam invades Kuwait. Details of its effects. 6.The war which brings down Saddam destroys Iraq's infrastructure and leave tens of thousands without homes or jobs. 7.An overview of the reasons behind the US & its ally's to the war on Iraq, and the reasons why the country has got so out of hand. 8.The Coalition Provision Authority takes its advice from exiled Iraqi groups with personal agendas.