Publisher Description
At a time when the United States debates how deeply to involve itself in Iraq and Syria, Lieutenant Colonel Michael Zacchea, USMC (Ret.), holds a unique vantage point on our still-ongoing war. Deployed to Iraq in March 2004, his team's mission was to build, train, and lead in combat the first Iraqi army battalion trained by the US military. Zacchea tells a deeply personal and powerful story while shedding light on the dangerous pitfalls of training foreign troops to fight murderous insurgents. The Ragged Edge is the first American military memoir out of Iraq or Syria that features complex Arab and Kurdish characters and that intimately explores their culture and politics in a dispassionate way. Zacchea's invaluable lessons about Americans working with Arabs and Kurds to fight insurgency and terrorism come precisely when such wartime collaboration is happening more than at any time in U.S. history.
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An honest, revealing glimpse of the dangers inherent in acting on good intentions based on ignorance.
—
Kirkus
About the Authors
Ted Kemp is an editor, writer, and foreign correspondent for CNBC Digital. Previously, he was digital bureau chief for CNBC EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa), based in London. He lives in New York City.
Michael Zacchea (USMC-ret.) led the Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis of the Iraqi Fifth Battalion and their US advisers.
About John Pruden
John Pruden is an Earphones Award–winning audiobook narrator. His exposure to many people, places, and experiences throughout his life provides a deep creative well from which he draws his narrative and vocal characterizations. His narration of The Killing of Crazy Horse by Thomas Powers was chosen by the Washington Post as a Best Audiobook of 2010.