"In the spring of 2003, a stunned world watched the armed forces of America and Britain conduct a lightning-last military campaign against Iraq. Confounding predictions of failure, the Iraqi regime was dismantled, and much of the conventional wisdom about modern war was irrevocably altered. Yet as U.S. and British forces occupied Basra, Tikrit, and Mosul, the Iraqi nation slipped into anarchy - and the phrase "shock and awe" began to sound more appropriate as a description of the war's aftermath, rather than its opening." "Such has been the twisted trail of the Iraq War's dramatic events. But like so many other conflicts, the war ultimately seemed to pose more questions than it solved. This book is the first in-depth analysis of the second war against Saddam Hussein's regime. What are the repercussions of the pre-war political fights in Washington, Paris, and the UN? Was victory really due to the brilliance of Anglo-American arms, or had Saddam's regime simply been too degraded to fight? Why didn't Baghdad become a second Stalingrad? Why weren't the occupying forces prepared to impose order? And then there is the mother of all questions: Where are Iraq's weapons of mass destruction?" "Respected military analyst Anthony Cordesman incisively examines the key issues swirling around the most significant American war since Vietnam. Beginning the search for answers is essential to understanding America's awesome power and its place in a new age of international terror and regional conflict."--Jacket.