Iraq Since 1958 is the definitive political history of modern Iraq from the fall of the Hashemite monarchy until today. As the world prepares for war, it provides a critical analysis of those issues that have dominated Iraqi affairs over the last half-century and will continue to do so in the years to come COMMA with or without Saddam Hussein. Iraq Since 1958 covers everything from the structure and ideology of the Ba'thist regime that has ruled since 1968, the nature of the Iraqi economy, tribalism, sectarianism, religious divisions within Iraq, long-standing Iraqi foreign policy imperatives, the personality of Saddam Hussein, and the role of the Kurds and the Shi'ites in a country dominated politically by Sunni Muslims._x000D_ _x000D_ 'This is an excellent, reasoned, historical analysis of Iraq, lucidly written, theoretically astute, empirically based, politically firm'._x000D_ *Fred Halliday*_x000D_ _x000D_ 'A very good book indeed'_x000D_ *Albert Hourani*.