World War II Guidebook: "A Short Guide to Iraq"

Click the image to download the book [4.8 MB, PDF].

I remember reading about A Short Guide to Iraq [4.8 MB, PDF]  in SPY magazine during the

first Gulf War — a guide for U.S. soldier stationed in Iraq during

WWII. Here’s the intr, which aside from the bit about defeating Hitler, is still applicable today:

YOU HAVE been order to Iraq (i – RAHK) as part of the world-wide offensive to beat Hitler.

You will enter Iraq both as a soldier and as an individual, because on

our side a man can be both a soldier and an individual. That is our

strength — if we are smart enough to use it. It can be our weakness if

we aren’t. As a soldier your duties are laid out for you. As an

individual, it is what you do on your own that counts — and it may

count for a lot more than you think.

American success or failure in Iraq may well depend on whether the

Iraqis (as the people are called) like American soldiers or not. It may

not be that simple. But then again it could.

In its 44 pages, the book provides the U.S. soldier enough

cultural and background information to function as a simple goodwill

ambassador in Iraq. Some of this information may be fairly obvious to

the cosmopolitan modern reader, but you have to remember that this was

a time before CNN, the internet, relatively inexpensive air travel and

several wars that taught us all about mideast geography.

The book looks like a pretty thorough introduction to Iraqi culture and

it seems as though the War Department (since renamed to the Department

of Defense) was taking great pains to win hearts and minds.

(Perhaps it was an era of better-behaved U.S. soldiers, the sort of whom Joi Ito wrote about in his piece on the anniversary of the atom bombing of Hiroshima.)

The illustrations included in the book are rather amusing. Here’s

“Bargaining takes time”, a fact that would’ve been unknown to many

Americans back then, but now familair thanks to cheap trips to Asia and

the bargaining scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian:

“How ’bout 30 dinars and I don’t electrocute your balls?”

This bit of advice is obvious today, but it wasn’t back then:

As is this:

My favourite tip in the “Do’s and Don’ts” section:

If you should see grown men walking hand in hand, ignore it. They are not “queer”.