Betrayed

George Packer

"Millions of Iraqis, spanning the country's religious and ethnic spectrum, welcomed the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. But the mostly young men and women who embraced America's project so enthusiastically that they were prepared to risk their lives for it by aiding the U.S. forces constituted a small minority. On a cold, wet night in January 2007. George Packer met two such Iraqi men in the lobby of the Palestine hotel in Baghdad to hear their stories and those of other Iraqis working as translators and additional key personnel for the U.S. military and occupation authorities. They had assumed that their perspective would be valuable to foreigners who knew little or nothing of Iraq. But instead of respect and gratitude, those who chose to help bridge the gap between the occupiers and the occupied were met with suspicion and hostility. They have been killed by insurgents and militias,...

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