When you'll hear the word Iraq you'll likely think of the 2003 war in and against Iraq conducted by the US and its allies.

You'll probably think of Saddam Hussein too.

Of course he was in charge of that country for decades beforehand.

It turns out he had a very close and intimate relationship,

again with the US and its allies.

And it turns out the nature of that relationship

offers some pretty key insights into what can go wrong

with Western foreign policy and how you can pay the price for supporting somebody who's actually

quite unsavory.

With me to discuss that today, and the lessons we can learn from that in the 20-20s

is the author of this book, The Achilles Trap, Stam Hussein, the United States, and the Achilles Trap, Sam Hussein the United States and the Middle East

1979 to 2003 and that is by Steve Cole a fantastic author Steve

welcome to downstreamstream. Thank you for having me. You were the Washington Post correspondent for South Asia during the early 1990s, which is an amazing beat,mere Pakistan-Afghanistan.

Did you know then that Afghanistan was going to be this central story over the next 25 years?

No, I didn't, but I did become aware of some of the groups and forces that would eventually yield its importance on 9-11 because my job was to cover

the CIA's COVID action program in Pakistan and Afghanistan where they were

arming and funding some of the Mujahideen rebels opposed to the well by the time I

got there the post Soviet government in Kabul.

And there was a big debate on the ground

among the Afghans in exile about the extent

to which CIA money and particularly

the front line off. money and particularly the frontline officers of the Pakistani Intelligence Service

...