How Syria’s dream of freedom ended in further repression
Anand Gopal has form when it comes to war. In Afghanistan, distrustful of President Bush’s ‘good vs evil’ and ‘you’re either with us or against us’ narrative, he did what every good reporter does: ‘I learned the language, grew a beard and hit the road like a local.’ The result was No Good Men Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War through Afghan Eyes, a Pulitzer and National Book Award finalist. In its refusal to stick to the script – especially American and British propaganda about all the ‘progress’ which later proved so illusory – the book recalled Michael Herr’s classic Vietnam exposé, Dispatches. Through the lives and
