Henry Shue, University of Oxford, author of Basic Rights 

 “This profoundly troubling story about U.S. foreign policy under three administrations reveals the shameful manner in which the United States relentlessly subverted the UN sanctions regime for Iraq, twisting it toward a purpose not approved by the Security Council. It is time Americans knew of the cruelty inflicted on Iraqis in our name behind closed doors at the UN in one of the morally most disastrous foreign policy decisions in American history. Gordon has documented it, calmly, courageously, meticulously, and convincingly.”

Sir Harold Walker, former British Ambassador to Iraq 

“Gordon dissects U.S. policies and practices in forensic detail. It is a chilling, and telling, tale of how a complex and sophisticated bureaucracy, given an overriding security remit, could be content not merely to allow a humanitarian tragedy to take place but indeed to help to create it, not by active malevolence but through indifference.”

Richard Falk, Princeton University, emeritus 

 “A superb critique of the U.S.-led sanctions against Iraq, which were imposed for twelve years, with disastrous humanitarian consequences for the civilian population. This wonderfully researched and written book has profound implications for ongoing assessments of American foreign policy, and deserves to be widely read, its argument absorbed at the highest levels of government.”

George A. Lopez, author of The Sanctions Decade

“This profoundly troubling story about U.S. foreign policy under three administrations reveals the shameful manner in which the United States relentlessly subverted the UN sanctions regime for Iraq, twisting it toward a purpose not approved by the Security Council. It is time Americans knew of the cruelty inflicted on Iraqis in our name behind closed doors at the UN in one of the morally most disastrous foreign policy decisions in American history. Gordon has documented it, calmly, courageously, meticulously, and convincingly.”

Marc Lynch, foreignpolicy.com, “Best Books on the Middle East, 2010“

While most Americans have largely forgotten the long decade of U.S. led sanctions on Iraq, Gordon forces attention back to their long-lasting effects on the Iraqi state and society. She offers a deeply researched account of American and United Nations policies towards the sanctions which captures the contradictions between an overt focus on forcing Saddam Hussein to surrender his WMD programs and a deeper interest in maintaining containment (“keeping Saddam in a box”) and pushing for regime change — contradictions which remain deeply relevant to current debates about Iran.

Andrew Cockburn,”Worth It,” London Review of Books, July 22, 2010:

“Even at the time, the sanctions against Iraq drew only sporadic public comment, and even less attention was paid to the bureaucratic manoeuvres in Washington, always with the dutiful assistance of London, which ensured the deaths of half a million children, among other consequences. In her excellent book Joy Gordon charts these in horrifying detail”

L. Carl Brown, Foreign Affairs, November/December 2010

This is more than an ethical or legal treatise. It is a solid historical reconstruction of the sanctions imposed on Iraq from 1990 to 2003 and of the persistent U.S. leadership in this effort. Especially impressive is Gordon’s combing of the sprawling U.S. and UN records over those 13 years.

James Denselow, Huffington Post, November 18, 2010

Gordon has unearthed a treasure trove of well researched statistics to support her argument that by substituting ‘regime change for what was legitimately mandated by the Security Council, the United States fundamentally compromised the legality of the sanctions and the legitimacy of the council’.  

Yale Journal of International Law, Fall 2010

The exhaustively researched book chronicles the more than decade-long sanctions imposed by the U.N. Security Council–at the behest of the United States–on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

Arab Studies Quarterly, Fall 2010

This book, which is meticulously documented, represents a courageous venture indeed.  It exposes the internal processes within the US that should only lead to a feeling of guilt for the genocidal acts against the Iraqi people.  It is an excellent read for whoever doubts that.

Dr. Mudhafar A. Amin, TAARII review, Spring 2011

The book’s richness of facts and clarity of style provide an informative – although sad – journey into the human suffering of an ancient civilization. It is one of the few books by a Western writer that deals objectively with the former Iraqi government, stating both the negative and positive aspects.

Military Review, September-October 2011

A must read for all military and State Department professionals…Gordon’s research methodology is virtually flawless. 

Kamil Mahdi, CounterFire, November 2010

We see and learn of more gruesome evidence of the human cost of this war with every day that passes, but western governments try to abdicate their responsibility for the cumulative damage of a war that has lasted a whole generation and which they continue to wage

Editor’s Picks, Choice, October 2010

 In this remarkable, well-researched study, Gordon (philosophy, Fairfield Univ.) explains how the US was able to establish, shape, and enforce 13 years of harsh and extreme sanctions on Iraq. In the absence of rival powers, the US projected absolute influence on and nearly complete control of international governance. Gordon persuasively and accurately raises moral and legal questions about US policy that resulted in the complete destruction of the Iraqi economy and infrastructure and the loss of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.

Eric Herring, Policies of Mass Destruction, Times Higher Education, September 23, 2010

Joy Gordon’s important book not only sets out the story superbly well, but demonstrates its wider implications for our understanding of economic sanctions, international law and global governance. She shows that a commitment to scholarly rigour and a commitment to common humanity can be mutually reinforcing, and her book deserves to be read and discussed widely.  

Chris Toensing, “Wilful Blindness,” Middle East Report, Summer 2010 

The fact, as Gordon demonstrates unimpeachably, is that successive US administrations knew the scope of the humanitarian catastrophe in Iraq and refused to consider that their ends might not justify the means. Gordon’s training as a philosopher shines through in her strongest chapter, a meditation upon US guilt of genocide or crimes against humanity that concludes with the lament that Washington cannot be held accountable because international law does not criminalize “willful blindness.” Gordon captures an important part of the tragedy that is the story of Iraq in the sanctions era. The US got away with a murderously cynical policy because, as the sole superpower, it could.

Human Rights and Human Welfare, 2011

Joy Gordon tells the story of how the United Nations became complicit in the “legalization of atrocity.” …Extensively documented, Gordon’s distressing story reveals how three successive US administrations were “hijacking” an anonymous Security Council committee established under Resolution 661.