Mike Martin is a Pashto speaker who spent almost
two years in Helmand as a British army officer. During that time,
he pioneered and developed the British military's human terrain and
cultural capability - a means to understanding the Helmandi
population and influence it. He also worked as an advisor to
several senior commanding officers in Helmand. His previous
publications include A Brief History of Helmand, required reading
for British commanders and intelligence staff deploying to the
province. He holds a doctorate in War Studies from King's College
London.
"An Intimate War is, quite simply, the book on Helmand. I sincerely
wish it had been available to me when I was ISAF Commander in
Afghanistan. Military, diplomatic and development professionals
involved in Afghanistan and elsewhere, for that matter read this
and take note." -- General Sir David Richards GCB, CBE, DSO, ADC
Gen; Commander of International Forces in Afghanistan, 2006-7 and
UK Chief of the Defence Staff, 2010-13
"The proverbial complexity of civil wars is typically discounted as
irrelevant or misinterpreted through orientalising. Mike Martin
begs to differ: in this rich and fascinating account of thirty-four
years of war in the Afghan province of Helmand, he explains how and
why the private and local logics of the conflict interact with, and
often subvert, the public, national, and international narratives.
He exposes the failure of Western bureaucratic institutions to
grasp this reality and dissects both the causes and consequences of
theircfailure. This outstanding book is a must-read for those
interested in understanding contemporary conflict." -- Stathis
Kalyvas, Arnold Wolfers Professor of Political Science, Yale
University, and author of The Logic of Violence in Civil War
"Essential reading for any serious student of Britain's Fourth
Afghan War. A deeply researched, clearly argued reminder of how the
West's road to Helmand was paved with good intentions, and that
there, as elsewhere in Afghanistan, the West failed to understand
the war it was fighting, causing them to coerce rather than to
co-opt." -- Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles KCMG LVO, UK Ambassador to
Afghanistan 2007-9 and UK Special Representative for Afghanistan
and Pakistan 2009-10.
"Mike Martin's book is by far the most detailed account of Helmand
province to date, giving us both historical background and a
chronicle of Helmandi politics in the post-2001 setup. The in-depth
analysis of the local political dynamics provided by Martin makes
this book a must-read for anybody trying to understand the
post-2006 British and American interventions in Helmand." --
Antonio Giustozzi, Visiting Professor in the Department of War
Studies at King's College London and author of Koran, Kalashnikov
and Laptop: The Neo-Taliban Insurgency in Afghanistan and Decoding
the New Taliban: Insights from the Afghan Field
'A new internal war in South Sudan, now in its fifth month, has
forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes. These
unfolding events are deftly forecast by James Copnall in his new
book A Poisonous Thorn in Our Hearts. ... Copnall gives a
clear-headed and compassionate account of events leading up to and
after the creation of South Sudan a year earlier, and what it means
for what remains of Sudan. ...Measured and understated.' -- The
Economist
'Martin's meticulous study, based on 150 interviews conducted over
four years, and his own experience as a serving officer in Helmand,
presents a view of the war that is radically different from the one
the British public has been hearing ever since Tony Blair ordered
British troops to deploy in Helmand in 2006. The picture that he
paints is often jaw-dropping.' -- Matt Carr, Stopthewar.org
"Among the best books on the Afghan crisis I have come across...
immensely detailed." -- Robert Fox, Defence Editor of the Evening
Standard, The World Today
"This work lays the foundation for much future research, including
similarly in-depth looks at the histories of, and
counterinsurgencies in, other provinces in Afghanistan and Iraq. It
also highlights the need for study into why institutions and
militaries adopt mistaken initial premises, and more importantly
why groups and individuals retain these flawed conceptions even as
it becomes clear that they are failing to achieve their goals.
Above all, Martin demonstrates the futility of trying to understand
intrastate conflict, much less intervene in such conflicts, without
grasping the implications of the local history, culture, politics
and social dynamics." -- Jessica Jensen, Journal of Military and
Strategic Studies, 2014
"...an extraordinary book ... An Intimate War is the work of a wise
and patient scholar." -- James Meek, London Review of Books
"It is impossible to do full justice in this review to the range
and depth of Martin's research, arguments, or account of the
Helmand conflict." -- Asian Affairs
"A must-read for anyone interested in a detailed history of the
British war in Helmand province or the counter-insurgency
debate...provides useful insights in the social dynamics of the
province before the start of the civil war." -- International
Affairs
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