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That day at Kassim’s, there was no music There was almost no sound at all, not even the echoes of battle; I only recall the lyrical float of Kassim’s voice Even his gloomy prognosis for Iraq’s future was entertaining, but I found it difficult to focus I shouldn’t even be here, ran the voice in my mind, I should be following security protocols The war wasn’t over: the day I arrived, my induction tour of the United Nations compound at the Canal Hotel was interrupted by bullets buzzing overhead; part of the natural environment, like the other insects, but with a worse bite   On my drive in from the airport – the second civilian flight to land at Saddam International Airport since Saddam himself had vanished with the first light of dawn – I had sat next to a braying UN staff member Before the war – the history of Iraq having been unilaterally divided into two periods, before the war and after – he had been part of the Oil-for-Food programme, one of the most corrupt endeavours in the history of the United Nations, and he was an idiot, holding forth about the way in which Iraq worked, regaling us with stories of his dealings with local politicians, trying to impress the rest of us with his deep knowledge of the country   All of this while we drove past a city in ruins, a society in riotous mood, an economy that had just had its heart ripped out: he clearly didn’t realise that Iraq didn’t work, not any more, and that the politicians he’d lunched with were dead or had fled This man’s deep knowledge of the country was the little knowledge that is commonly recognised to be a dangerous thing: the sort of knowledge that can get a brother killed   The US soldiers grimly guarding the Ministry of Energy – apparently the only Ministry not looted during the post-Saddam euphoria – watched him pass For a moment, I wondered how the US military had managed to secure the Ministry of Energy when every other had been looted by popular consent,