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In the NoCo

A retired Air Force Academy teacher considers hard lessons from Iraq, and why they matter now

Author Tom Mowle, a man, smiles at the camera.
Courtesy photo
Author Tom Mowle

In 2004, Tom Mowle was a political science professor at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.

It was early in the Iraq war. The U.S had invaded just the year before. A top general asked for help understanding the landscape in Iraq, and Tom volunteered.

A few weeks later, Tom left his desk job and flew to Baghdad. He had no idea what he was getting into. He lost colleagues throughout the war and lived on a base that was frequently under fire.

He revisited those experiences in his new book. It’s called Chaos in the Green Zone: My Time as an Iraq War Strategist. Tom spent more than a decade working on the memoir.

He spoke with In The NoCo’s Brad Turner about his account of what went wrong in the Iraq War, and what lessons military leaders might apply as the conflict with Iran continues.

Read an excerpt from the book.

KUNC's In The NoCo is a daily slice of stories, news, people and issues. It's a window to the communities along the Colorado Rocky Mountains. The show brings context and insight to the stories of the day, often elevating unheard voices in the process. And because life in Northern Colorado is a balance of work and play, we celebrate the lighter side of things here, too.
As KUNC's Interim Senior Managing Editor, my job is to find out what’s important to northern Colorado residents and why. I seek to create a deeper sense of urgency and understanding around these issues through in-depth, character driven daily reporting and series work.
Brad Turner is an executive producer in KUNC's newsroom. He manages the podcast team that makes In The NoCo, which also airs weekdays in Morning Edition and All Things Considered. His work as a podcaster and journalist has appeared on NPR's Weekend Edition, NPR Music, the PBS Newshour, Colorado Public Radio, MTV Online, the Denver Post, Boulder's Daily Camera, and the Longmont Times-Call.