A Desert Called Peace

This is a military science-fiction novel by LTC Tom Kratman (ret.), and it's actually amazingly funny. Here's a few quotes...

"General speaking the rule had been: Republic equals republic. People's Republic equals dictatorship. Democratic Republic equals really oppressive dictatorship. People's Democratic Republic equals really oppressive and corrupt dictatorship, amounting to a family corporation, with genocidal tendencies."

"Crudely modified Volgan missiles. Even the unmodified versions were so inaccurate they had been known to miss entire countries before. The dictator, Saleh, would be more likely to hit the base around Mangesh if he hired a bunch of witch doctors from Uhuru and had them try to entice meteors down from space."

"When no attack materialized, they went back to their normal routine of shivering, freezing, and, if the Yezidi were to be believed, buggering [fucking] each other. In this belief Fahad and the Chaldeans seemed to concur.
They were still, so far as Cheatham could tell, buggering [fucking] each other when the frameworks for the Stollen began to go up.
Perhaps they had run out of lubrication-that, or they'd discovered that weapons oil was a poor substitute-when the layer of concrete was poured.
Supplies of less toxic lubricant must have come through, though, because they disappeared again when the Yezidi gangs began piling dirt atop the concrete. Still, so Cheatham and the Yezidis surmised, those supplies must have been limited. They were back again to watch as the dirt was covered with large chunks and slabs of rock."

"Everything you need to know about the Yezidi is explained by their conduct during and after the Oil War. We told them if they arose in rebellion, in other words if they helped us by drawing off some of the Sumeri troops, we would help them. They rebelled all right, but they waited until after we had stomped the crap out of the Sumeri army on our own. They only rebelled when it seemed perfectly safe to rise up in the vacuum we created, and after we didn't need their help any more. Then they whined when even the shot-and-bombed-to-shit rump of the Sumeri Haris al Watini was able to crush their chicken-shit asses. They will do nothing for themselves or for us. Trust me on this. Politically they're unreliable and militarily they're worthless."

"I've been in those mountains before. They practically defend themselves, at least as long as they're not being defended by Yezidis. Yezidis are a net minus to combat power."

""Arrest the motherfuckers as spies," Carrera commanded McNamara when told that a group of media types from the Global News Network had arrived in now-abandoned Mangesh. When told of a humanitarian medical group nosing around he had said, with equal vehemence, "Arrest them. Take them to the caves and inform them they will care for our wounded as well as any civilians. Make it clear that I am firing squad serious about that."
"Patricio," Jiminez cautioned, "do you really think it's wise to alienate the press?"
"Err...maybe not, Xavier," Carrera relented. "Though frankly I doubt it matters. The press is the enemy, as much as the Sumeris or perhaps more so. But...all right. We won't arrest them as spies."
"Instead....Sergeant Major, take the pressies and medicos into protective custody, confiscate their equipment and cell phones, and confine them to the field hospital cave where they'll help care for our wounded. Don't trust the bastards; strip search them. If any of them are women see if the good father can come up with some Chaldean women to do the strip search. And if they try to escape, shoot them as spies.""

Anyway, I just finished it today. It is a bloody fine book, and I can't wait to get my hands on the sequel. :)