Roger Hardy

Roger Hardy was for more than twenty years a Middle East analyst with the BBC World Service. His latest book, The Poisoned Well: Empire and its Legacy in the Middle East, has been published in paperback by Hurst and in the United States by Oxford University Press.

Qatar’s University of Fear

Professors were in some respects treated as badly as the hundreds of thousands of immigrant workers comprising the majority of the small state’s population.

By Roger Hardy

/ 16 Dec 2019

Sowing the seeds of conflict in the Middle East

Whatever else they were guilty of, the two authors of the invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003, George Bush and Tony Blair, displayed an astonishing ignorance of history.

By Roger Hardy

/ 6 Sep 2016

The similarities between Suez in 1956 and Iraq in 2003 are uncanny

The Chilcot report will, at long last, draw lessons from the Iraq war of 2003 – which many experts have concluded was Britain’s worst strategic blunder since the Suez débâcle of 1956.

By Roger Hardy

/ 5 Jul 2016

Speaking truth to power? Iraq & the BBC

For the media, as for the politicians, the ideal war is one that’s short and sharp, has good guys and bad guys, and has a clear outcome. Iraq in 2003 did not follow the script

By Roger Hardy

/ 2 Dec 2014

How America lost the war of ideas

In the decade since 9/11, the United States has failed to win Muslim hearts and minds. Two administrations, beginning from very different starting-points, have been unable to produce a coherent strategy for the ‘war of ideas’.

By Roger Hardy

/ 12 Sep 2011

The man and the machine: in search of Barack Obama

In his first two years in office, President Obama had six foreign-policy goals. None has been achieved.

By Roger Hardy

/ 31 May 2011

Iran's five-card trick

The former United States secretary of state Henry Kissinger has been turning his mind to the problem of Iran. Not surprisingly, his focus is on the nuclear issue; but that

By Roger Hardy

/ 9 Aug 2006