Iraq, the subject of Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor's magisterial new book Endgame: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq from George W. Bush to Barack Obama (Pantheon, $35), plays a central role in Tehran's hopes for creating "a world without America". In the Khomeinist vision, the promised world order which would replace that created by the Western powers would be centred on a new Islamic "superpower" with Iran at its core. To protect that core, Iran should create a regional glacis consisting of a Shia-dominated Iraq, a Syria ruled by Nusairis and a Lebanon dominated by Hezbollah. In time, that glacis could be extended to include Kuwait, where Shias account for 30 per cent of the citizens, Bahrain, where 75 per cent are Shias, and Yemen with Zaydi Shias representing 60 per cent of the population. Middle East commentators have dubbed this an Iranian plan to create a "Shia crescent" carved in the heart of the Arab world where Sunni Muslims form more than 90 per cent of the population. The Shia crescent would then claim leadership by casting itself as standard-bearer in a "jihad to liberate Palestine", chase the Jews out of the region, and lead a worldwide campaign to destroy American hegemony. In that context Iraq could play a crucial role. With Egypt, it is one of only two countries that have the demographic weight, historical and cultural credentials and the economic weight to claim the leadership of the Arab world. The fact that in the past few years it has enjoyed a measure of stability rare among Arab nations, while opening vast new spaces for personal and political freedoms, adds to its political appeal to Arabs.

Liberated from Saddam Hussein's tyranny in 2003, Iraq had much of what was needed to realise the dream of a democratic future for all Arabs, as spelled out in George W. Bush's controversial "Freedom Agenda". The idea was that Arabs would look at the nascent Iraqi democracy and rise to emulate it by overthrowing their respective despots. At the same time, thanks to Iraq's immense oil wealth, fertile soil and water resources rare in other Arab countries, building it as a modern state with a liberal political and economic system would be no burden on the American Treasury. However, things did not develop as Bush had imagined. Iraq was transformed into the hottest issue in domestic US politics: those who had opposed the toppling of Saddam succeeded in presenting the entire enterprise as a costly and tragic failure. The authors of Endgame clearly suggest that Obama owes a good part of his victory in the 2008 presidential election to that success.

Whether or not that was the case, Obama has done all he can to weaken the links between the US and Iraq, leaving the latter with little option but to draw closer to Iran as a shield against Sunni revanchism. As the authors of Endgame explain in some detail, Obama even ended up supporting the reappointment of Nuri al-Maliki, the candidate backed by Iran, as prime minister. So determined has Obama been to ignore Iraq that he did not bother to appoint a new ambassador to Baghdad for several months. The President simply shrugged his shoulders when the Status of Forces (SOFA) treaty with Baghdad ran out, ending all effective American presence in Iraq, despite being urged by many senior Iraqi politicians, especially the Kurdish leaders, to agree to the presence of a token American military presence, around 16,000 troops in all, for a further five years. Obama has also made a point of excluding Iraq from the process of consultation with America's regional allies. Saudi Arabia, Egypt under President Hosni Mubarak and even Algeria have been consulted and invited to G8 summits. Iraq, however, has been left out in the cold, its sin being its liberation by American troops.