Twenty years ago, in the spring of 2003, when I responded to an email from the Foreign Office asking for volunteers to go to Iraq to administer the country, I had no idea what to expect. I was told to get to RAF Brize Norton and jump on a military plane to Basra, and that on arrival I would be met by someone holding a sign with my name on it and taken to the nearest hotel. The British Council, my employer at the time, seconded me to the Foreign Office and off I flew, with a purple rucksack on my back and in my hand a three-month contract to be part of the UK contribution to the Coalition Provisional Authority.
I had never been to Iraq before and knew little about the country, as it had been under sanctions and cut off from the rest of the world. But I was passionate about the Middle East and had worked in Israel and Palestine for most of the 1990s in support of the peace process. I had skills and experiences that I believed would be useful. I was ready to apologise to Iraqis for the war and to help rebuild the country. And I did not want the only Westerners they ever met to be men with guns.
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