Inside the Outlaw State of Somalia

The World's Most Dangerous Place

The first authoritative account of the Somali region, its history, and the Islamic extremists operating there today.

One of the best narratives of discovery I have read for years. The sense of place is acute, the characters and landscapes vivid ... rivals Ryszard Kapuscinski and Robert Byron at their best.

Fergusson has a talent for shedding light in dark places. While most reporters have opted to stay away, Fergusson has risked his life to cover the ground and, an even greater achievement, succeeded in making the Somali mess understandable and relevant. It is this insight, alongside his harrowing account of life in the grief zone that gives Fergusson's book its power.

Essential reading for those who seek to counter the menace. With ingenuity and no little courage he has travelled far and wide, within Somalia and among the Somali diaspora in Britain and America, delving into the soul of a ravaged community.

What [Fergusson] has done, with heroic tenacity and no little courage, is to spend much of the last two years wandering from one end of the country to the other, interviewing politicians and presidents, fighters and pirates, foreign advisers and security guards, and above all scores of ordinary Somalis, whose lives have been destroyed by 20 years of carnage and whose tales he eloquently recounts. An elegant writer, with a scholarly understanding of history, he brings to terrible light the catastrophe that is Somalia.

Fergusson's book is an honest, illuminating and surprisingly funny account of his travels through a lawless land in which the lure of terrorism all too often proves irresistible.

If you meet James Fergusson on your travels, look out, you are most definitely in the wrong place. The writer has earned something of a reputation as a specialist on the dark side of the troubled world in which we live. From the Balkans to Afghanistan and the modern-day hell that is sub-Saharan Africa, the adventurous journalist and best-selling author has put his life on the line to become a global authority on Al Qaeda, the Taliban, boy soldiers in Somalia - and the worst aspects of human behaviour in the most inhospitable and dangerous regions.

This book is one of the most detailed and illuminating books I have ever read. Comprehensive, detailed, and filled with information, this is an excellent read. Read this book.

Coruscating reportage... Fergusson is a great journalist, and such truly brilliant investigative work offers the seeds, the suggestions of remedies for the contagion beneath the reporter’s microscope.

Riveting ... Fergusson rounds out this invaluable work by noting the glimmers of hope appearing

[A] fine book... With his usual insouciant courage – for this country is not for the faint-hearted – Fergusson takes us on an invigorating journey through Somali life and history... wide-ranging and fascinating.

Exceptional... Fergusson vividly recounts the  grotesque horrors of the endless war in Somalia while leavening his account with  the gallows humor of some of the war’s participants.

James Fergusson is a freelance journalist and foreign correspondent who has written for many publications including the Independent, The Times, the Daily Mail and The Economist. A regular television and radio commentator on Afghanistan and the Taliban, he is the author of four previous books including A Million Bullets, which was the British Army’s Military Book of the Year. He is married with four children and lives in Edinburgh.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE 2014 AND THE PADDY POWER POLITICAL BOOK AWARDS INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS BOOK OF THE YEAR. 
 
Award-winning journalist James Fergusson is among the few to have witnessed at first hand the devastating reality of life in the failed and desperate state of Somalia. 
 
This corner of the world has long been seen as the rotting and charred heart of Africa: a melting pot of crime, corruption, poverty, famine and civil war. And in recent years, whilst Somalia’s lucrative piracy industry has grabbed the headlines, a darker, much deeper threat has come of age: the Al Qaida-linked militants Al Shabaab, and the dawn of a new phase in the global war on terror. 
 
Yet, paradoxically, Somalia’s star is brightening, as forms of business, law enforcement and local politics begin to establish themselves, and members of the vast Somali diaspora return to their homeland. 
 
Fergusson takes us to the heart of the struggle, meeting everyone from politicians, pirates, extremists and mercenaries to aid workers, civilians and refugees. He gives a unique account of a country ravaged by war, considers what the future might hold for a generation who have grown up knowing little else and exposes the reality of life in this hard, often forgotten land.

the history of the world’s most feared fighting force

Taliban

The definitive history of the religious movement which became the world's most feared fighting force

one of the best... a brave book - Fergusson is prepared to probe beyond the cliche

Crystal-clear writing and first-rate analysis...devastating... this is a stunning book. Meticulously researched and deeply thoughtful, it is explanatory journalism at its best.

...a brave and nuanced re-evaluation of the Taliban

James Fergusson is a freelance journalist and foreign correspondent who has written for many publications including the Independent, The Times, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and The Economist. From 1997 he reported from Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan, covering that city's fall to the Taliban. In 1998 he became the first western journalist in more than two years to interview the fugitive warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. His first book, Kandahar Cockney, told the story of Mir, his Pashtun fixer-interpreter whom he befriended and helped gain political asylum in London. From 1999 to 2001 he worked in Sarajevo as a press spokesman for OHR, the organisation charged with implementing the Dayton, Ohio peace accord that ended Bosnia's savage civil war in 1995. He lives in Edinburgh and is married with three children.

Southern Afghanistan in the early 1990s was in even greater chaos than it is now. The Russians, who had occupied the country throughout the 1980s, were long gone. The disparate ethnic and religious leaders who had united to eject the invaders - the famous mujaheddin - were at each others' throats. For the rural poor of Kandahar province, life was almost impossible. 
 
On 12 October 1994 a small group of religious students decided to take matters into their own hands. Led by an illiterate village mullah with one eye, some 200 of them surrounded and took Spin Boldak, a trucking stop on the border with Pakistan. From this short and unremarkable border skirmish, a legend was born. The students' numbers swelled as news of their triumph spread. The Taliban, as they now called themselves - taliban is the plural of talib, literally 'one who seeks knowledge' - had a simple mission statement: the disarmament of the population, and the establishment of a theocracy based on Sharia law. They fought with a religious zeal that the warring mujaheddin could not match. 
 
By February 1995, this people's revolt had become a national movement; 18 months later Kabul fell, and the country was effectively theirs. James Fergusson's fascinating account of this extraordinary story is be required reading for anyone who wishes to understand the situation in Afghanistan, now and for the future...

The real story of the British Army in Afghanistan

A Million Bullets

The real story of the British army in Afghanistan

The lessons drawn by James Fergusson are deeply uncomfortable; but his account cannot be ignored by anyone seriously interested in the future of the British armed forces

a riveting, blistering, deeply reported narrative of the recent British military interventions in Afghanistan

If you read anything on Afghanistan this year, then read this strong, intelligent book of crafted anger and insight

Fascinating... Succeeds brilliantly in detailing the emotional impact on soldiers killing for the first time and seeing comrades killed

The only thoughtful and informed book to come out of the UK's venture into Helmand

James Fergusson is a freelance journalist and foreign correspondent who has written for many publications including the Independent, The Times, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and The Economist. From 1997 he reported from Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan, covering that city's fall to the Taliban. In 1998 he became the first western journalist in more than two years to interview the fugitive warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. He lives in Edinburgh and is married with two children.

In April 2006 a small British peace-keeping force was sent to Helmand province in southern Afghanistan. Within weeks they were cut off and besieged by some of the world's toughest fighters: the infamous Taliban, who were determined to send the foreigners home again. Defence Secretary John Reid had hoped that Operation Herrick 4 could be accomplished without a shot being fired; instead, the Army was drawn into the fiercest fighting it had seen for fifty years. Millions of bullets and thousands of lives have been expended since then in an under-publicized but bitter conflict whose end is still not in sight. Some people consider it the fourth Anglo-Afghan War since Victorian times. How on earth did this happen? And what is it like for the troops on the front line of the 'War on Terror'? 
James Fergusson takes us to the dark heart of the battle zone. Here, in their own words and for the first time, are the young veterans of Herrick 4. Here, unmasked, are the civilian and military officials responsible for planning and executing the operation. Here, too, are the Taliban themselves, to whom Fergusson gained unique and extraordinary access. Controversial, fascinating and occasionally downright terrifying, A Million Bullets analyses the sorry slide into war in Helmand and asks this most troubling question: could Britain perhaps have avoided the violence altogether?

James Fergusson

Perhaps the best book ever written by a non-Muslim about Islam in Britain.

This is an impressively sustained attempt to listen to what British Muslims are actually saying, honest, fair-minded and not uncritical.  For once we are allowed to see Islamic life in Britain in its human diversity, its three-dimensional reality.  A seriously necessary book.

Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury

A fascinating journey across the diversity of Al-Britannia. Fergusson's fresh approach yields powerful and honest insights. A must read.

A compelling and compassionate survey of British Islam.

A highly readable and common sense dismantling of the conventional view of British Islam. His gentle, unassuming tone makes his analysis all the more powerful. His message is urgent… a hugely important book.

A timely book that deals with some complex and sensitive issues.  Fergusson allows individuals on all sides of the argument to put their case.

Fergusson is a delicate, warm, lucid writer with true curiosity and humility. With his porous sensibility [in Al-Britannia] he journeys through the UK to demystify and detoxify British Islam and Muslims. The book is a vital rejoinder to the growing pile of panic books about the "Muslim threat"... and is most moving when Fergusson writes as he fasts for the month of Ramadan. An absorbing book.

Fergusson sees through the curse of terrorism to reveal Muslims who – much like the rest of us – are kind, funny, confused, fearful, angry and proud to be British. His conclusion is heartening: that living better together is not only desirable, but well within our grasp.

Compelling and relevant... vivid, nuanced reporting.

Judicious and insightful...timely in a great many ways. Strong and brave. A fascinating book... it allows [Britain’s Muslims] to speak for themselves.

A triumph of detail... Al-Britannia doesn't fail in its mission to ask hard questions of all concerned parties.

A triumph of detail and gracefully written.

Fergusson is a delicate, warm, lucid writer with true curiosity and humility. A vital rejoinder to the growing pile of panic books about the 'Muslim threat'. Moving, humane... an absorbing book.

[Fergusson] has marshalled his surveillance tools of wit, tenacity and decades of experience of the Muslim world to produce a fine, detailed portrait of Al-Britannia.

Don’t read Al-Britannia, My Country unless you’re prepared to let go of prejudices against Muslims, and seek a deeper understanding beyond headlines which have fanned the flames of fear and hatred. Fascinating, rich and complex.

A recommended read for anyone interested in the present condition and further development of Muslims in Britain.

[A] highly sympathetic new survey of British Muslims. The end of multiculturalism and its replacement with heightened surveillance and the emphasis on national cultural values are dealt with in detail. Fergusson’s belief that British Muslims should be valued because of their faith, not in spite of it, is a major improvement on the self-interested toleration that has often passed for an enlightened position on the Muslim question.

A Journey Through Muslim Britain

Shortlisted for the British Academy Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize for Global Cultural Understanding 2018. 
 
'A SERIOUSLY NECESSARY BOOK.' ROWAN WILLIAMS, FORMER ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY 
 
'A MUST READ.' MIQDAAD VERSI, MUSLIM COUNCIL OF BRITAIN 
 
'A COMPELLING AND COMPASSIONATE SURVEY OF BRITISH ISLAM.’ THE GUARDIAN 
 
'A TIMELY BOOK.' BARONESS WARSI 
 
'HUGELY IMPORTANT.' PETER OBORNE 
 
'HEARTENING.' DAVID ANDERSON QC 
 
In this groundbreaking book, James Fergusson travels the length of Britain to explore our often misunderstood Muslim communities, and to experience life on both sides of our increasingly segregated society. 
 
The face of Britain is changing. The Muslim population has more than doubled over the last twenty years, and is projected to do so again over the next twenty. A societal shift of this size and speed has inevitably brought growing pains, with the impact on our communities becoming ever more profound – as well as painful, because in the eyes of many, Islam has a problem: the extremist views of a tiny minority, which, when translated into action, can result in catastrophic violence. 
 
The danger of this extremist threat - or our response to it - is that we are collectively starting to lose faith in the cultural diversity that has glued our nation together for so long. Our tolerance of others, so often celebrated as a ‘fundamental British value,’ is at risk. 
 
In this groundbreaking book, James Fergusson travels the length of Britain to evaluate the impact these seismic shifts have had on our communities. With the rise of nationalist movements, growing racial tensions and an increasingly out of touch political elite, what does it mean to be a Muslim in Britain? What is life like on both sides of this growing religious divide? And what can we do to heal the fractures appearing in our national fabric? 
 
Al-Britannia, My Country is a timely and urgent account of life in Britain today, a call to action filled with real-life experience, hard truths and important suggestions for our future.

James Fergusson

Praise for Al-Britannia, My Country

Perhaps the best book ever written by a non-Muslim about Islam in Britain.

This is an impressively sustained attempt to listen to what British Muslims are actually saying, honest, fair-minded and not uncritical. For once we are allowed to see Islamic life in Britain in its human diversity ...

A fascinating journey across the diversity of Al-Britannia. Fergusson's fresh approach yields powerful and honest insights. A must read.

Perhaps the best book ever written by a non-Muslim about Islam in Britain.

This is an impressively sustained attempt to listen to what British Muslims are actually saying, honest, fair-minded and not uncritical. For once we are allowed to see Islamic life in Britain in its human diversity ...

A fascinating journey across the diversity of Al-Britannia. Fergusson's fresh approach yields powerful and honest insights. A must read.

Perhaps the best book ever written by a non-Muslim about Islam in Britain.

This is an impressively sustained attempt to listen to what British Muslims are actually saying, honest, fair-minded and not uncritical. For once we are allowed to see Islamic life in Britain in its human diversity ...

A fascinating journey across the diversity of Al-Britannia. Fergusson's fresh approach yields powerful and honest insights. A must read.

Books by James Fergusson

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