"We're French! It's not our fucking war!", Robert Baer yelled out in Arabic, as a group of armed and "very hostile" Sunni-Muslim tribesmen confronted him and his wife, Dayna, in their jeep on the outskirts of Tikrit, some 180km north of Baghdad, on 11 April 2003.
"That stopped them, and we got through," he said, recalling the incident 17 years later.
He did have a French driver's licence, but, in fact, both he and his wife were American and both were former CIA operatives.
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Already a member? Login hereAndrew Rettman is EUobserver's Foreign Affairs Editor. He has been writing about foreign and security affairs for EUobserver since 2005. He is Polish but grew up in the UK. He has also written for The Guardian, The Telegraph, and The Times of London.
Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's Foreign Affairs Editor. He has been writing about foreign and security affairs for EUobserver since 2005. He is Polish but grew up in the UK. He has also written for The Guardian, The Telegraph, and The Times of London.