Photo Essay: Baghdad’s Back, Six Years After the Invasion

March 20 marks the six-year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The war sparked a bloody insurgency, but in Baghdad today, normal life is cautiously reemerging.

Brimming with optimism? On Thursday, March 20, 2003, the United States launched missiles at Baghdad in an effort to disarm Iraq and to free its people, as then U.S. President George W. Bush put it. In the following years, the capital city became overrun by death squads, and car bombings were an everyday occurrence. But in the wake of the 2007 U.S. troop surge, daily life has reemerged, though the city isn’t in the clear yet. Above, a vendor serves fresh orange juice at his fruit stand in Baghdad on Feb. 21. A glass costs about 70 U.S. cents.

Photo: SABAH ARAR/AFP/Getty Images

Preeti Aroon was copy chief at Foreign Policy from 2009 to 2016 and was an FP assistant editor from 2007 to 2009. Twitter: @pjaroonFP

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