The Green Zone is a little America embedded in the heart of Baghdad. It is the former preserve of Saddam Hussein and his favored associates—an uncrowded district of villas, palaces, and monuments set in a parklike expanse that spreads for four square miles inside a meander of the Tigris River at the center of the ruined city. During the thirty-five years of Baath Party dictatorship it was neither gated nor strictly delineated, and it did not need to be, since the public's survival instincts were well honed, and people just naturally understood that special unwritten rules applied there. The Green Zone was the seat of Saddam's power. You could cross it along the three or four grand boulevards that were open to traffic, and you could reflect on the glory of the regime, but you could not safely linger or gawk. If you had a car and happened to blow a tire, you kept driving on the rims, and made a good show of it too. I know of one young man, the son of a high official in the former regime, who made a U-turn there, and was arrested for the indiscretion; he was held and questioned until his father intervened, and explained that he was innocent and just a bit feckless. Ah, youth.
