B lack-clad fighters promised the group of penniless Iraqi farmers together they would conquer “all the lands to Burma”. The attentive teenagers from al-Jazirah, an area west of Tikrit, Saddam Hussein’s hometown, did not know where Burma was but it sounded far away.

After years of punishing droughts, which had blasted their lands and livelihoods, they did not really care. Their real interest was in the salaries of more than $400 a month.