Dispatches

Every war gets its headlines. Its battlefront news flashes. Its urgent reporting and analysis and op-ed pieces.

And then, in time, comes something else. The slow, knowing telling that opens the war and its meaning to us in a new way. The narrative that gets to its heart, its dark music, and its hold on all it touches.

For many, Michael Herr’s drug-soaked “Dispatches” did that for Vietnam. Now, New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins is drawing comparisons for his deep telling of Iraq and Afghanistan.

This hour, On Point: Dexter Filkins and “The Forever War.”

Guest:

Joining us from Irvine, California is Dexter Filkins, foreign correspondent for The New York Times. He has covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001. His new book is "The Forever War."