Overby has a firsthand account of the Afghan war set against an extensive and thoroughly researched background of political history. In order to fix the personal experience in the broader historical context Overby has drawn on leading Afghan scholars like Louis Dupree, Olivier Roy, Bahanudin Majrooh, Eqbal Ahmad, Jan-Heeren Grevemeyer and Barnett Rubin. He sees the war growing from the angry tension over modernization in Afghanistan and sets it in its context as an expression of Islamism--the most modern and dynamic version of Islamic fundamentalism.