Bless you. In my case, the informant on the ground closest to my heart is my father, who having lived in Saudi for over 20 years has been an invaluable source of info to flesh out the in-person and online interviews I conduct with locals. In fact, if not for him and his intelligence, the State Department would not have known to publish (belattedly, after much argument) a warning to all Westerners in the MI in 2003. When Brits were getting blown up in Saudi, but before the Riyadh bombing.
Half my family is in Afghanistan and Iraq....Dad is now in Spain, which isn't much safer.
President Bush thumbed our collective nose at the so-called World Court.
KEEP the gloves off, while encouraging the Iraqis to keep their gloves off too.