In her provocative new book, Damned Nations: Greed, Guns, Armies and Aid, Samanatha Nutt shows how the activists’ ability to help is increasingly compromised by the changing nature of contemporary warfare, specifically a “blurring of the lines between civilian and military operations.” Nutt’s life has been threatened at gunpoint, and she found herself in a hail of grenades and gunfire during an unexpected outbreak of armed conflict in Congo in 2004. She has survived the dangers of her work, but two of her close friends, women she got to know over the course of 12 visits to Iraq, were not as lucky; her book—part memoir, part call to action—includes a memorial to them. Their murders underscore a disturbing trend, she says: Attacks on aid workers have increased an astounding 177 percent since 1997, and some 80 percent of those who die in war now are civilians.

Click here to read MORE's interview with Samantha Nutt.

Click here to buy Nutt's new book.

Don’t miss out on MORE great articles like this one. Click here to sign up for our weekly newsletter!