The Fog of War

I apologize for the cross-post, but there are so many people who post regularly on this board that I wanted to mention it here too. I just saw the documentary about former Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara, "The Fog of War."

I think everyone who posts regularly on this board should see it. I'm guessing this will be this year's Oscar winner for Best Documentary.

The movie focuses on 11 lessons that McNamara has learned about war. This is a statement from an 85 year old man, who knows he doesn't have a lot of time left on this world and feels he has something important to say. He's very concerned about the mistakes of the past, and how we could still very easily have a nuclear war.

It sounds like he wants forgiveness for the mistakes of Vietnam, but he's not willing to outright say that he's ashamed of Vietnam or sorry for Vietnam. What he does want people to understand is the mentality that created the mistakes of Vietnam.

In addition to talking about Vietnam, he's got a lot of interesting things to say about his participation in WWII and the firebombings of Japan, as well as the Cuban Missile crisis. He says that later in life when he met Castro, that Castro told him they already had nukes on the island before the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis. We were closer to a nuclear war than we understood, and we knew we were very, very, close.

Anyway ... regardless of your political bent, I think this is a must see. It's a good look at some of the innerworkings of our military learders, their decision making, and all of the political wrangling.

The scenerios he describes very much resemble other White Houses including and especially the current administration.

Boring. And they are specious comparisons. The world of the Cold War is completely different from the current situation, even though they overlap very significantly in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

That's a far more interesting story.

[Edited on Feb 07, 2004 by stockula]

Damn - reading that without my glasses I thought you were talking about the frog of war, and how it was going to be Oscar winner for the beast documentary.
Sounded interesting for a second.

Ha Ha -- Idiots aside, thanks for mentioning this, I hadn't heard of it until now, and I'm very interested.

And I also think it's a shame more people apparently don't care about something like this -- These things (can) affect practically everything we know around us, and the average Joe and Jane don't seem to really give a flying fuck.

The Battle of Algiers is being re-released too, for those of you who haven't seen it. Good movie, not quite sure if it is an accurate parallel to the situation in Iraq, seeing how France's consideration of Algeria (as part of France as much as Provence or Normandy) is so different from how we see Iraq (get it established as an independent, sovereign and democratic nation as soon as possible and split)

[Edited on Feb 07, 2004 by stockula]

Actually ... the comparisons are dead on. In Vietnam we didn't have a clue about who we were fighting, and we don't have a clue about who we are fighting in Iraq. One of the lessons learned, according to McNamara, is to be able to empathize with your enemy and live in his skin. We're not doing that in Iraq or Afghanistan, and we didn't in Vietnam.

The other obvious parallel is the arrogance of jackasses who seem to think that being a superpower means you don't have to learn from past mistakes, our own and those of others.

Again ... this isn't just about Vietnam, it's also about WWII and other events.

Haha

I kinda thought that too.


ribbit!

Well, I think you could certainly draw a parallel between the sort of corps of the "Best and the Brightest" (to use Halberstam's phrase) that was pushing the Vietnam war on JFK and LBJ and the Project for a New American Century crowd (especially Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Pearle) pushing the Iraq war on Dubya. In both cases, it's a war being argued for on somewhat nebulous ideological aims, in which a country that didn't really pose any sort of real threat became our enemy and a threat we must neutralize.

I mean, the idea of a President allowing himself to be manipulated into an unadvisable war is nothing new. LBJ didn't feel capable of arguing with McNamara and the others because they went to Harvard, and he just went to teacher's college in Texas.

I always love hearing from real heroes in the military. Personally I think the leadership in this war is bullshit. I just found out that our commander is getting the same award that a battle buddy of mine got for dying. Our commander hasn't done shit but fuck us every chance he has gotten.

The one thing that I don't think I've communicated clearly is that McNamara is focusing on 11 specific lessons that he wants to communicate. The title of the movie refers to the idea that there is so much happening in during a war, that it is impossible to know everything.

It's kind of like how we used to "know" that the world was flat. He gives some very poignant examples of things that generals and politicians "knew" and how they knew them, only to find out later that this information wasn't correct. He talks about incidents, both famous and lesser known, and what went into making the decisions. This is more than just 20/20 hindsight. It's an examination of the thinking process for gathering and analyzing strategic data.

Those are tactical comparisons, not strategic ones. Yes, Fedayeen and al-qaeda dress like civilians and wage guerrilla war against conventional US forces, but there the comparisons stop. I mean, did we ever invade the enemy homeland and occupy it, get rid of the communist regime? We were afraid to in the Cold War geopolitical context, whereas today we can invade Iraq or Afghanistan and not have to worry about it escalating into nuclear war with the USSR. That's not the main struggle today.

In Vietnam, we didn't know the enemy. We weren't empathizing with their needs and trying to understand them. We were working towards an end game based on an inacurate picture of the Vietnamese.

We don't know the enemy in Iraq. We haven't made knowing what's in their hearts and minds a top priority. We're making the exact same mistake. You know what they call people who do the same thing over and over and expect a different result?

Then again ... you seem pretty sure that you know more about the Vietnam War than the guy who was actually Secretary of Defense for half the war. You're probably just as sure about your expertise on Iraq.

I just saw this movie and I want to see it again.

Boring? That's your critique? Boring?

The big difference being that it's a fucking movie.

I saw the Fog of War a few months after I made these comments. And aside from being a really good movie with a nice Phillip Glass soundtrack, there's a refreshing absence of comparing Iraq to Vietnam. At least not an obvious one. It was good, gave a good bio of a man I really didn't know aside from his time as Secretary of Defense. Didn't know he worked for Ford and had a big role in standardizing seat belts, for example.

So you reviewed it without watching it?
nice.

ironic, huh?

Great movie, everyone should see it.

The most intense part is when he is talking about the fire bombing of Japan. That scene is so hard to watch!

Huh? Why? Dont you know what they did to us?

Yeah, that totally justifies firebombing 100 000 civilians.

I know you'll say some "all's fair in war" crap, but you're wrong, it isn't.

The loss of life is always tragic.
and when you see the person that orchestrated the attacks coming to tears,
it kind of adds to the affect.

I think if McNamera (sp) can't justify what he did, then some neo-conservative whoever, on a soft core porn site probably is off base with any justification they think they can come up with.

Maybe when Canada is sneak-attacked, you'll understand. But Canada isn't America in so, so many ways.

And every day I thank God for that fact.

And I'm an atheist!

Great movie. I've always loved the way that Errol Morris -- the occasional silly visual effect aside -- lets a person just talk, so that we can judge for ourselves. I found it riveting, occasionally quite disturbing, and very useful. Even though I support the Iraq War, I am often frustrated at some of the decisions that have been made in terms of the way it is being conducted, and was amused to hear Fmr. Sec. McNamara grappling with the same issues with regard to Vietnam (although he actually seems to regret some of the decisions in WW2 more).