I just had a chance to see Sebastian Junger's 2010 film, "Restrepo". It details the experience of a group of soldiers from the Second Platoon in the Korengal valley of Afghanistan, one of the most dangerous areas of the country. After viewing it, one is left with an overwhelming feeling of futility.
The motivations that characterize this group of soldiers seems all too typical. There is a mixture of bravado that is based in part on patriotism and in part on the need for young men to prove themselves in a ritual of passage. One suspects as well that many of them are motivated by poverty and by the lack of opportunities at home. When young men (and women) graduate and have no special aptitude for academic pursuits, and limited job prospects, they have traditionally joined the armed forces as a way of achieving some source of security and direction. That is why many of the recruits tend to come from working-class backgrounds.
These soldiers seem to be very appealing in the beginning because they seem typical. They are shown jockeying with each other as they embark on what some of them see as an "adventure", a chance to prove themselves. A few of them chant about going off to war, and seem far too confident about their prospects for survival, as if they haven't internalized what war means as, indeed, they haven't. All they know of war is the triumphalist narrative of American campaigns in which, with occasional setbacks, their countrymen have been heroic and have overcome all challenges. They have an arrogance that is deeply offensive, and that has failed to learn the lessons of the past fifty years, in which such clear-cut triumph has been denied.
All too frequently what they know of war is what they have learned in video games, that form of entertainment that works to desensitize them to violent conduct and that instead trivializes it. In a game they can lose themselves in fantasies of mythical heroic exploits, in which motives are never questioned and in which instead they are engaged in all manner of duels, to see who is most adept at pushing buttons and manipulating levers in order to "kill" others. These products rely on accomplished graphics and creative interfaces and stoke their adrenalin levels without engaging them on an ethical basis. After a while this activity becomes repetitive and numbs them to further sensations, and in the best of cases, prompts them to interrupt their gaming activity. In the worse of circumstances, it is misapplied in the real world and feeds fantasies of power and self-sufficiency that endanger the entire platoon, and fuel as well misguides mission such as the one that seems to define this one. Juvenile mentalities are entrusted with real weapons, and the resultant carnage only serves to unleash new cycles of violence.
The structure of such a movie would necessitate a tragic death within this group, and indeed, this comes to take place. The bonds that this group of soldiers has forged is tested and there are moments (such as in operation called "Rock Avalanche") where it seems as if they will become incapacitated by grief and anxiety. The death of comrades is difficult for them to accept, and yet, they seem unable to reflect on the underlying dynamic that fuels this destructive situation. Their unity is a postive element, but it is bases on a mercenary ideal, the same ideal they are quick to denounce when they talk about the "foreigners" who are leading the young Afghans to take up arms against them. One wonders how they can fail to recognize the most elementary of facts, that they are foreigners themselves, with a timeframe that speaks to weeks and months and not to the future. It is the Afghans who seem to trust to time, while for the Americans, it becomes another fearsome foe, a stretch to be counted down until they can evacuate, releasing them from perpetual danger.
What resonates in this movie is the feeling of futility. The commanders and their soldiers are never able to effectively communicate with the Afghans, and despite their numerous gatherings and conferences, it is clear that there is a deep level of distrust that they are never able to dispel. This is all the more evident in the tone that they adopt, in which condescension seems to predominate. The Americans express frustration but at the same time a tone-deafness that refuses to recognize that they aren't the only ones who can set the terms of this conflict. The commander repeatedly expresses the wish to "wipe the board clean" of past abuses by preceeding commanders, but is incapable of recognizing that they are perceived as outsiders, temporary interlopers who in the pageant of Afghan history have repeatedly arrived only to be eventually forced to withdraw.
The Americans can't and shouldn't pretend to be able to set the rules. They try to bribe the villagers, promising to "flood" the area with aid and with resources, including jobs, if they will help the soldiers, little able to recognize how demeaning this offer is to people who, as with any other people, have a deep sense of honor and dignity. It is actually difficult to view these moments on film because one recognizes that the soldiers have no training in either politics nor civility, and insist on cleaving to the paradigm of our disgraced former President Bush, who divides the world into "good" and "bad" guys. Is it any wonder that the platoon continues to meet with such fierce resistence, despite their efforts?
I am struck as well by how the soldiers become increasingly demoralized themselves. They have no sense of participating in a mission that has longer objectives other than surviving the daily attacks they suffer. They live in a bunker, they venture out and shoot at the hills when they receive gunfire, they are ambushed and from time to time killed mercilessly, and this provokes deep anguish, astonishment, benumbment or an empty rage, none of which they can channel into more useful ventures. Even the rallying cry of their commander, who informs them of the death of nine soldiers from a sister platoon in an adjoining area, rings hollow. He utters a series of trite banalities regarding making their enemies feel the same pain that they are feeling, but one senses that revenge is a hollow rationale for involvement in Afghanistan. It doesn't uplift and it doesn't inspire; all it does is drain them (and the viewer) of energy.
In the end, we have a series of tragic deaths and a feeling that this an ordeal in which survival was the only triumpth possible. Not changing the mentality of the villagers, not eliminating the Taliban fighters, not changing the social system and implanting Western values, not encouraging development. It was all about containment, and in this case, it is evident that they have failed.
In what is a telling note, the film ends with the declaration that the soldiers had to withdraw from the Korengal Valley in April of 2010. All those deaths, all those resources, all that time and all that suffering was, indeed, for naught.
It was as futile as shooting at mountains.
Copyrights ORomero 2011
No comments:
Post a Comment