War, Inc: Cusack's Savage Satire Strikes a Chord with Soldiers and Their Families
This post originally ran during War, Inc's theatrical run. It has just been released on DVD.
"Whose top advisers are linked to war profiteers?" asks John Cusack in a new TV ad linking John McCain and George Bush ("Both...Bet you can't tell them apart"). The ad, produced by MoveOn.org, starts airing today and is already being passed around the Internet.
Cusack's righteous rage over the billions being pocketed in Iraq by companies like Blackwater, Halliburton, and Bechtel is the beating heart of his brilliant War Inc. The film, a corrosive, audaciously funny takedown of the Right's push toward privatized war, has become a surprise, grassroots-driven hit -- despite having almost no ad money behind it.
I saw the film before it was finished, and even before the final edit, the music, etc., I was overwhelmed by how it captured the insanity going on in Iraq. War Inc. has pulled off the near-impossible: it has a found a savage, reality-altering humor amidst the tragedy of Iraq.
It masterfully wields my favorite creative weapon: satire. It punches you in the gut, making you laugh, wince, and become outraged all at the same time. Naomi Klein rightly calls War, Inc. "one of those rare satires with the danger left in."
Political satire designed to confront the powers-that-be with painful truths and to produce not just laughs but change is rarely seen in today's multiplexes. And that's not surprising; it's a high-wire act few even dare to attempt. But when someone does and succeeds at it -- think Stanley Kubrick, Paddy Chayefsky, Joseph Heller, Billy Wilder -- the effect is indelible.
Lewis Lapham identified the satirist's project as "the crime of arson, meaning to set a torch of words to the hospitality tents of pompous and self-righteous cant." And that great satirical arsonist Mark Twain wrote that exposure to good satire made citizens less likely to be "shriveled into sheep."
The great satirists have always been passionate reformers challenging the status quo. "Sometimes," says Paul Krassner, whose satiric and radical journalism inspired Cusack and his co-creators, "humor is just a way of calling attention to the contradictions or the hypocrisy that's going on officially. ... That's the function of humor -- it can alter your reality." Which is exactly what War, Inc. does.
When in 1729, Jonathan Swift wrote the most famous work of political satire of all time, "A Modest Proposal," he was seeking to light a fire under the indifference toward the twin Irish crises of hunger and over-population. His proposal was to feed young children to hungry men. "I have been assured," he wrote, "that a young healthy child, well-nursed, is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout."
You can imagine the blowback from those who failed to grasp the satiric point Swift was trying to make. Similarly, the satire-challenged Right has tried to attack Cusack and War, Inc. as (all together now) unpatriotic and a slam on American troops. They've also gotten their knickers in a twist, outraged that someone would try to find humor in the death and suffering of U.S. soldiers.
But Cusack's targets are not our troops but private military contractors, war profiteers, and flag-waving politicians who, as Cusack puts it, support "keeping our troops in harm's way in Iraq but not the bipartisan G.I. bill of rights to support them when they return home." (And, yes, he's talking about you, Messrs Bush and McCain).
Indeed, since the film's release Cusack has received many moving emails and postings on his MySpace page from soldiers and military family members supporting the film and its message. Their missives run from disappointment to disillusionment and fury over being asked to serve and sacrifice while mercenaries are better paid -- and often better treated.
Among the emails:
From Sgt. Brent Sammann, an active-duty soldier in the US Army:
(Click for full-size image --
check out the two flags)
I'm a first-hand witness to the exploitation by KBR and other companies lending their services to the war effort -- services us soldiers are fully capable of doing ourselves.... The military is being overcharged by these companies on a regular basis. Also, the poor service and treatment we get from some of their employees who make three times as much as those of us serving our country that are not in it for the money but are trying to make the world a better place for everyone.
From SPC (P) Johnny Rhodes in 3/2 SCR Infantry based in Diyala, Iraq:
After being awake for 3 days I may be a little bit out of it, so excuse any rambling or incoherence on my part. Off the top of my head, I can easily say that KBR in particular is of no help here in my area of Iraq. They do, jobs soldiers could do, get paid way better for it, but the work is almost always substandard.... at any given time there are hordes of these guys tying up the phones and internet, cramming the chow hall, etc. Which makes the soldiers have to wait. And wait. And wait. They also paid way more than me, for a job, I could do with my eyes closed.
From Brenda Clampitt, of Baton Rouge, LA, the wife of a soldier stationed at Camp Adder in Tallil, Iraq:
[My husband] drives the trucks and Humvees and escorts the KBR around where they need to go. He doesn't understand why they get paid way more then he does when [he and his fellow soldiers] are the ones doing the protecting, and are the ones getting shot at and blown up. He has seen soldiers die in front of him; he has seen lives destroyed and the country torn apart. My husband would serve his country whether he got paid or not, that is just how he is. He loves his country and wants to protect it but he sees first hand what is going on over there and he doesn't like it.... I myself am sick and tired of this war. It is dragging on and on and it is all about the money. I am not anti war. But I am FOR everything your movie is about.
Today's lead editorial in the New York Times, titled "Interrogation for Profit," decries "one of the Bush administration's most blatant evasions of accountability in Iraq -- the outsourcing of war detainees' interrogation to mercenary private contractors" and calls on Congress to approve "measures to make war-zone contractors liable for criminal behavior." The editorial concludes: "The way out of the Iraq fiasco must include an end to the outsourced shadow armies."
This indictment has the same urgency of War Inc. Especially with John McCain reminding us that it's "not that important" to him when our troops come home.
Click here to watch a new interview with Cusack in which he talks about War, Inc, war profiteering and the McCain campaign's race-baiting.
Follow Arianna Huffington on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ariannahuff
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While it's STILL not in a market yet that I wouldn't have to fly to in order to see it, Arianna, I DID pre-order a copy on Amazon to watch it again and again on the home theatre come October. I will also still support this film in a local theatre when it becomes available, and I continue to bother the local movie houses with questions about showing dates here. I believe in the anti-privatization message and hope citizens nationally realize what damaging parallels exist in OUR country and society currently. In a military town though, the resistance to its showing is probably higher than other markets.
Let's call it like it is: a "contractor" is a Mercenary. Mercenaries are soldiers -- scratch that -- Killers, i.e. murderers for hire; assassins,even, for money. And they are using the United States Military for shields. Faux patriotic bullshit aside, It should be the other way around. A merc should be taking the bullet in the face so the soldier can shoot back. After all: he's being paid for the priveledge.
Right you are......merceneries, such as "Executive Outcomes" have been growing to the detriment of all our transparency talk.
KBR. (Kellogg, Brown and Roote) Which, in pre-Haliburton days, was Brown and Roote. They were an industrial coonstruction, and Paving company. Does this ring any bells for anyone? Well, does it??? It should. Back "in the day," they were the outfit "contracted" by the military, at the behest of LBJ, to dredge Comron Bay, in southeast Asia. Hearing any bells yet? Comron Bay was the primary imputus that triggered the Gulf of Tonkon (spelling uncertain) 'Incident,' which led directly to, and started, the Vietnam War. Sorry -- Conflict. Either way, that war caused the deaths of thousands and thousands of people; an estimated 100,000 of them American, and dragged on for over ten years. After a suitable number of men died over there, Congerss finally had to shut down the money. And they only did that after so many Americans threatened to not pay their taxes, i.e. their paychecks. And for what? A Domino Theory that was never anything more than a paranoid vision of the communist take-over of the world. And lest we forget, we lost that war. Our friends, brothers, fathers, and sons fought and died for nothing, and thousands more of Americans forced to relingquish their citizenship.
In the end, even LBJ's Civil Rights policies were negated by that war, and he was, in essence, force to retire.Who woulda thunk it. . . .
I look forward to seeing this movie. Irony like that in Catch-22 is difficult because it makes us want to laugh and cry at the same time. As for great early satirists, don't forget St. Thomas More's Utopia, in which he makes the devastating observation that in England, the sheep have developed a peculiar taste for human flesh, and are not only devouring families, but whole villages as well. I hope it shows up in local theaters soon.
Perhaps instead of increasing the re-enlistment bonuses to motivate soldiers to stay in Iraq I suggest they give stock in these companies, Halliburton, Bechtel, etc., to the GIs. After all, why should all the money being made on this "romanitic adventure" (Bush's words) by people such as the wheeler dealers who started it rather than to the victims fighting it?
I wish the movie had achieved the satire it had the lofty goal of reaching, but unfortunately the over the top violence juxtaposed with a few really poignant moments of cutting wit ended up blowing up War, Inc.'s chances of having a lasting influence one way or the other on war profiteering, etc. I was very, very disappointed and have to agree with the review posted to the San Francisco Chronicle at http://www.sfgate.com movie section. Sorry, John. Maybe it is just too soon, when we are smack dab in the middle of a heavily outsourced war, but this one needs a hefty rewrite. The premise is excellent, the delivery/story line, not so much.
The truth will unfold-- as MCain , Bush, Lieberman Inc. will be held under the microscope
The flags in the full-size picture is a priceless commentary. I am surprised, though, that burn and loot's flag is on a shorter staff than the stars and stripes... that doesn't reflect the guvmint's priorities.
Go where?! It doesn't show anywhere near me...
Its not in Denver. Does anyone have a schedule for when it will be released between the coasts?
Where I work we use Reservists as augmentees. One of them just spent a year in Iraq where he served as an airlift scheduler for an Army 1 star. He's disillusioned not with the military but with the contractors. He believes they could be doing more to help finish the war, but they have no incentive to. They are too busy making a financial killing.
As for Iraqi society he concurs we don't really understand tribalism and its importance. With regards to Sadr he says he's a brilliant strategist. He is very ambitious and what he wants to be is the Grand Ayatollah of Iraq's Shiite community, a position held by Sistani. He's back in Iran working on his religious credentials. We blew an opportunit to kill Sadr during the fighting in Najaf. What really elevated his power was the Sadr Army who met Sunni terror with their own. They allied themselves with the Iraqi police and whenever Sunnis killed Shiites they rounded up Sunnis, tortured them, killed them, and dumped them.
Baghdad is safer, not because of the surge, but because the Sadr Army drove the Sunnis out.
As for where the soldiers want to be stationed in Iraq, Kurdistan. There we are truly greeted as liberators.
If you've not seen the PBS documentary Bad Voodoo's War -- now is the time. It was produced by Deborah Scranton and documents the deployment of a California National Guard Platoon. They were assigned convoy escort while they were in Iraq.
The one thing that surfaced during this program was the ineptitude of KBR. One of their vehicles was hit by an IED during the course of a road trip. KBR was notified to come and get them -- KBR didn't show (102 degrees @ 10 in the morning), didn't show, and didn't show. 8.5 hrs later another convoy escort found them and helped them out. KBR never showed up.
The platoon is now back in the states, however their leader, Sfc. Toby Nunn was hung out to dry for doing nothing but tell the truth. He is being investigated, reprimanded, and drummed out of the Army. I think they're trying to say he didn't follow procedure by getting permission to do the documentary in the first place. Someone has lied and this honorable man is being made the scapegoat.
If you've not seen the documentary, you really should -- it was an eye opener on April 1 and continues to tell the story this administration wants none of us to hear:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/badvoodoo/
http://tobynunn.net/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=1&Itemid=54
Hitler was able to form his own Private Army (the Brown Shirts), and with them was able to intimidate the German Government so that they hesitated to put a halt to his activities. We know the outcome. What is Blackwater and the other private security armies real purpose. That we have yet to find out. One thing we can be sure of is that they are right wing in ideology and that they are ruthless and without conscience. Can we afford to overlook them or allow them to exist? I think we do so at our own peril.
I ,too, am concerned about the Blackwater army and the lack of acccountability. Remember they were sent to New Orleans during Katrina and they shot people suspected of looting. I would guess that some of the citizens were just trying to find food. After all ,the citizens of New Orleans and the gulf coast were left to drown and to starve, while M r Bush and Mr McCain were partying in Arizona and California. If they are planning a terrorist attack or a scare, they could proclaim martial law, and guess who would enforce it, while our National Guard is tied up in Iraq. This way they might stop the elections and stay in power. Let us be alert and ever vigilant for more lies and trickery and be ready to protest .
Not protest, FIGHT!!!!
Good points, just an observation, they are not armies, by a strict definition, they are mercenaries and war porfiteers, the neo-cons "new world order"
The People need to express strong opposition to the privatization of public services paid for by the taxpayers. This must be stopped before they steal all of our treasure for their own personal enrichment.
What the hell are we going to do, People, to put a stop to the raping and pillaging of our national treasure.
I just read that it looks like the dems are going to cave and give Bush what he wants once again--immunity from prosecution for the telecoms. I am extremely angry over this. According to the article I read, in 18 months, this was the only matter that the democrats didn't cave into Bush over, and now they've decided to go ahead and give it to me after all. So, the electing the democrats in 2006 has made absolutely no difference. They have given Bush pretty everything he has demanded with barely a struggle. It is becoming more and more apparent that the democrats and the repukes both violated their oaths of office and have betrayed and abandoned their people.
You know, maybe the problem lies in the fact that they're not afraid of us or what we might do. Since we seem to have no recourse--
Ruthless and without conscience=psychopathy. Interestingly, Eric Prinz, head of Blackwater, is a fundamentalist Christian.
I was clued in to this film by Democracy Now! a couple of weeks ago, when Amy Goodman interviewed John Cusack and Jeremy Scahill. Scahill gave his stamp of approval to the film, saying it accurately depicts the Green Zone. I knew from that recommendation I had to see it. I can't speak to the accuracy of it; I haven't been to Iraq, so I have to defer to Scahill and the soldiers cited above. I can say, however, the film is funny, rough, and feels oddly real. It's well-executed from an artistic standpoint.
Blackwater is stil working on invading us in San Diego so they can "train" all the different people who might need the training they can provide. These are for example, border guards, police, military and oh yes the foreign countries that might need the "help". The fact that Balckwater is full of former military and mercenaries from all over the world should scare the hell out of us. This administration has made war big business as these big business owners are their friends. The information about all of this has been quietly, until War Inc, been lying under the paper work sent to Congress and has not gotten any attention by MSM unless forced on them too. This should be a must see for the Congress who has balnk checked Bush and Haliburtin (Cheney's former (?) company). The GOP who refuses to back the GI Bill should have, as any Congress person should have, every single voter who truly supports our troops on their butts with call emails and letters. We can do something if we act.
The KBR issue was exposed first hand and on tape in PBS's Bad Voodoo's War. Stranded the whole platoon returning from an escort assignment when it was 102 degrees at 10 in the morning. These guys waited 8.5 hours before they finally received assistance -- nope not KBR -- another convoy escort.
Talk about War, Inc. -- Bad Voodoo's War tells it like it was for them and is for the troops still over there. FFunny thing though, the platoon leader, Sfc. Toby Nunn? Has since been screwed by the Army, investigated, reprimanded, and is being drummed out. For what? Telling the truth. Go figure...
If you haven't seen this -- your really should -- it's an eye-opener.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/badvoodoo/
The review for War Inc. in "The Seattle Post Inteligencer" this morning was not good. You can read it on-line at the paper's website. I have been eagerly awaiting this movie, but was not surprised about the bad review because the movie reviews in this paper are often out of tune with the paper's left editorial page. (Bill O'Reilly called the Seattle Post Intellingencer the "worst paper in America". High praise indeed.) I know this movie will be grist for the left's mill. Can't wait to see it. It is playing in Seattle, but google Fandango to find a theater in your area.
Thanks
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