Last night Netflix viddie-on-demand served up Restrepo at my house. I was awed by it.
The quality of the filming was impressive and the relating of the embedded combat tour without embellishment or judgment made it an Academy Award contender. Possibly the most moving scene was near the end of the movie when the camera slowly panned up the back of one of the soldiers from boot to helmet stained with the blood of his brother-in-arms.
The saddest moment though came at the very end when a simple frame of text displayed for only about twenty seconds. It calmly declared that in the Spring of 2009 the administration chose to abandon the Korengal Outpost. Yep, that's what these men fought and died for, Bamster. But, they aren't many votes are they?
4 comments:
Maybe one of the problems is we no longer have leaders who have been in wars or military service. Current leaders make decisions that are costing us young lives. The days having leaders with military backgrounds are diminishing quickly.
Echoes is correct and I would prefer, frankly, that the leader be required to have served - in combat.
That said, the film was amazing, no? And quite the glimpse into the foolishness of trying to deal with a stone age people bent on self-destruction. Leave them to it...
I caught it on one of the Nat Geo channels a few weeks ago and I echo your sentiments. It was powerful.
I've wondered about that many times since this war began, as we have had so many people since almost day one ready to pull out. Admittedly, I don't really see a lot of permanent good we can do in Afghanistan. There is nothing consistent there to work with. But we cannot leave without accomplishing something. Those men cannot have died for nothing. The same goes for Iraq. We have been more successful in Iraq, but I still believe that the situation there isn't strong enough to stand on it's own if we leave. It won't fall apart overnight, but it will begin a slowly accelerating degeneration into a larger version of the west bank. Once more, that's not what our people died for. And if that happens, what will that do to our military? Who will want to serve knowing that their leaders are guaranteed to pull the rug out from under them at some point, and that whatever sacrifice they make is likely to be wasted?
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