Review of Why We Fight (2005) by Tonypolito — 19 Nov 2010

A concise, comprehensible and mostly factual encapsulation of the nepotistic relationship between the defense industry, government and the think-tank and intelligence communities.

Beginning with Eisenhower's 1961 Presidential Farewell Address warning of the dangers inherent in the growth of the Military-Industrial Complex, the film dissects the nature, aims and methods of the Complex since WWII. The film argues that the Complex increasingly war-mongers at whim, exploiting the notions of freedom, democracy and patriotism simply to advance the power and wealth of its elite and its corporations.

Mostly, the argument rests on fact. A glowing map of 40 countries where America has intervened since 1955, Donald Rumsfield gladhanding Saddam Hussein for an arms deal, the installation of the Shah of Iran, and LBJ peddling his tainted version of the Gulf of Tonkin incident are but a few of the film's evidential touchstones.

The slow, steady metamorphosis of the American public's tolerance of war-as-policy is, at one point, ironically presented in the form of a munitions scientist who reveals to be a child refugee from the horrors of Vietnam.

The film lingers on Iraq. Along the way, John McCain fires off a few salvos on behalf of the prosecution. The director especially skewers Rumsfeld, Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Perle with strong evidence of their self-interested actions and their efforts at disinformation. Bush is mostly spared from the director's political barbeque.

Unfortunately, a good bit of below-the-belt heart-tugging is also employed to win over the viewer. And the film does wander - several minutes ogling a new Army consignee is but one example.

RECOMMENDATION: A stark reminder of America's foreign and military policy as practiced since the 1960s. Merits viewing.