Video gamers, please take note: War = Rape + Murder...

Rating: 5/10 (10 July 2014)

Just yesterday morning, AMC (that's American Movie Classics) ran an infomercial offering "more sex, less stress." That was followed by two Three Stooges shorts, then a heavily redacted version of CASUALTIES OF WAR. I'd seen the movie way back when, but I'd dismissed it as just another of Brian DePalmer's overblown would-be epics (like the vastly overrated SCARFACE, which features Al Pacino's worst-ever over-the-top performance). Because I'm not a video gamer, I have no idea if the first-person shooter games, set in a variety of war zones, feature any of the more True-to-Life perks that actual War provides- perks like Rape and Indiscriminate Murder. Certainly any video game set during The Vietnam War would have to feature such bonuses. As Nick Turse points out in his exhaustive study of The American War, KILL ANYTHING THAT MOVES, "atrocities were committed by members of EVERY infantry, cavalry and airborne division... That is, every major army unit in Vietnam." "Soldiers realized that small groups of civilians could be killed with impunity and logged as enemy war dead..." One medical officer listed a civilian's cause of death as "running from U.$. forces." And it was none other than Douglas MacArthur who set the tone for the war by telling General William Westmoreland: "You might have to employ a scorched earth policy in Vietnam." The U.$. released 30 BILLION pounds of munitions in Vietnam (and by the early 70s, there were 20 million bomb craters) and 70 Million liters of herbal agents- most notably Agent orange (which Turse refers to rightly as "ECOCIDE"). This was the equivalent of 640 Hiroshima bombs... "Detained civilians and captured guerrillas were often used as human mine detectors and regularly died in the process." The Biggest crime of all, called Operation Speedy Express, was, according to concerned soldier George Lewis, "... a My Lai each month for over a year." The International Commission of Enquiry Into U.$. Crimes in Indochina concluded: "... The main burden of responsibility must lie with those who have been making this policy." Said Kissinger: "Once we've broken the war in Vietnam, no one will give a damn about war crimes." As Huynh Thi Nay (whose son was murdered) said when she spoke about it: "It became dark as night." Maybe gamers could get extra points for Civilian deaths- or bonus points for Rape (unless they get caught, which might entail a loss of turn or something)...