Too sad to be called a comedy

Rating: 10/10 (4 June 2017)

This new Netflix original directed by David Michod is a powerful statement not just about the futility of our 16-year war in Afghanistan, but more importantly, the whole concept of counterinsurgency as outlined in the Army's Counterinsurgency Field Manual (FM 3-24 *MCWP 3-33.5). Every set piece scene hits home displaying the ignorance, the futility, and the hubris of our efforts in Afghanistan. Even when some politicians and enlightened officers realized the impossibility of "winning" they were often muted in their opposition. We like to think we will always win. We are the best, the most professional, most well-equipped military force the world has ever known. How could we lose? To a bunch of ragtag insurgents with flip flops and rusty AK-47s? More to the point, who was willing to say openly that we might? The movie describes a series of commanders each believing (some more than others) that he had the solutions for winning that his predecessors did not. The scenes where the officer talks to the Afghan people about our desire to "liberate" them I found particularly gut wrenching. The Afghan people thought they were free. Who were these alien, Christian invaders to tell them they were there to help them as they smashed around the country destroying villages and killing (accidently for the most part) civilians? This is not black humor. It is too sad for that. The scene in Karzai's bedroom where the general, while demanding the Afghan President authorize an offensive that was hours away from starting while at the same time telling him that the United States did not want to be shown as an occupying power and that he, Karzai had some real authority was another painful look at the reality of our involvement there. This movie merely states the blindingly obvious, but that doesn't seem to be understood by a new set of politicians and generals who believe that with a few more troops and more intelligent use of the COIN manual, victory will be ours. Sadly it will not win any new "hearts and minds".