Red Dawn (Yes, The Movie) & Iraq

[hostagecow]

I've noticed recently that AMC has been replaying the classic eighties film "Red Dawn" directed by John Milius (the original screewriter for "Apocalypse Now.") The movie imagines America being conquered by the Soviets with the help of the Cubans. Most of the movie follows a rugged band of teenage American insurgents in Colorado. As I watched the film I was struck by how applicable it is to Iraq...the question I kept coming back to is this: If some foreign power came and occupied your land, killed your brother, incarcerated your father, would you take up arms against him? The answer is, of course you would.

At first when I first saw the movie on tv again, I just laughed. It's really a boyhood fantasy flick about turning the local boy scout troop into a guerilla band. The dialogue is really bad at times. But the more I thought about it, the idea of simply sympathizing with many of the nationalist Iraqi (non-AQI & Salafist types) insurgents we've been fighting over there took on more valence.

Ten years ago, "Red Dawn" was just another bad eighties movie. Now I'm starting to think that it's one of the most trenchant films for Americans to watch to understand their enemy because there's no intervening cultural static. We see Americans doing what many Iraq insurgents are doing: attacking enemy armor columns, watching the enemy shoot himself in the foot through his cultural arrogance, growing increasingly frustrated and turning to torture as his losses mount.

Obviously, the issues aren't this simple. Iraq isn't 1980s America. We're not the Soviets. But in my two trips to Iraq, I've found myself wondering what kind of person would become an insurgent. I came to the conclusion that I'm exactly the kind of person that would.