Letters

From the April 2002 issue

(Page 2 of 3)

Drug War Defectors

I would like to thank Michael Lynch and the three ex-drug warriors he interviewed for the refreshingly truthful "Battlefield Conversions" (January). The information presented makes one thing undeniable: Some government departments have been lying to us for years about the War on Drugs. Unfortunately, John Q. Public remains mostly unaware of the depth of this deception. Lynch's article should be required reading for every taxpaying American voter.

L.J. Carden
Concord, CA

In "Battlefield Conversions," Joseph McNamara relates that when he was police chief in San Jose, the city manager didn't budget money for police equipment, telling him to raise the funds through drug seizures. McNamara says, "So law enforcement becomes a revenue-raising agency...."

You don't have to be a whole lot smarter than a turnip to appreciate that a prerequisite for drug profits is a profitable drug trade. San Jose and just about every jurisdiction in the country are betting the police budget that there will be a profitable drug trade next year. Making police departments profit-sharing partners is the best way I can think of to guarantee a profitable drug trade in America.

Paul Kelly
Boulder, CO

Nostalgic for War

I have to comment on Michael Valdez Moses' "Virtual Warriors" (January). The "explosion" of motion pictures about World War II resulted from the success of Saving Private Ryan. The formula worked so well that other movies jumped on the bandwagon. World War II was the last war that occurred when our country was still naive. People trusted and believed in their government (even if it wasn't innocent then either). It was the last time that we fought a real evil. It's understandable that people today would be nostalgic about such a time.

Writing about Enemy at the Gates, Moses mentions that due to the Cold War's end the movie reflects a more positive attitude toward Russia. He says the true evil of the movie is fascism. Did he see the first 30 minutes? Did he watch the scenes where the Russian soldiers prepared to battle the Germans and every other man was forced into the field without a gun? Or the scene where those same men, after getting hit by a barrage of German firepower, retreat only to get shot dead by their own Russian officers? The officers of the Russian army sure defined evil for me.

Writing about Saving Private Ryan, Moses criticizes Ryan's decision to stay and fight instead of going home. He feels it was unrealistic. I have read extensively on World War II, and unless the veterans are lying many of them did choose to stay and fight when given a choice. It's called true patriotism.

I think Moses needs to do a little nonfiction reading of his own. Maybe then he won't be so sarcastic toward movies attempting to accurately depict events of that war. It's a put-down to the men who served.

Maria Keneck
New York, NY

Michael Valdez Moses replies: Far from intending a "put-down of the men who served," I aimed to show how the sacrifices of World War II veterans have been cleverly misrepresented and manipulated by a generation of filmmakers not hitherto known for their warm embrace of the U.S. military or of the virtues of American patriotism. In pursuit of that goal, I endeavored to draw precisely the distinction that Maria Keneck demands, that between what really happened in World War II (as best I can determine from a fair reading of historical accounts) and current cinematic representations of it.

If the evils of communism are vividly portrayed in the opening minutes of Enemy at the Gates, as I acknowledge in my article, they are nonetheless increasingly obscured and marginalized as the film approaches its dramatic climax, in which the audience is meant to sympathize with a "simple" Russian sniper (as against his "upper-class" fascist counterpart), whose triumph is stage-managed by the Soviet intelligence service. Suggestively, the main Russian characters, who always speak English, are played by British actors, while the evil fascist sniper, whose occasional German dialogue must be subtitled, is played by the only American actor cast in a major role. The cinematic reduction of the battle of Stalingrad to a media campaign manages to eclipse the vast military struggle and the tremendous human sacrifice actually required to lift the siege of the city. Such subtle manipulations of the audience suggest to me the post-Cold War (European) sensibilities of a left-of-center and mildly anti-American media-savvy generation.

During her extensive reading, Maria Keneck no doubt came across the fact that the airborne trooper on whom Spielberg's Pvt. Ryan is loosely based was found by a chaplain (not the squad depicted in the film) and immediately removed from the front lines. What I find curious is not that the historical counterpart of Pvt. Ryan, who performed his patriotic duty, should have followed orders requiring his immediate evacuation, but that Spielberg should alter history for a variety of ends, some dramatic and commercially motivated, others ideological and politically self-serving. In short, my criticism was directed at a current generation of filmmakers and not toward an earlier generation of warriors, or those, such as Keneck, who faithfully honor them and their memory.

Comments

nfl jerseys|11.13.10 @ 2:41AM|#

yut