A Critical Appraisal of Why We Fight
Why We Fight (Jarecki 2005) is a documentary that is based on the American military force and especially its operations since World War II. The documentary focuses on the reasons behind the foreign military policy of the United States of America. It uses the invasion of Iraq in 2003 as an example to explain this policy. It covers multiple concepts, the most important one being the military industrial complex. Is the American foreign military policy in its own interest? What are their motives? The film discusses these questions and more. This paper aims to define the key message of this documentary and evaluates if the evidence that is provided is enough to be able to get the central message across. To appraise …show more content…
Finally, possible shortcomings are described.
Key message
The main point in this documentary is that the American foreign policy is not based on the urge to bring freedom to countries that lack freedom, but to sustain its military dominance in the world or expand its influence and industries within the world. I believe the director wants to make you think about what the motives of the United States of America were with foreign military operations. Also, because it becomes clear within the movie that at a certain point the citizens of the United States do not know why and what they are fighting for. The movie starts off by showing fragments of presidential speeches to demonstrate the usual view the audience has of American military operations - more or less to bring freedom and democracy to countries that are lacking them -. Moreover, it continues by showing the horrors of the terrorist attacks on the twin towers. It gives the viewer another idea of why the military operations of America could be justified. However, after this fragment the documentary shows another side to this story. This side reveals very different motives. It argues that at the end of World War II Truman dropped the atomic bombs not because of the threat Japan posed, but to demonstrate the power of the American military force – especially to …show more content…
The reason being that the documentary is really well structured and shows both sides of the story. By starting off with showing the side of going to war for freedom or bringing justice to terrorists and then switching to the view of economic colonialism, it slowly convinces the viewer of the latter. By showing several documents in the film this argument gains strength. There is actually some proof for this view. Still, it is hard to proof this beyond any doubt. At least it makes you think about how genuine the motives of their military operations actually are and that is what I think the director set out to do in the first
Why We Fight (Jarecki 2005) is a documentary that is based on the American military force and especially its operations since World War II. The documentary focuses on the reasons behind the foreign military policy of the United States of America. It uses the invasion of Iraq in 2003 as an example to explain this policy. It covers multiple concepts, the most important one being the military industrial complex. Is the American foreign military policy in its own interest? What are their motives? The film discusses these questions and more. This paper aims to define the key message of this documentary and evaluates if the evidence that is provided is enough to be able to get the central message across. To appraise …show more content…
Finally, possible shortcomings are described.
Key message
The main point in this documentary is that the American foreign policy is not based on the urge to bring freedom to countries that lack freedom, but to sustain its military dominance in the world or expand its influence and industries within the world. I believe the director wants to make you think about what the motives of the United States of America were with foreign military operations. Also, because it becomes clear within the movie that at a certain point the citizens of the United States do not know why and what they are fighting for. The movie starts off by showing fragments of presidential speeches to demonstrate the usual view the audience has of American military operations - more or less to bring freedom and democracy to countries that are lacking them -. Moreover, it continues by showing the horrors of the terrorist attacks on the twin towers. It gives the viewer another idea of why the military operations of America could be justified. However, after this fragment the documentary shows another side to this story. This side reveals very different motives. It argues that at the end of World War II Truman dropped the atomic bombs not because of the threat Japan posed, but to demonstrate the power of the American military force – especially to …show more content…
The reason being that the documentary is really well structured and shows both sides of the story. By starting off with showing the side of going to war for freedom or bringing justice to terrorists and then switching to the view of economic colonialism, it slowly convinces the viewer of the latter. By showing several documents in the film this argument gains strength. There is actually some proof for this view. Still, it is hard to proof this beyond any doubt. At least it makes you think about how genuine the motives of their military operations actually are and that is what I think the director set out to do in the first