Has Hollywood finally snapped out of their wicked anti-American streak thanks to profits, Obama being in office, or a little bit of both? It isn’t a moral awakening, that you can be sure of.

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Christopher McQuarrie will write, produce and direct Rubicon, a new property that is intended to be turned into a movie, graphic novel and videogame. McQuarrie is directing Tom Cruise as Jack Reacher in One Shot, but the project was announced at NY Comic-Con by coproducers Mark Long and Dan Capel. They describe the project as The Seven Samurai, set in Afghanistan with Navy SEALs as the heroes, and the Taliban the villains. Since Navy SEAL Team Six killed Osama Bin Laden, the SEALs have become the centerpiece of numerous feature films.

Full piece here.

Director Jonathan Flora frames the film around Gary Sinise, an actor and director with a long, intimate history with soldiers and veterans, though he himself has never served. From his brother-in-law, who was killed in Vietnam, to current bandmate Kimo Williams,  a ‘Nam veteran who started jamming with Sinise after they met on a production of A Streetcar Named Desire in the mid-90s, his career has always seemed to providentially intertwine with the military. Following the jihadist attacks of 9/11, Sinise felt compelled to help those directly affected by the Twin Towers’ destruction, volunteering in campaigns to benefit the FDNY. This spirit of volunteerism, in concert with his ever more frequent band practices with Williams,  materialized into a USO tour in 2003. Despite his diverse résumé, Sinise was universally associated with his Oscar-nominated performance as “Lieutenant Dan” from Forrest Gump, so as the group expanded, Sinise named it the “Lieutenant Dan Band,” and the rest is history.

It’s tempting to think this is a vanity project for Sinise, now better known for his long-running role on CSI: New York–that like other celebrities, he’s got a pet cause designed to make him look like a good guy. It’s certainly clear the producers ask virtually every interviewee their opinion of the man, but any doubts the viewer entertains about his sincerity quickly evaporate as the film reveals a level of determination and effort that would be noteworthy from anyone, celebrity or no. We see him orchestrate an increasingly elaborate stage show, drawing on his experience running Chicago’s Steppenwolf theatre. We see his family silently bear the burden of his prolonged absences; they miss him but recognize his time away as tours of duty. We realize Sinise and co. aren’t ego strokers reading a PSA script for a check, whipping up crocodile tears over the ozone layer so they can lecture flyover country and feel morally superior. They’re hard-working entertainers willing to put their lives on hold and travel to war zones all to display their gratitude to our servicemen and women.

Aside from the warm fuzzies it’ll put in your heart, For the Common Good is an entertaining and exhaustive documentary. We’re treated to a brief history of the USO, Gary’s young introduction to both music and acting, musical numbers by the Lt. Dan Band switching seamlessly from one concert’s footage to the next, and plenty of interviews with soldiers and veterans. We get to meet members of the band as well, and it becomes rather apparent why Kimo and Gary gravitated toward each other; both are natural storytellers and performers. One of the film’s highlights is Kimo revealing how he almost got shot playing a concert (while still a soldier) at a fire base in Vietnam. Other notable sequences include a view and discussion of the inside of one of Saddam Hussein’s mansions, a “Snowball Express” concert for the children and other family members of deployed soldiers, and a few cameos from other celebrities such as John Ratzenburger, Robert Duvall, Gary Cole, and Jon Voight.

The film’s title comes from an Abraham Lincoln quote that perfectly sums up its themes: “Honor to the Soldier and Sailor everywhere, who bravely bears his country’s cause. Honor also the citizen who cares for his brother in the field, and serves, as best he can, the same cause. Honor to him, who braves for the common good.” In any other context, I know the phrase “for the common good” would cause many here to blow a gasket over its collectivist implications, but in this documentary we see the concept in its noblest form. Our soldiers sacrifice themselves not to prop up dependents but to protect independence, and we see how one man’s thankfulness for that protection plays its own part in carrying our troops forward in their mission.

Lt. Dan Band: For the Common Good is available through On Demand nationwide, or  you can view the film directly through its website.

This is NOT a propaganda piece – Jaker shows just how difficult the job of counterinsurgency is, and how successful and rewarding it can be. The 1st Battalion 5th Marine Regiment’s Regimental Combat Team 3, the 1st Combat Engineer Battalion, Combat Logistics Battalion 8 and the unit’s highly motivated civil affairs teams took over Patrol Base Jaker in the almost deserted Taliban controlled town of Nawa-l-Brakzayi in Helmand Province. The British unit that was relieved had been so under manned that they had to over depend on air support that sometimes killed and wounded local civilians.

Enter Jaker’s commanding officer Colonel William McCollough, a scholar-warrior of the best type who commands through example, intelligence and understanding. McCollough’s officers, NCO’s and enlisted personnel not only push back the Taliban from Nawa but implement a large number of successful civil affairs missions, ranging from rebuilding and resupplying local schools, clearing irrigation ditches and providing wheat seed to replace the poppies that help fund the Taliban. They also reinvigorate the abandoned market place, gradually getting the locals to bringing back almost 80 merchants and do their best to help reform the corrupt local governmental hierarchy and police. This is a film about gaining trust, one uneasy step at a time.

It’s a huge job, but the Marines of Patrol Base Jaker are more than up to it thanks to civil affairs professionals like Gus Biggio, who gave up a successful career on Wall Street to serve his country. The success in Nawa is in a big part due to getting to know and understand the local Afghani people, who grow poppies and let their son’s fight for the Taliban, because they’ll wind up dead if they don’t. Afghani governmental and police corruption is not shied away from. McCollough and his officers listen to the complaints and observe the locals confront Afghani officials right on camera.

One of the film’s biggest strengths is that the viewer gets to know average Afghanis, young and old as real people, in many ways vastly different from us, but still wanting peace, education and self determination. School kids and parents yearn for the reopening of the first school and merchants and farmers are anxious to get back to their trades. Even local tribal leaders are shown now not afraid to stand up and speak their minds in public, gradually coming to trust the Americans, not as conquerors but as allies. The Marines in Nawa are not trying to turn these Afghanis into Americans they’re just trying to give them a chance to live their normal lives.

The successes in Nawa didn’t come without a bloody price tag, during filming four Marines, including a highly regarded 34-year-old NCO and recent first time father lost their lives trying to bring peace to the region. One of the most affecting scenes is the ceremony honoring that sergeant with members of the battalion in formation as his helmet is place a top his M-4 carbine commemorating his sacrifice. David Scantling’s Patrol Base Jaker captures the spirit, intelligence and compassion of the modern American fighting man, whose contributions are not always won at the end of the muzzle of a weapon, but often with a bulldozer and a school book.

Mitty Griffis Mirrer’s Gold Star Children is an inspiring look at how the children of service men and women killed in Iraq and Afghanistan are coping with their losses. And it is told through the eyes and words of many of those children and surviving parents including Ms. Mirrer, who lost her own father in Vietnam when she was only 16 hours old. Mirrer doesn’t appear to have any previous film credits, but this film is not only as professional as any top PBS documentary, but also so emotional that hardly anyone in the audience could back a tear or two, myself included.

The spouses and kids of Gold Star children aren’t blaming the U.S. Government for their losses. They are all incredibly proud of their parents or spouses service and are learning to cope through a wonderful mentoring program called TAPS, the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors. At TAPS older children and adults who have lost loved ones go through extensive training to help the younger kids deal with the loss in a positive fashion. In the process the adults learn as much from the kids as the kids do from the adults. The maturity and decency of the youngest surviving family members is incredible to see. Nine-year-olds talk openly about how they are dealing with dad or mom’s death while mothers strive to regain a positive sense of normalcy for their children. Mirrer has captured the children and adults of TAPS on camera in a poignant and compassionate style that was not easy to accomplish.

One dignified Hispanic-American mother tells how as a child she lost her father in Vietnam and now has to deal with the death of her officer husband in Afghanistan. She has two bright and decent teenaged boys who are a true tribute to their dad’s memory and the family works with each other one day at a time in a fitting memory to a loving husband and father.

Gold Star kids are brought to the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington to help clean it and are then told the stories behind some of the 50,000 names chiseled there. During the annual Rolling Thunder biker rally of Vietnam Vets these tough looking former soldiers, Marines, sailors and airmen are shown giving kids rides on their bikes and talking with them quietly about their own war time friends and experiences. One nine-year-old girl from Texas trains and then runs a children’s TAPS marathon as a tribute to her late father, learning about, while also teaching others, how to deal with the loss while on her own emotional journey.

The quietly gripping content of this film that director Mirrer so deftly gives to her audience makes any one viewing it feel sadness, pride and wonder, all at the same time, at how everyone from grownups to three-year-olds are dealing with their grief. This is not a film that is easy to explain, it is far more a film that has to be felt. Gold Star Children should be mandatory viewing for all high school students so they can see just how real the phrase “Freedom isn’t free,” truly is.

War’s casualties have never felt more cruel.

Tim Hetherington, always a seeker of truth, was killed yesterday while covering the conflict in Misrata, Libya. Chris Hondros, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated photographer was also killed. Two other photographers, Guy Martin and Chris Brown, were injured. There is always an understanding of (and no way to prepare for) the possibility that those who follow their mission into the war zone may not make it back alive. Unfortunately it is a given that comes with the territory. There is even less inclination to prepare for the possibility that someone who is in that war zone not as a soldier, but as a journalist, will be among the fallen.

News of Tim’s death first came via Facebook. (It was an honor to be one of the 1,197 friends that stayed in touch with Tim and his work on Facebook, where he was sometimes known as ‘The Timinator.’) It was here that his friend and fellow photographer in Libya, André Liohn, posted the news that no one ever wants to read. As has become my habit with breaking news, I checked Twitter for the latest update. The last tweet on his Twitter account was posted on Tuesday and read “In besieged Libyan city of Misrata. Indiscriminate shelling by Qaddafi forces. No sign of NATO.”

I’m sure that Tim and I had differing opinions of this ongoing series of wars in our life. I don’t mean this in terms of “pro” or “con.” I mean this in terms of how we based our opinions, whatever they were. How could we not? Our very understandings of the war(s) were vastly differently-informed. He was there and I was not. These wars that filled our headlines were wars that he saw and breathed… But then again, for 93 minutes, sitting in the darkened cinema, I had the opportunity to see and breathe the Korengal Valley as if I were there. Tim would say that his goal was to take an audience to a remote place that they could never get to without his help. And so he did, bravely. He and Sebastian Junger had the vision to step aside from the center of the story and let the camera capture simply what was. It was a bold idea that inspired many viewers to take a closer look at a war they thought they knew. More importantly, it allowed people to see up-close the lives of the actual soldiers that fight our wars. In doing so, the film gave audiences a deeper understanding of what is asked of soldiers in a time of war, and what responsibilities we have to them.

Here’s a short installation piece Tim made that is a precursor/supplement to Restrepo, titled Sleeping Soldiers — (2009) Camera + Directed by Tim Hetherington, Edit + Sound design by Magali Charrier.
(In Tim’s own words): “The work was made in 2007-8 while I was following a platoon of US Airborne Infantry based in the Korengal Valley of Eastern Afghanistan. This is a single screen version of the original 3-screen installation that was first show in New York in 2009 (the original 3-screen version was designed as an immerisve installation, and not for the small screen).”

Sleeping Soldiers_single screen (2009) from Tim Hetherington on Vimeo.

Yesterday, the Hetherington family released a statement saying, “It is with great sadness we learned that our son and brother photographer and filmmaker Tim Hetherington was killed today in Misrata, Libya by a rocket-propelled grenade. Tim will be remembered for his amazing images and for the documentary Restrepo which he co-produced with his friend Sebastian Junger. That film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2011. Tim was in Libya to continue his ongoing multimedia project to highlight humanitarian issues during time of war and conflict. He will be forever missed.”

Here was Tim’s last message posted on his Facebook page (written the day after the Academy Awards):
“I’m particularly proud of my ‘community’ – people who dedicate their lives to inform us about world despite the difficulties, dangers, and criticisms inherent in making such communication. You all rock. Thanks too to those who let us intrude into their lives. Finally, thanks to my friends, family, and colleagues for the support over the years and for putting up with me – I love you all. And now I guess it’s forwards.”

No, Tim, it is us who are proud — proud to have known you, and proud of your noble dream to record and share the truth in all of its complexity… and even its simplicity.

This article originally appeared at Parcbench.

An informative and intelligent discussion that desperately needed to be had outside the world of the news media and inside Maher’s world — the world of popular culture.

The most telling moment here is the audience reaction after Maher pulls no punches and says the following: 

“What it comes down to, is that there is one religion in the world that kills you when you disagree with them. And they say, ‘Look, we are a religion of peace, and if you disagree, we’ll cut your fucking head off.’”

The studio audience … applauds.

In the past, whenever Maher’s brought this truth up in this way, his audience has audibly gasped as the silent tension became thick and immediate. At this point, Maher was always on his own as his guests shifted uncomfortably in their chairs and the audience gulped for air to fight off a case of the PC vapors.

To his credit, though, Maher keeps on keeping on, keeps making this case and telling this truth as he sees it, and it appears now as though it’s finally penetrating.

Don’t get me wrong, Maher’s still Maher, but he’s righteous on this one — not only on the issue itself, but in his refusal to have his free speech rights cowed and shamed into silence by the PC fascists that infest his world on the Left. 

Better yet, if last night’s audience is any kind of indicator — and I think it is — he’s winning this debate.

Over to you, Jon Stewart…!

His current anti-soldier hit piece, The Kill Team, is about a group of disgraceful scumbags in Afghanistan who decided to murder several civilians.  With it, Boal seems to be following his tried and true formula – write something for publication in a past-its-prime magazine that makes American troops look like cro-magnons then work to turn it into a movie.  He took a Playboy article on Americans murdering each other and soon we had In the Valley of Elah.  You may have seen it – though the odds are stacked against it.  It was ignored by popular demand.

Another article, this one on bomb disposal experts, became The Hurt Locker, which took some of the bravest and most dedicated people in our armed forces and made them out as undisciplined, drunken, unprofessional clowns.  In fact, Boal got sued by one of the guys he allegedly wrote about.  To be fair, it did win an Academy Award . . . from the same band of geniuses who passed over Saving Private Ryan in favor of Shakespeare In Love and once picked as “Best Song” the unforgettable hit “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp.”  So, there’s that.

Boal’s technique is to chronicle the most degenerate fringes of the warfighters’ experience and repackage the most sordid episodes as its totality.  One can easily imagine the Rolling Stone editors eager for the chance to please their dwindling audience of aging Garfunkel-digging hippies and Chomsky-devouring clove-smokers with another prejudice-reinforcing piece about how those Middle-American Army guys are barely one step above gorillas.  Rolling Stone even promises a glimpse at the grim photos the mean old Pentagon doesn’t want you to see – as if there was some moral imperative for the military to provide gist for the jihadi propaganda mill.  Hey, that’s Boal and Rolling Stones’ job!

What is particularly cunning in his approach is that there is no excuse for the crimes these savages committed, and Boal uses this fact to deflect any kind of perspective.  Hundreds of thousands of young, heavily-armed and stressed American men and women have served overseas since 9/11.  Several dozen have murdered people.  You won’t find any city in America with a murder rate like that for that demographic. 

Michael Yon, who has embedded with the unit involved, sums up his feelings in the title of his response: “Calling BULLSHIT on ‘Rolling Stone’”.  Unlike the chaotic rabble Boal imagines, the unit Yon embedded with was squared away and effective.  Yon’s critique of the story is devastating and deserves a close read.  And Yon knows what he is talking about; in contrast, when Boal makes obvious errors, like referring to a battalion commander as the “battalion chief,” he self-identifies as a poser.   

For his part, Boal chooses to focus on one squad out of dozens, a handful of losers out of several thousand in a Stryker brigade, and to subtly extrapolate that the entire brigade was on some sort of rampage.  His article contains lots of hints about a greater, grander conspiracy, but offers nothing like convincing evidence to anyone familiar with either the law or the military.  In fact, it was the Army that investigated every aspect of the case.  The murderers are going to jail for decades, yet he leaves the impression that there was some sort of collective shrug of the shoulders on the part of the Army – despite the fact that the Army uncovered, investigated and prosecuted the case long before ace reporter Mark Boal appeared on the scene with Final Draft loaded on his iPad.

What’s missing from Boal’s article is the usual implication that these murders are simply a manifestation of some sort of malignant wink and nod from the very highest echelons of power.  Of course, with the Bu$Hitler/Cheney-satan cabal out of power, instead of the evil originating in the Halliburton-spawned machinations of the neo-con White House, today it simply bubbles up from the poisonous minds of those poor, benighted Americans unfortunate enough not to be born in New York City and who enlist for the sole purpose of living out their homicidal fantasies.  Boal’s nothing if not fully in tune with the expectations of his Hollywood masters.

Of course, there’s plenty of innuendo in there about the officer corps too; if he’s going to sell the screenplay, he needs some villains and the killers themselves are already slotted as the designated victims of a murderous American culture.  Boal describes ominously how the brigade commander, a decorated colonel, has critiqued the current counter-insurgency strategy.  Now, being part of the liberal media establishment, Boal is probably not used to the idea of diversity of thought.  Since he and all his friends think exactly alike, he probably can’t conceive that within the military community and its many professional journals there is a healthy and invaluable debate about the best way to fight a guerrilla war. 

The fact is that an infantry squad leader – the toughest job in the Army and one that should only be entrusted to leaders of the highest moral caliber – appears to have carefully surrounded himself with a small collection of thugs and weak-willed pawns and lived out his sick fantasies in a combat zone.  He is a disgrace to every NCO who ever wore stripes.  He and his band of misfits did their best to exploit the understandable and justified leeway given to troops in a hostile fire zone to hide their crimes.  Boal seems to see this tragedy as his next film credit; unfortunately, the American men and women in Afghanistan will be paying the price for these criminals’ actions – amplified by Boal’s breathless reporting – for a long time. 

The real story of American warriors in Afghanistan is one of courage and compassion, of bravery in the face of almost overwhelming challenges.  You won’t see that in Boal’s article or his movies.  The truth is off-message.  The truth doesn’t pay.

Let me share a story from Desert Storm 20 years ago that sums up the truth about American soldiers.  The ground war had just started and I had to go out to a field hospital in the middle of the desert to take care of some business.  I was in a tent with a young specialist who had – as American troops will do – decked it out pretty nicely.  Among his amenities, he had a small fridge packed with sodas running off a generator. 

There was an announcement that a Blackhawk was inbound with a lightly wounded Iraqi prisoner – the big, bad Army sent a crew in a multi-million dollar chopper forward to pick up an enemy with a minor injury to take him to an American hospital for treatment.  The specialist thought for a moment, went into his fridge and grabbed a Coke.  Then he looked at me and said, “Do you think he’d want one of these?”

That’s an American fighting man – an unequalled warrior in battle yet compassionate and kind when the shooting stops.  I’ve seen it.  Millions of other vets have seen it.  Millions of civilians all over the world have seen it – in fact, they are seeing it as we speak.  But we won’t see that in Boal’s next opus.  Boal knows what sells in Hollywood, and it sure as hell isn’t the truth.

—–

This is a bad film, both in its execution and its intent.  As a lawyer, it insults my intelligence.  As a veteran, it insults my professionalism.  As an audience member, it failed me as a film.  Pat Tillman, first seen in footage sitting nearly silently in a studio, begins the film as a cipher and ends as a cipher.  I know little more about the man or his motivations than I did coming in.  All I know is that I could not wait for it to be over.

This over-praised documentary is based on the premise that there was an enormous, mysterious conspiracy surrounding the death of Pat Tillman, which is a problem for the filmmaker since it is clear there is no giant, mysterious conspiracy surrounding the death of Pat Tillman.  The filmmakers cannot explain who conspired, or what they conspired to do.  Was there a cover-up?  Of what?  The film desperately wants there to be one, as does the family – perhaps that would give them the story the producers need and generate the meaning the family wants.  But, as the film demonstrates beyond all reasonable doubt, there isn’t one.  This is a story of mistakes, not malice.

Pat Tillman died in a tragic battlefield accident.  That happens – young men, powerful weapons, and “the fog of war” all combine to make fratricide a terrible and ever-present reality of infantry combat.  I know nothing about the circumstances of Tillman’s death other than what the film showed (including several instances where the camera focused on Army investigation documents that revealed information the filmmakers did not highlight).  But what the film shows makes it clear that there are no “unanswered questions.” 

Since the film presumes to stand on its own I have taken it at its word and report only what the film and its accompanying publicity materials show.  There is plenty of speculation out there in cyberspace, most of it numbingly stupid, and there are at least two Army investigations, one which recognized the failure to initially get the family accurate information about the circumstances of Tillman’s death.

The film reports that Tillman’s patrol was ordered split into two elements so one element could recover a broken vehicle.  Whether this was a tactically sound decision is unclear – none of the officers in the chain of command were interviewed, though a private states he did not like the order.  In any case, Tillman’s element went first through a canyon.  The second followed.  Tillman’s element heard explosions and firing from back in the canyon.  Tillman led his team (accompanied by a friendly Afghan militia fighter) up a steep hill to go back and assist, even asking to drop his body armor so he could go faster (The squad leader denied his request).

At the crest of the hill, a hummer from the second element saw Tillman’s team and misidentified them.  They fired, killing the Afghan militia fighter.  Tillman attempted to stop the fire by standing up and shouting.  He was hit in the head, apparently by machine gun rounds if the film is to be believed, and was killed.  It is unclear whether the vehicle was moving or stopped at the time, or if the shooters had dismounted.

Those are the sad facts of the incident itself.  However, the early confusion over what happened out there on that remote battlefield sparked the entire conspiracy meme.  Initially, the family was told Tillman died heroically charging the enemy.  Tillman was issued a Silver Star almost immediately.  Then, about a month later, but after a memorial ceremony where Tillman’s heroism was praised, they were told he was killed by friendly fire.  This demonstrates why it is so critical not to discuss such matters until all the facts are absolutely clear and documented – that is the least America owes the families of the fallen.

There’s a truism among soldiers – repeated in the film during an interview with a general punished for his part in the initial confusion – that the first reports are always wrong.  They were here.  And it is understandable why.  Tillman was charging toward what he thought to be the enemy.  He did die bravely even if as the result of a tragic mistake.  Apparently the producers never played “Telephone” as kids; they can either not understand, or not accept, that things in the real world could get screwed up between Khost and California.

In fact, that same assumption of malice applies to everything in The Tillman Story.  Each and every fact is sinister.  Each and every fact is evidence of a conspiracy.  One of Tillman’s team members is assigned to fly back with the body but is told not to discuss the circumstances of the incident (which was still being investigated) with the family.  Is this a reasonable precaution to avoid passing potentially bad information to the family (especially with this particular team member, a smarmy little creep who the filmmakers note later went AWOL), or part of a plot?  After a month, Army officers inform the family that there is reason to believe it was fratricide.  Is this an attempt to, perhaps, tell the family what happened, or part of a plot?  The father sends an obscenity-laced letter to the Army regarding the initially mistake, so the Army initiates a second investigation (which would find at least one general officer culpable).  A reasonable reaction to the family’s concerns, or part of a plot?

In The Tillman Story, it’s all part of a plot.

And the innuendo runs fast and furious.  A memo circulates to various headquarters indicating the possibility that it was a fratricide incident, but the filmmakers assume that every general reads and digests every single memorandum that comes through their thousand soldier headquarters.  That a bunch of them, and Donald Rumsfeld, cannot precisely testify before a Congressional committee as to the exact date they first read the memo becomes the most damning evidence of all in the eyes of these credulous documentarians. 

This movie was, frankly, nearly too stupid to endure.  To my right sat a short man who I think was a modestly successful actor (I won’t name him since I can’t be sure) nodding feverishly and making little noises of agreement with each of the film’s unsupported assertions and at all of its clichéd images.  (Don’t get me started on the hackneyed, unlistenable old Neil Young tune “Hawks and Doves” that closes the movie).

Naturally, there was ominous footage of President Bush, who was apparently somehow in on it.  Now, he did not say that Tillman was killed by the enemy when discussing Tillman’s death.  Apparently, telling the truth was even worse and somehow more supportive of the giant lie than, well, not telling the truth would have been.  Oh, and there is footage of Karl Rove as well, who is daring to smile at the Washington Correspondent’s dinner.  The sort-of star to my right nearly climaxed when the Architect showed up on screen – if I was nicer I would have offered him a cigarette.

What’s particularly annoying, besides the fact that – as the guy on my right proved – the filmmakers correctly believe that all they need to do to get their critical hosannas is flash a shot of one of the designated villains to make their case, is that they think their audience is so stupid.  For example, they discuss how there is supposedly no evidence of any ambush against the second element at all even as the camera pans over witness statements where one of the Rangers states that he saw Taliban and witnessed muzzle flashes.  Sorry, guys, but it’s still evidence even if you don’t like what it proves.

The filmmakers assert that Tillman’s legacy has been hijacked by evil neoconservatives who have tried to make him a symbol of the Global War on Terror, but in reality they are the ones enlisting Tillman’s memory in support of their own incoherent agenda.  What’s clear is that the last thing they want is Tillman’s actions or words speaking for themselves. 

They claim that Tillman refused to speak of his motives for joining the military, but they then dismiss as some sort of invasion of Tillman’s privacy the taped interview Tillman gave on September 12, 2001 in which he expressed admiration for American fighting men and expressed concern that he himself was not making any contribution (he enlisted a few months later). They note (twice) that Tillman read at least one book by the inexorable Noam Chomsky, as if that made him a convert to Chomsky’s dictator-loving leftist idiocy any more than his study of the Bible and other religious works meant he believed in God, which he allegedly did not.  They portray him as alienated by the “illegal” war in Iraq, yet even after allegedly being offered a chance to get out of his enlistment early to return to the NFL he instead chose to accompany his battalion on the fateful deployment to Afghanistan.  Even in death, Tillman refuses to conform to others’ expectations – especially those of these agenda documentarians.

While the film fails to make Tillman’s motives or his character clear, but what is clear is that the Tillman family is devastated by Pat’s death.  You cannot see them without your heart going out to them.  It’s horrible enough to lose a son or a brother, but to have it happen because of such a stupid, avoidable screw-up makes it doubly painful.  The Tillmans’ constant refrain is that they are looking for answers, and it is clear they are.  However, it is not clear what kind of answer they seek.  The film does not answer the question – the family picks to pieces every bit of information they get, alternately complaining that the Army has not given them enough information then, after receiving a box of materials including witness statements photos, videos and forensic reports, declare that the Army must be trying to hide the facts by drowning them in information.  

The film takes a moment to play an interview of an Army colonel who investigated the case speculating that the source of the Tillman family’s inability to be satisfied is their rather militant atheism (At Tillman’s memorial, Tillman’s younger brother, beer in hand, launched an obscenity-fueled tirade against speakers like John McCain who referred to Pat being in the hands of “a loving God.”).  The filmmakers clearly expect their audience to roll their eyes at the colonel’s notion that without the comfort of religious faith the family members are seeking to satisfy their natural human need to understand Pat’s death via their endless “investigation” – here, the pseudo-star’s peepers nearly did a somersault.  But, frankly, and meaning no disrespect to the family, the colonel’s comments ring truer than anything else in the film except Pat’s own words about 9/11. 

Sadly, one legacy of the Tillman incident, according to some, is a reluctance by the military to issue decorations to recognize military heroes in order to avoid even the remotest chance of another embarrassment.  If true, that would be a terrible disservice to a brave American.  The filmmakers can say what they want, but Pat Tillman still chose to leave the NFL to join the Rangers.  He chose to go to Airborne School and Ranger School.  He chose to charge up that hill, and he chose to try and stop the friendly fire toward his men. 

His actions speak louder than any confused , twisted characterization by these documentarians.  His actions also speak louder than any characterization I might give them.  Tillman’s actions speak for themselves, and the one thing the movie does affirm is what we all already knew — that Airborne Ranger Corporal Pat Tillman probably would have wanted it that way.

Pat Tillman left one of the most sought after jobs on Earth as a star in the NFL to join the Army and volunteer as a Ranger. It was a noble, patriotic and selfless act that deserves to be his legacy. Unfortunately the circumstances surrounding his death get more attention than the sacrifice he made for this country. There is a movie coming out called “The Tillman Story” that seems to perpetuate some of the worst conspiracy theories about his death. It is important that we separate myths from reality. This piece will focus on the circumstances of the incident and the immediate reaction from the military in the weeks that followed.

Pat Tillman’s death in Afghanistan in 2004 was a tragic accident and resulted from fratricide. He was shot by members of his own unit who failed to identify an Afghan soldier and Tillman as friendlies. There are those who want to cast doubt on that and claim that there was a crime committed and that Tillman was murdered, but there is simply nothing in the evidence available that points to that. I have read hundreds of pages from the multiple investigations of the incident and there is simply no way to get that many people to tell almost exactly the same story of how the incident unfolded.

Tillman was on a patrol when one of the vehicles broke down and they were attempting to tow it back to their base. During the course of that the patrol split into two groups. Tillman and serial one were to head back via one route and the broken vehicle and serial two were to rendezvous with a recovery vehicle via another. Serial one left and shortly thereafter serial two did as well. The civilian truck towing the broken vehicle stated that he was unable to traverse one section of the route and serial two then redirected to follow the same route as serial one. They were unable to convey this change to serial one due to the extreme terrain. The second group came under enemy fire during this movement and began to attempt to clear themselves from the ambush site by moving forward.

Tillman and the members of the first group also heard the fire and began to react. They exited their vehicles and Tillman spotted one of the sources of enemy fire. He asked permission to assault that position and when it was granted, moved out and began maneuvering and firing upon it. As he was doing this one of the vehicles from the second serial rounded a corner and observed an Afghan soldier who was with Tillman firing an AK-47. The light conditions prevented them from identifying him as a friendly, so based on the proximity to the ambush site, his weapon and a dark face they took him under fire. Multiple weapons systems from the vehicle engaged and killed him. During this Tillman and another American took cover behind a rock.

There was a lull in fire after the Afghan was killed and Tillman stood up to identify himself shouting “I’m Pat Fu**ing Tillman, why are you shooting?”. Unfortunately all the Rangers in the vehicle saw was another silhouette and a possible threat and they shot and killed him. Almost immediately after this the driver of the vehicle that had fired rounded a corner and saw the vehicles from Tillman’s group and began yelling for a cease fire because there were friendlies in the area.

They immediately learned that they had killed Tillman and the other allied soldier and in all of the statements they made this was noted. But there are several more items that are regularly brought up as “evidence of some sort of cover up.” The first is that Tillman’s uniform and body armor were burned several days after this. This was done mistakenly by personnel who believed that because the gear was covered in blood that it represented a bio hazard. Although this was not the case, by this point it was common knowledge that this was a friendly fire incident and that Tillman’s body armor had been hit by multiple rounds identified as US because of the green markings on the bullets. There was no attempt to hide this fact and there was an investigation into the incident underway.

Another point of contention was that it took 5 weeks to tell the family that this was fratricide. That was a failure by the command to properly understand the reporting procedures. They should have told them at the initial notification that it was believed to be friendly fire, but that investigations were still underway. Instead they waited for the investigation to give them positive confirmation and that caused the family concern and made them suspicious. They commenced an inquiry, helped by Sen. John McCain, and submitted a list of questions about the incident. I have seen the questions and answers and they leave no reason to believe it was not an accident or that there was a concerted effort to deceive them.

The other major issue surrounds the award of a Silver Star to Tillman for this event. It is often posited that this was to deflect from the fact that this was a friendly fire incident. While that may be true, CPL Tillman was leading his men on an assault of an enemy position when he was killed. He was attacking and leading from the front and that is why the award was submitted. Was there an element of “this is Pat Tillman” involved? Almost certainly, but the idea that this was simply part of a cover up is unfair. The speed with which the award was approved has also been questioned, but the Rangers had a policy of rapid response for posthumous valor awards so the families could be presented the medal at or before the funeral. There were numerous examples of this from the unit to validate that.

Anyone who volunteers for the military during wartime deserves our respect and our thanks. Someone who leaves comfort and riches behind to do so especially. Pat Tillman’s death was an unfortunate accident, but it was not a conspiracy to kill him or to cover up the fact that his own men pulled the triggers. He deserves to be remembered for the sacrifice he made as a patriot and a brave US Army Ranger.

What did he find?

Trash talk directed at bureaucrats.

Yeah, I know.

Here’s a fact: if someone followed me around for three weeks, they’d find far more worse. The storage container underneath my waterbed would put me away for life. Fact is, journos like me and those at Rolling Stone are so seedy, we could never survive the scrutiny we apply on others.

Simply put: Soldiers are better people than those who cover them.

But this writer followed the troops, who might as well be on Mars. That’s what Afghanistan is. A weird, scary place without decent cable. They don’t have time to worry about some slimy dickwad writer trying to ingratiate himself into their fold in order to get a damaging tidbit upon which to build a career. These soldiers deal with death. And that’s the irony. While those troops work like hell – in hell – to protect that writer from his own demise, he’s busy orchestrating theirs. How screwed is that?

And what did the writer find? Banter. Normal give and take between men. The kind of stuff you find between cops, troops, and yeah: editors. Everyone bad mouths the boss.

But, I guess the left hates manly conversation almost as much as they hate the military. They just don’t get it. And so, they use it to form their lazy narrative: that we’ve got another Vietnam on our hands. Of course we do, when we have so many writers saying we’ve got another Vietnam on our hands. They said the same thing about Iraq (we won), the Gulf War (we won), and if they had a time machine, they’d go back and say the same thing about WW2 (which, we won, I think).

And that leave us with Rolling Stone. the only thing it hates more than war, is winning one. They altered history last week – but not in the way they intended. That is: an end of courageous restraint.

Rolling Stone’s gotta hate this: we may win this war, because they wanted to lose it.

And if you disagree with me, you’re a racist homophobe who dated Jann Wenner.

Tonight we’ve got Joe Devito, Remi Spencer and Diana Falzone!