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[ezekielsdaughter]

No movies and no TV yesterday. During the day, I finished Generation Kill by Evan Wright. New Year’s evening, I watched two dvds: Traitor and part of the second year of Torchwood. 

 

In reconsidering Generation Kill, I realized that, in one sense, the chapters consist of one battle scene followed by another. 34 chapters of battles. In another real sense, that is not true. The chapters include brief but concise character studies of the men involved. Battles are interspersed with biographies of the participants. The author kept me turning pages even though I knew the end of the story (after seeing the HBO series) and despite the fact that I knew that the next chapter would be yet another fight through yet another Iraqi hamlet or town. I did have a little of the difficulty that I had with the HBO series. I could not keep the levels of hierarchy straight in the platoon. I knew that Colbert reported to Frick. However, I was constantly confused by Frick’s “upper management”. I think that his immediate supervisor was the person called Encino Man, however…. This is probably my issue as I have the same issue on a corporate level here. When former managers ask about managers here, I can’t report on anyone above my immediate level. If I don’t have to deal with them on a daily basis, they don’t exist.

 

When I was actively working on my novel, I tried reading books of battle strategy and tactics because Kai was to be on the edge of what was going on in the group. Every book that I found was dry and unusable because it was written from the inside. Even though this book is set in the wrong century (hah!), it’s a better writing tutor for me. The author is a reporter riding alongside soldiers. He has to have everything explained to him and some things he does not understand until much later. Despite this, much of his later enlightenment is incorporated into each chapter. That incorporation helps to prevent the possibility that this would read as one useless battle after another.  

 

Not that many of these battles weren’t stupid and useless. However, they were designed to be ‘useless’—that is—a feint. One wonders if the entire war wasn’t a feint by the Bush administration. I wouldn’t be the first to suggest that the war was a magic trick to divert us from their dismantlement of the Constitution. 

 

When I read creative non-fiction, I am always aware that I am viewing history through someone else’s window. The glass may be purposely foggy or warped. However, I enjoyed this book. I am hoping that the characters existed as portrayed. I am hoping that it’s true that some of the enlisted men worried that some of their battles were fought only to aggrandize their officers. It means that they were not robots obeying blindly. I am hoping that there are still officers are out there who oppose stupid orders and worry about another My Lai. I am ambivalent about the fact that so many intelligent people have such a need for risk that they were bored in camp and eager for battle. I’m glad that there is a place for them during wartime, but wish there was another outlet for that mindset. Neil Gaiman has a point about happy endings to stories. It’s always possible to have a happy ending if you know where to stop. Evan Wright’s book probably stops at the right place, even with the new Afterword. The majority of the soldiers are still alive. Some of them have left the military; others have been promoted. The HBO series has been made. I only hope that the rest make it home in the next year without too many nightmares awaiting them.