"manipulating the war"
...riotic. The government of the United States covers the true reasons for the war in Vietnam. As Myer’s shows us in Fallen Angels, most men in the war did not have their own reason for risking their lives each and every day. Many of the young draftees say they are fighting the spread of communism, yet few could give us the true motivator for the war. Richie Perry simply regurgitates a mixture of answers that he hears from comrades, “We either defend our country abroad...or fight in the streets of America.” The soldiers begin to fight for their own reasons, backed by their only concern. Survival. Even the enemy Vietcong fight not for communism, but for their independent freedom. They fight because they are invaded. Sergeant Simpson tells the news team this is why they are fighting, “...so the Vietnamese could do what the want.” Commanding officers and media pass on incredibly false casualty numbers that display board game war, won by numbers rather that combat. Jamal relays the false three enemy casualties marked down by Captain Stewart, instead of the factual solo kill. Perry gives us a pixel of the larger picture of guerilla warfare. Just as manipulation causes the war, who ever perfects in is granted the prize of life. Perry’s NCO’s use the land of the enemy against the natives of the country, setting ambushes, and killing everything, even that which they do not see. In the beginning Perry’s men kill to win the war, to keep a score of how their victories are decided, just like Captain Stewart tells them to, “...maximize the killing.” As battle forms soldiers into “animals”, they see that there is no winner in the war. The kamikaze that explodes herself and her child shows the platoon this fact of war. Battles are only test that let that lucky enter the next course. Commanding officers such as Captain Stewart are the chess players who give out these test to their pawns, giving no care to their advancement, but only for his recognition as an able and confident leader of his blind assassins. Captain Stewart volunteers h...