It is such a 'sanitized' version of
war 'as to make it unrecognizable for those of us who have been to war.'
-- Chris Hedges, author and journalist |
We are seeing myth, created narrative, not war
by Tom Roberts, editor of NCR
What we’re seeing on our evening newscasts is not war but “a giant commercial
for the U.S. military,” said Chris Hedges, The New York Times reporter
and former war correspondent.
I caught up with Hedges by
phone as he was heading for a Midwest airport. He is on the road constantly
these days, giving interviews and lectures, mostly on college campuses, based on
his book, WAR Is the Force that Gives Us Meaning (PublicAffairs, $23.)
The book, incidentally, is selling well and the interest in Hedges’ point of
view -- that patriotism is “often a thinly veiled form of collective celebration
of collective self-worship” and that war requires both a myth and a lie -- is
apparently also high despite the current war fervor. His book was the basis of a
cover story and interview in the Nov. 29 issue.
Though claiming not to be a
pacifist, but a realist and a reporter who has to “see the world as it is, not
as I want it to be,” Hedges is nonetheless unsparing in his critique of the
military and of the current war and of those who bring us reports of the war.
“We are not seeing war,” he
said in a phone interview yesterday. “We are seeing myth, created narrative.” It
is such a “sanitized” version of war “as to make it unrecognizable for those of
us who have been to war.”
What we get, he said, “is what
is palatable, and war is unpalatable.”
Even with all the embedded
journalists? Maybe we’ll get more of the real story when the journalists return
home?
Hedges, who was a war
correspondent for 15 years and covered conflicts from El Salvador to the Middle
East to Eastern Europe and the first Gulf War, said he thinks most journalists
feel restrained while in the field from reporting the most horrible aspects of
war. And when they get home, he said, they discover that no one really wants to
talk about what they’ve seen. In the news industry, he added, many “want to
believe the myth of war.”
Hedges also believes the
current war in Iraq “is completely unjustifiable,” in that Iraq is not an
imminent threat to the United States. He said pre-emptive war is a fundamental
breach of understanding that has existed among nations and international
organizations for decades.
Between speaking engagements
and his work for the Times, Hedges has completed another book, What
Every Person Should Know About War (Free Press), due out in June. It is a
reportorial project in which Hedges primarily uses military documents and
studies commissioned by the military to answer basic questions about the conduct
of war.
“The military has used science and technology to create a more efficient
killing machine, and I wrote about it,” he said. In the manuals and the studies,
he said, “you get quite a powerful dose of the horror that war is and what it is
they are trying to create and why.” |
