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October 18, 2007
Meeting Resistance
UPDATE: Steven Vincent vs Molly Bingham: compare and contrast.
I saw a "video Op-Ed" at the NYT site, which was a prime example of trying so hard to be non-judgmental about nasty people that you squeeze yourself through your own asshole and out the other side. It is a 7-minute excerpt/spin-off from Meeting Resistance, a pro-insurgent piece of propaganda now playing in theaters around the world.
The short at the NYT site as of 6 PM EST is not loading - must be all the LGF and Hot Air readers checking it out. But you can also see it at Crooks and Liars. And here's the official trailer.
(There will be Q&A with the filmmakers after screenings of "Meeting Resistence" THIS WEEKEND in New York and Washington DC. More info at the end of this post. If you can make it, show up and, you know, ask questions.)
In addition to inserting tendentious quotes from unidentified 2007 polls into footage from 2004, these PR flacks for terrorists take the opportunity to fit in this week's wide misquoting of General Sanchez, demonstrating that - like the NYTimes - they didn't bother to read what Sanchez actually said. However, the Times plays this straight, presenting the video thus:
In a video Op-Ed by documentary filmmakers Molly Bingham and Steve Connors, Iraqis explain the roots of the insurgency.Well, to be precise, twelve self-identified Baghdadi insurgents explain what they want Bingham and Conners to tell America about what said insurgents want the roots of the insurgency to be, to justify themselves. After you enter the website, and are greeted by a breathless quote from Sidney Blumenthal and a list of all the awards the film has won, you can pass to the Director's Statement which explains that they filmed in one neighborhood of Baghdad and cherry-picked interviewees, yet in the same column they claim that their agenda-driven effort in one tiny corner of an extremely complex politically fluid country four years ago tells important "truths" about the entire war and its aftermath.
More lurid copy from the Synopsis:
What would you do if your country was invaded? MEETING RESISTANCE raises the veil of anonymity surrounding the Iraqi insurgency by meeting face to face with individuals who are passionately engaged in the struggle, and documenting for the very first time, the sentiments experienced and actions taken by a nation's citizens when their homeland is occupied. Voices that have previously not been heard, male and female, speak candidly about their motivations, hopes and goals, revealing a kaleidoscope of human perspectives. Featuring reflective, yet fervent conversations with active insurgents, MEETING RESISTANCE is the missing puzzle piece in understanding the Iraq war. Directed by Steve Connors and Molly Bingham, this daring, eye-opening film provides unique insight into the personal narratives of people involved in the resistance, exploding myth after myth about the war in Iraq and the Iraqis who participate. Through its unprecedented access to these clandestine groups, MEETING RESISTANCE focuses the spotlight on the "other side," leaving the viewer with clarity as to why the violence in Iraq continues to this day.
"Passionately." Terrorists are always passionate.
".... the sentiments experienced and actions taken by a nation's citizens when their homeland is occupied." (Twelve handpicked informants in a shitty part of Baghdad in 2003 = "a nation's citizenry" in 2007.)
"The missing puzzle piece." (As if insurgent motivation wasn't already widely disseminated, not to mention analysed in the COIN Manual.)
".... leaving the viewer with clarity as to why the violence in Iraq continues to this day." If the film doesn't show the agitation and financing from Iran, KSA and Al Qeda, or the Sunni-Shia conflicts, or the power vacuum filled by common gangsters, or the terror tactics of the insurgents against their fellow Iraqis who just want to raise their kids and earn a living - and neither the short nor the trailer mention any of these things - then no, "Meeting Resistance" is not going to enlighten you as to "why the violence in Iraq continues to this day."
Especially since Bingham and Connors tell us that they "drove out of Iraq on the long road to Amman, Jordan at the end of May 2004."
A lot has happened in Iraq since May 2004, three and a half years ago.
I sent the NYT link to LGF and Hot Air, both of which posted it. Allahpundit:
The Times, smartly, has chosen to title it “Know Thine Enemy” to reassure viewers where they stand vis-a-vis the insurgency. But let’s take them up on their offer: watch the clip and see if you know anything after seven minutes that you didn’t know before. Iraqi nationalists want to expel Americans from their soil? You don’t say.Actually, there is something I didn’t know. I didn’t know that Sunnis and Shiites lived in a magical realm of peace and friendship, dancing happily together in the streets of Iraq, before the foul stench of America descended upon the land. Remember last year when “civil war” became a Democratic talking point and people like Murtha assured us we were stuck in the middle of an ancient, intractable, and practically inevitable intrafaith conflict? All lies, apparently. Judging from this, the Sunni/Shiite tensions date to approximately April 2003. So I take it back: there is new information here.
No mention whatsoever of any change in Anbar province either, of course.
An LGF commenter makes a good point:
Keep in mind that recently in Iraq it is Iraqi journalists al-qaeda has been murdering. The nyt is so low that, despite this, they have continued to wantonly promote these killers of their own peers. I now have to question if there is anyone they wouldn't sell down the river to promote their hatred for America. I bet they'd sell out their own mothers.
Another commenter reports:
...Skimming through the channels about an hour ago (right after I watched the nyt traitor video), I came across the beginning of it being shown - in its entirety - on CNN. Michael Ware (of snipers-shooting-American-soldiers video fame) was providing the running commentary....
The Red Team - the official military "learn to think like the enemy" training group - has added "Meeting Resistance" to its library; the film was shown at the Marine Corps Base Quantico on January 30th 2007, the United States Institute of Peace, Washington DC, on Thursday, November 30th 2006, The Royal College of Defense Studies, London, UK, Tuesday, November 21st 2006, and at the United States Military Academy at Westpoint, on Monday, October 23rd 2006, and most recently to US Troops in Iraq:
This was the last in a series of films on insurgencies sponsored by the Red Team. Also in the series were classics of war and fighting insurgencies, like Gillo Pontecorvos' 1966 "The Battle of Algiers," the 2004 documentary "Control Room" about Al Jazeera, the Arabic satellite channel and the views it transmitted about the U.S. war in Iraq; it even screened a western, Fred Zinnemann's 1952 film "High Noon," about a sheriff trying to bring order to a lawless town whose citizens are too afraid to lift a finger to help him."We are literally the devil's advocate," said Red Team leader Lt. Col. Jeff Ragland. "It doesn't make you a popular guy, but it's a necessary thing."
Necessary, said Ragland, because defeating an insurgency is about more than killing the bad guys. "If we were to kill every insurgent tomorrow, would we win? If we don't do something to the motivation and the root cause, we're not likely to defeat it."
As a minor ingredient in the slew of contradictory and partial and constantly mutating information about Iraq which the Coalition has to parse, I am sure the film is useful, although not as useful as Bingham and Connors would like it to be. Those of us who won't be viewing "Meeting Resistance" within the context of professional counterinsurgency studies might like to view the film with questions in mind. So ....
As promised, screening times for NYC and Washington DC, where the directors will be taking questions after the show:
New York, NY
Cinema Village,
22 E 12th St, New York, NY 10003
Friday, October 19th -Thursday, October 25th
1:35pm, 3:25pm, 5:15pm, 7:20pm & 9:25pm daily
Q&A with producer Daniel J. Chalfen on Friday, October 19th following the 7:20 & 9:25pm showtimes.
Q&A with directors Steve Connors & Molly Bingham on Saturday, October 20th following the 5:15, 7:20 and 9:25pm showtimes.
And on Sunday, October 21st following the 5:15 & 7:20pm showtimes.
Washington, DC
AMC Loews Dupont Circle 5,
1350 19th St NW, Washington, DC 20036
Friday, October 19th -Thursday, October 25th
Friday, October 19th, 1:45pm, 4:30pm, 7:00pm, 9:00pm
Saturday October 20th 11:45pm 1:45pm, 4:30pm, 7:00pm, 9:00pm
Sunday October 21st 1:45pm, 4:30pm, 7:00pm
Monday October 22nd - Thursday October 25th 7:00pm & 9:00pm daily
Q&A with directors Steve Connors & Molly Bingham on Friday, October 19th following the 7:00 and 9:00pm showtimes.
And on Monday October 22 - Thursday October 25 at 7pm daily
Judith | 10/18/07 at 07:05 PM | Categories: - Iraq
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Comments
I may be misinformed, but last I heard there was an Iraq election, a legitimate government is in place, that government wants our military presence there. There is no "occupation." QED
Fred Beloit | October 19, 2007 07:48 AM
here's a comment i left at the belmont club:
Molly Bingham's claims for this film are pretty extraordinary, considering what a limited document it is, as Weiss points out. Twelve people three years ago?
Check out this essay by her from 2005, in which her prejudices are out in the open. Here's a sample:
I could go into a long litany of the ways in which the American military has treated journalists in Iraq. Recent actions indicate that the U.S. military will detain and/or kill any journalist who happens to be caught covering the Iraqi side of the militant resistance, and indeed a number of journalists have been killed by U.S. troops while working in Iraq. This behavior at the moment seems to be limited to journalists who also happen to be Arabs, or Arab-looking, but that is only a tangential story to what I’m telling you about here.
Persecution complex, anybody?
It gets even better. She's convinced that what she's done is tremendous work, the kind of thing every brave journalist should do. She realizes she's in a special position, being the daughter of a billionaire newspaper publisher and well established in her career, but:
How many other American journalists, perhaps not as secure in their position as I, have thought to do a story and decided that it’s too close to the bone, too questioning of the American government or its actions? How many times was the risk that our own government might come in and rifle through our apartment, our homes or take us away for questioning in front of our children a factor in our decision not to do a story?
I can taste my dinner. Maybe she spends too much time abroad.
This is after she's "had to acquire the discipline of overriding my emotional attachment to my country, and remember my sense of human values that transcend frontiers and ethnicity."
Uh huh. I'm sure it was real hard.
Do you recall that she was taken prisoner by the Iraqis during the early days of the war, and held at Abu Ghraib or some place like it? No one knew what had happened to her and several colleagues for a week or so. The Newsday guys she was working with were definitely in Abu Ghraib, where they could hear people being tortured, and they were in constant fear for their life. What the hell is this woman on, that she could have come so close to the real thing, and then say something like this:
At the time that we were working, the American military was the law, and it seemed to me that they were pretty much making it up as they went along. I was pretty sure that if they wanted to “disappear” us, rough us up or even send us for an all expenses paid vacation in Guantánamo for suspected al-Qaida connections, they could do so with very little, or even no recourse on our part.
Which makes it hard for me to take her seriously when she says, "our soldiers have been sent with insufficient resources to protect themselves. In my mind, that is all inexcusable." Would these be the same soldiers who would kill you if they knew you were "covering the Iraqi side," or send you away to Gitmo? I'm sure she really feels for them.
The film is a historical artifact at best. The attempt to turn it into a contemporary opinion piece is a fraud.
clazy | October 19, 2007 05:40 PM
