The Messenger and the Hidden Costs of War

Many Americans don't need a movie to appreciate the human toll that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have exacted on communities in this country. For those who do, there is The Messenger, Oren Moverman's haunting new film about a captain and a young staff sergeant working the army's "bereavement notification" beat, which requires them to go around the area near Fort Dix, NJ, knocking on the doors of relatives and spouses to inform them that one of their loved ones has been killed.

The movie isn't quite as artful as some bedazzled critics have made it out to be. Some of the dialogue is stilted; a couple of scenes seem overly scripted or forced. Still, in the course of two tightly compressed hours, The Messenger manages to offer something so much of the news coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has not: a glimpse into the shattered lives of the bereaved. We watch people's faces compress into grief as they realize their worst fear has come to pass. We hear them wail uncontrollably or sputter in rage. Although there is no gory war footage in the movie, the emotional weather hovers between uncomfortable and unbearable, as viewers take in the small scenes of devastation that have unfolded in countless living rooms and vestibules in recent years, yet remained largely hidden from view. The Messenger's director, Oren Moverman, is Israeli, and I wondered after seeing it whether part of what drew him to this subject was the creepiness of being in a country ‘at war' where so many citizens are completely insulated from its costs, something that wouldn't be possible if America, like Israel, had a draft.

The backdrop to The Messenger is, tellingly and predictably, Iraq: the bad, pointless, unwinnable war. Yet its timeliness owes to Afghanistan, where, on Friday, two more American servicemen were killed, meaning two more unwelcome visits paid by bereavement notification officers to parents or spouses somewhere. In the latest issue of the New York Review of Books, there is a short, poignant piece on Afghanistan by Garry Wills, who notes that one thousand soldiers were wounded there in the last three months alone. These soldiers are the lucky ones, not killed but merely injured, a travail conveyed with great force in The Messenger through the character of Will Montgomery, a staff sergeant who returns from Iraq a "hero," but with a severely damaged eye and badly fractured psyche that has him looking for ways to numb himself and escape.

Escalating the war in Afghanistan will vastly expand the ranks of soldiers consigned to this fate, which is why Garry Wills hopes Obama will end it, even if this deprives him of the opportunity to serve a second term. "I have great hopes for the Obama presidency... especially if he could have two terms," writes Wills. But, "If [pulling out] costs him his presidency, what other achievement can match it?... Presidents who just kick the can down the road are easy to come by. Lost lives and limbs are not."

Comments (36)

1. >>>"If [pulling out] costs him his presidency, what other achievement can match it?... Presidents who just kick the can down the road are easy to come by. Lost lives and limbs are not." <<<

   I guess Garry Wills has not been adversely affected by the 30 years of conservative rule since the Reagan revolution.

   For every family who had to bereave the loss of a loved one on this war started by Bush, there are "at least" a 100o more stories of those kicked out of mental institutions who have had fend for themselves as part of the homeless population, or countless that have died because of the lack of access to affordable healthcare, or dreams of college denied because of cuts in financial aid, or millions that have had their families torn apart by the prison-industrial-complex that is too quick to imprison black and Latino men for non-violent offenses.

   The HUMAN COSTS of conservative policies on the poor and middle class FAR outweighs the human toll of these two wars.

   This does NOT mean that these wars should not end as soon as possible, but it does mean that Obama is 100% correct to withdraw RESPONSIBLY so conservative opponents can't just bribe some Taliban operatives in Afghanistan's ungovernable regions to allow terrorists back in the country after we leave.

   If Garry Wills truly understood the EXTREMES the conservatives will engage in to regain power, he will join Obama and all "pragmatic progressives" in calling for a RESPONSIBLE withdrawal that does not put this country at risk of another terrorist attack.

   Posted by Metteyya at 11/15/2009 @ 12:23pm

2. posted by EYAL PRESS on 11/15/2009 @ 12:10pm

   If you find it creepy to live in a country where people are not "conscripted" (effectively enslaved) to kill and die in wars wherein the broad working population being conscripted had no real say in whether or not the wars should have started, then by all means, move to Israel.

   For my part, I think I'll hold it up as a fundamental part of our American freedoms, that I don't have to kill and die in a war or wars that I find to be wrongheaded or even evil.

   How many times have you written about the need to get out of Iraq? Out of Afghanistan? How the US should never have invaded Iraq? And yet you'd still prefer, based on your writing, that everyone in the US (or at least, every man) be faced with a real prospect of having to go to Iraq? Believe you me, the elites who make the decisions like the decision to invade Iraq - they and theirs will always be safe from conscription. We have an entire generation of born-rich draft evaders running the country right now. Conscription didn't stop the Vietnam war and it certainly didn't cost the elites much as most of them didn't have to serve. Bringing back conscription just takes away from working people the right to resist participating in wars that elites start, and normally for evil reasons or at least never in the interests of the broad working public in the US.

   Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 1:08pm

3. posted by EYAL PRESS on 11/15/2009 @ 12:10pm

   Likewise conscription, famously, has hardly stopped the barbaric Israeli nation from egregious and horrible acts of military violence outside of whatever borders it actually has. See "Gaza". See "Lebanon". See "West Bank".

   Perhaps if Israel, like America, didn't have a draft, there would be fewer soldiers bombing and shooting the civilian populations in the areas outside of the 1967 borders of Israel.

   Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 1:11pm

4. Blah, blah, blah.

   Another article to enable those who hate America and Israel to rant.

   Yes, Sy, we all know that you hate Jews and want the jihadists to have a glorious victory in Israel, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

   Posted by antisocialist at 11/15/2009 @ 1:51pm

5. Did anyone catch the promo for this movie on Colbert t'other night?

   Woody Harrelson got his head shaved while singing the national anthem to match Colbert's stunt while in Iraq in support of the troops (insert ideologically appropriate NaCl grain here).

   He and Colbert actually did a nice 2-part harmony and Woody obviously knew the words....whodathunkit?

   Posted by snowball777 at 11/15/2009 @ 2:27pm

6. osted by antisocialist at 11/15/2009 @ 1:51pm | ignore this person | warn this person

   Go ---- yourself. I will not be smeared as some sort of "anti-semite" by a racist, bigoted, hate-filled, deeply stupid and uninformed religious maniac like yourself. Christ, how can you stand being you? You're one of the most obnoxious toads who's ever visited this web site.

   Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 2:45pm

7. "Another article to enable those who hate America and Israel to rant"

   anyone who points out something unforgivable about american foreign policy must hate america.

   it's that simple in the mind of our resident asshole.

   Posted by darladoon at 11/15/2009 @ 3:19pm

8. This blog entry is like a dirty diamond. It is ridiculous in so many facets.

   It celebrates Obama's courage should he pull out of Afghanistan at the possible loss of a second term.

   It forgets that it was he who turned that war into a raging wildfire. During the campaign, Obama blew on its dying embers, denounced the Republicans for neglecting that theater, and promised to give Afghanistan all the resources it needed to drain that breeding ground of terror. It is Obama who reversed the Bush policy of idling there, i.e., doing the bare minimum to keep Kabul out of Taliban hands and minimizing casualties. It is Obama who stepped on the gas, increased our deployment from 35,000 to 68,000 men, put in his own tough general in charge, demanded a new aggressive strategy and got more casualties in six months than were suffered over the past six years. Now Wills and Press think it would be brave of Obama to defy the hawks and leave.

   Almost as absurd is Press's celebration of this movie which is pure propaganda. It is obviously easy for actors to respond with heartrending groans, or with stoic dignity, all depending on what effect the director is after. Were this our Civil War and the peace movement of that day, the Copperheads, made a film dramatizing the grief of families bemoaning the enormous casualties at Cold Harbor, Battle of the Wilderness, Gettysburg, would Press be so enchanted?

   The fact is, our casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan, together, have been extremely light. After 7 years they equal the casualties we suffered in just the first week of fighting on the beaches of Normandy in June 1944. Of course all deaths and maiming are a tragedy for the victims, but for a nation of 300 million, 5,000 deaths across seven years are insignificant.

   Posted by Pirovano at 11/15/2009 @ 6:51pm

9. The simple truth is that AQ has been virtually eliminated in Afghanistan.

   AQ was a tiny, primitively armed force of loosely associated Islamists harbored by the governments of Iran and Afghanistan.

   There are barely any AQ left in Afghanistan. Those AQ terrorists that escaped the American bombardment after 9/11 are being harbored by Iran, which sponsors over 384 individual AQ members including 22 senior leaders and which is funding them, and arming and training them (along with the Taliban) with explosives. The near entirety of AQ is in Iran, and the rest are located almost completely in Pakistan near the Afghan border.

   Afghanistan was the place that the people who attacked us on 9/11 hid in. It was too devastated to provide any serious military, technological, logistical, or financial support to the jihad. This is why the 9/11 hijackers ended up receiving assistance not from the Taliban that simply allowed them to do as they pleased, but from the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. AQ is only a tiny fraction of the Islamist movement. Islamic jihad is the broader threat to the West and America. The most active state sponsor of terror is (and has been for 30 years) the Islamic Republic of Iran. An invasion of Iran in 1979 would have prevented the Ayatollah from invading secular Iraq to export his jihadist revolution, an effort that killed at least a million people. It would have solved our Afghanistan problem as well, since the USSR would not have invaded it while we occupied its neighbor. More fundamentally, it would have crippled the jihadist movement when it was first starting out, and eliminated most of its military and financial support, both through deterrence and through destroying the state that would ultimately provide most of it. ...

   Posted by rightwingnutcase at 11/15/2009 @ 8:23pm

10. ... Eliminating this state support is crucial. As John David Lewis pointed out after 9/11, "the resources required to carry out the attack, especially training given the pilots, were on the scale of that available only to governments." Iran provides support other states never could. This is because most other Middle Eastern countries ruled by child molesters who rape 9-year-old girls, stone adulterers to death, exterminate gays, behead apostates, saw off the limbs of dissidents, and light people on fire for questioning the Supreme Leader were severely impoverished and rendered failed states before radical Islamists were able to conquer them (Afghanistan being the perfect example). However, Iran was a sophisticated, advanced country under the Shah, and remained so when the Mullahs overthrew him. One could argue that Iran is too advanced for its population to embrace the jihad as the state is not their only source of education, whereas the educational system of Afghanistan (not to mention Palestine) had to be altered so that it would no longer produce an endless stream of jihadists. This would be a good reason for the Afghan war. However, the government of Iran should have been destroyed along with the Taliban, as it is the primary sponsor of jihad. Iran and Afghanistan were the only countries whose governments were involved in 9/11. Of them, Iran was by far the greater threat to America, not least because the Taliban were radical nationalists who harbored anti-American terrorists but who did not believe personally in attacking the United States. ....

    Posted by rightwingnutcase at 11/15/2009 @ 8:24pm

11. Go ---- yourself. I will not be smeared as some sort of "anti-semite" by a racist, bigoted, hate-filled, deeply stupid and uninformed religious maniac like yourself. Christ, how can you stand being you? You're one of the most obnoxious toads who's ever visited this web site.

    Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 2:45pm

    The truth hurts, eh Sy?

    Posted by antisocialist at 11/15/2009 @ 8:24pm

12. ... . By contrast, the government of Iran has not only involved itself in the murder of thousands of Americans, it has attempted assassinations worldwide, tried to set up terrorist sleeper cells in Europe, and has chanted every Friday night hysterically over and over again the phrase "Death to America!" in order to express its desire to kill many more Americans. It is now developing nuclear weapons, and has threatened to use them on Israel. AQ was nearly obliterated after a few weeks of the Afghan war. Yet, our government has foiled dozens of terror attacks since 9/11 that nearly claimed the lives of thousands of Americans. Dozens of attacks have also been prevented in Europe. Yet, this threat cannot be from AQ. AQ is not the bogeyman we portray it as, but rather one former terrorist organization among many others. The clear solution to crippling the jihad is to take military action against Iran, which would also enable us to turn the tide in Afghanistan. This action would have to destroy the entire Iranian government, or else it would actually strengthen the support for jihad among the Iranian populace.

    Posted by rightwingnutcase at 11/15/2009 @ 8:25pm

13. Posted by antisocialist at 11/15/2009 @ 8:24pm | ignore this person | warn this person

    I don't know who the hell you think you are to address me like that. You are some random crank maniac on a web site. You do not know who I am, anything about me at all. What you are is an obnoxious and frankly weird toad who lives as far as I can tell on this web site day and night. You are also, frankly, a religious maniac, and a bigoted, hate-filled dope who fills mind with illusions about the world. Get a life, you tool. Who do you think you are to sit on this web site day after day making up bullshit insults about people?

    I mean, Christ. You are such. a. waste. of. space.

    I've avoided this site largely for at least a month now, in particular, the comments sections on the web log entries. I've avoided this site because it has some of the stupidest and most obnoxious, pointless commenters of any web site I frequent. People like you convince people like me that there really is no hope for a better civics and integrated sense of national community in the US via the internet. Really - why bother to have an integrated community when it is toads like you in need of the integration? Christ, shut off the internet already. It's just a swamp with people like you in it.

    Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 9:14pm

14. Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 9:14pm

    Start by switching to decaf.

    Posted by freiheit1 at 11/15/2009 @ 9:27pm

15. Guess this kind of movie is certainly a shit load easier to make than the Hidden Benefits of War....but for some reason, they always bomb....but addictive to the ideologues....like NYT, MSNBC, Time, etc...today!

    Posted by Happy at 11/15/2009 @ 9:28pm

16. There's lots of other downsides to perpetual anti-social religious-extremists wars apart from the immediate scars, disabilities, death, fundlessness and inevitable retribution cycles. One need only go to our emergency rooms on..., I was going to say on Friday and Saturday nights, but it seems like one can go any day of the week now and see what our increasingly violent society is willing to put up with on an out of control escalating ramp up to an insane ecstatically religious 2nd coming and going rapturous delusion.

    And much to amusing profitability of multinational corporations-- soon we'll all be wearing kevlar and armed to walk our pit bull.

    Posted by hsuBfools at 11/16/2009 @ 09:27am

17. Of course all deaths and maiming are a tragedy for the victims, but for a nation of 300 million, 5,000 deaths across seven years are insignificant.-----Posted by Pirovano at 11/15/2009 @ 6:51pm

    General Buck Turgidson advocates a further nuclear attack to prevent a Soviet response to General Ripper's attack--

    General "Buck" Turgidson: Mr. President, we are rapidly approaching a moment of truth both for ourselves as human beings and for the life of our nation. Now, truth is not always a pleasant thing. But it is necessary now to make a choice, to choose between two admittedly regrettable, but nevertheless *distinguishable*, postwar environments: one where you got twenty million people killed, and the other where you got a hundred and fifty million people killed.

    President Merkin Muffley: You're talking about mass murder, General, not war!

    General "Buck" Turgidson: Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed. But I do say no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops. Uh, depending on the breaks. ---"Dr. Strangelove"

    Posted by Mask at 11/16/2009 @ 11:07am

18. http://waltzwithbashir.com/

    Posted by ttr at 11/16/2009 @ 12:31pm

19. Poor leftists, they just can't get over the reality that our nations fighting forces are now ALL voluteer!

    What is even worse is Bush averted Islamic fascist terrorist attacks on our nation and our national intrests for 8 yrs., ousted a genicidal maniac, endowed a M.E. nation with liberty and freedom for all thier people, and was successful.

    Hate is such a negitive yet intrical aspect of leftist existence that they cannot even see the loathing they project towards this nation and its people. Oh well, at least they are as entertaining as the latest horror film.

    Posted by BigPasture at 11/16/2009 @ 6:14pm

20. "ousted a genicidal maniac"

    What about the genocidal maniacs in Zimbabwe, Sudan, North Korea, the Congo, Burma, and elsewhere?

    "endowed a M.E. nation with liberty and freedom for all thier people,"

    Both Afghanistan and Iraq are Islamic theocracies.

    Posted by rightwingnutcase at 11/16/2009 @ 8:50pm

21. What is even worse is Bush averted Islamic fascist terrorist attacks on our nation and our national intrests for 8 yrs.,

    Posted by BigPasture at 11/16/2009 @ 6:14pm | ignore this person | warn this person

    --ahem...ever heard of 9/11? that happened under W's watch.

    Posted by urmygyro at 11/16/2009 @ 10:17pm

22. --ahem...ever heard of 9/11? that happened under W's watch.

    Posted by urmygyro at 11/16/2009 @ 10:17pm

    WTC Bombing I was when?

    By your reasoning, the 10.2% (& still increasing) Unemployment is then, all Magic's fault.....I consider this a good trade on faults!

    Posted by Happy at 11/16/2009 @ 10:50pm

23. --ahem...ever heard of 9/11? that happened under W's watch.

    Posted by urmygyro at 11/16/2009 @ 10:17pm | ignore this person | warn this person

    so, a president is saddled with what happens within 8 months under his watch? Right? Who is that new idiot that oversaw the collapse of the American economy and has done nothing about it?

    Posted by BigPasture at 11/17/2009 @ 01:04am

24. Posted by BigPasture at 11/17/2009 @ 01:04am

    Which is it, RIO? Does Bush get the blame for 9/11 or not? Ergo, does Obama get the blame for the recession or not?

    You can't have it both ways.

    Posted by Mask at 11/17/2009 @ 07:33am

25. "The fact is, our casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan, together, have been extremely light. ......... Of course all deaths and maiming are a tragedy for the victims, but for a nation of 300 million, 5,000 deaths across seven years are insignificant."Posted by Pirovano at 11/15/2009 @ 6:51pm | ignore this person

    How very cavalier of you to just wave your hand and say the deaths are insignificant.

    The "deaths and maining" are more than a tragedy for the victims, but for their Mothers, Fathers, wives and children as well. Those "deaths and maiming" as you say are facts those families have to deal with everyday, 365 days a year. They go to sleep at night thinking about those "deaths and maining" and awake in the morning with the same reality. They don't have the luxury that you afford yourself of being able to wave your hand and exclaim that it is only "insignificant".

    Someday in the future, you too will meet your "death" and we still around can wave our hands and write you off as "insignificant", not because you died, but because you lived.

    Posted by COProgressive at 11/17/2009 @ 8:50pm

26. a shit load easier to make than the Hidden Benefits of War....Posted by Happy at 11/15/2009 @ 9:28pm | ignore this person

    And the hidden benefits of war would be what? Glory, Patriotism, love of flag, the sheer joy of killing another?

    "The commitment of our forces to this fight was done with a casualness and swagger that are the special province of those who have never had to execute these missions - or bury the results." - Major General Gregory Newbold USMC

    Posted by COProgressive at 11/17/2009 @ 8:56pm

27. Posted by syfriendly at 11/15/2009 @ 9:14pm | ignore this person | warn this person

    don't avoid these blogs, ignore, ignore and ignore.

    Posted by emile duBois at 11/18/2009 @ 12:03pm

28. Mask,

    You ask:

    "......Which is it, RIO? Does Bush get the blame for 9/11 or not? Ergo, does Obama get the blame for the recession or not? ................."

    The answer to question one is no, the Bush Administration was reviewing the approach that had been taken for years regarding combatting terror, to try and be more pro-active and productive at stopping it than the U.S. had been in the past. The August 6, 2001 memo did not tell anybody anything they did not already know.

    And the "wall" was still in place that meant law enforcement and intelligence agencies could not share information.

    The answer to your second question is that Obama will be blamed for the continuance of the recession and the ensuing inflation that many predict will be happening in a year or two. Obama came into office after the current economic problem hit and thus he did not cause the current economic problem to start......but his policiy is ensuring the continuance of the recession when recovery should have already begun and his policy is predicted to lead to inflation.

    Posted by sjchermak at 11/18/2009 @ 1:21pm

29. 'war started by Bush'

    Posted by Metteyya at 11/15/2009 @ 12:23pm

    Are you serious. The war on terror was started by Bush? Are you an American?

    The war on terror started long before GWB became President. The Iraq War was just a continuation of the first Gulf War. The war in Afghanistan is the result of the terrorist attacks on 9/11.

    Where do you get this crap from? Too much Olbermann and Matthews I think.

    Every life is precious. Not to diminish any loss of life in battle but in comparison to the battles waged in WWII, consider this. At the height of that war, we were losing 12,000 KIA's per day. PER DAY!

    Posted by gunslinger1 at 11/18/2009 @ 1:22pm

30. Eyal Press talks about the bereavement notification, that the military conducts when a soldier is killed.

    This is a part of the discussion of the movie "The Messenger", which offers a glimpse into the a glimpse into the shattered lives of those left behind.

    But it seems the whole cost of the war has not been discussed.

    We had been bearing the costs of war and it was decided this was not acceptable so we would fight to win the war and stop it, rather than let it continue.

    Since it is not mentioned in Eyal Press' article, I have to assume it is not included in the movie, but the U.S. Military I would think is not the only group that conducts berevement notification.

    I would think the FDNY, NYPD and Port Authority Police do that also, and they were quite busy after September 11, 2001.

    If one talks about war, one should talk about the entire war and why we are at war. Eyal Press does not.

    Posted by sjchermak at 11/18/2009 @ 1:31pm

31. Posted by sjchermak at 11/18/2009 @ 1:31pm

    Remember where you are. This a a radical left publication whose contributors follow the same philosophy, namely that America is the agressor and that the Jihadists are the ones fighting the good fight.

    Posted by gunslinger1 at 11/18/2009 @ 3:02pm

32. Remember where you are. This a a radical left publication whose contributors follow the same philosophy, namely that America is the agressor and that the Jihadists are the ones fighting the good fight.

    Posted by gunslinger1 at 11/18/2009 @ 3:02pm

    No this is not a redical let publication. You're a radical right winger in a center left forum. From where you stand, it feels like a radical departure, but then again, you probably think you're a moderate.

    Posted by Shingo at 11/18/2009 @ 4:39pm

33. The war on terror started long before GWB became President. The Iraq War was just a continuation of the first Gulf War. The war in Afghanistan is the result of the terrorist attacks on 9/11.

    Posted by gunslinger1 at 11/18/2009 @ 1:22pm

    The first Gulf War was started by the other Bush and the Afghanistan war was planned before 911.

    Posted by Shingo at 11/18/2009 @ 4:41pm

34. The answer to question one is no, the Bush Administration was reviewing the approach that had been taken for years regarding combatting terror, to try and be more pro-active and productive at stopping it than the U.S. had been in the past. The August 6, 2001 memo did not tell anybody anything they did not already know.

    Posted by sjchermak at 11/18/2009 @ 1:21pm

    This is all complete bunk of course.

    There was nothing pro active about going after Iran, who had never attacked us and posed no threat, while letting key AQ leaders get away in Afghanistan becasue the Bush administration took their eyes off the ball

    The Bush Administration was not reviewing the approach to combating terror. Before 911, they were not interested and ignored all warnings and advice given to them, becasue they were more concerned with giving tax breaks to the rich. The story that they were reviewing ways to combat terror came after it was revealed they ignored dozens of warnings about the impeding 911 attacks.

    The so called "wall" is another justification after the fact to pass the buck.

    Posted by Shingo at 11/18/2009 @ 4:46pm

35. We can just continue what we are doing now. We borrow the money to fight the wars and we spend trillions on a war effort that produces nothing of value...no food, energy, infastructure etc. The Russians tried that against us and they lost...big time. Osama is laughing as we spend our way to oblivion. He spent a couple hundred thousand to train pilots and we've spent 3 trillion countering him and we still failed. Who is winning? Them obviously. But we can be happy that we killed hundreds of thousands of "them" in our efforts. I love America but we sure do stoopid things.

    Posted by notsleepy at 11/18/2009 @ 9:44pm

36. Bin Laden has something we don't. a powerful idea, which makes people willing to commit suicide for.

    Posted by emile duBois at 11/19/2009 @ 09:37am