War is Still Hell: Reflections on “The Fog of War”
“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves…” — William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
One of the most impactful periods in my life was when I had the chance to study abroad in England during my sophomore year of college. While I always had an interest in politics and current affairs, that particular school year was formative in a way that previous years weren’t up until that point. The University of Reading, where I participated in my study abroad program, offered me the chance to connect with many other international students and learn more about the world in a handful of months than the entirety of my small-town existence up to that point.
During that year, I took a class called Modern International Relations that, unbeknownst to me at the time, would ultimately change my life and how I see the world. As part of our course, our class watched a thought-provoking 2003 documentary called The Fog of War which recounts the life of the now-late former US Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara. Fog of War serves as a timeless warning to the dangers of miscalculations in war, offers us poignant advice amidst growing tensions around the world, and calls us to to think more seriously about the remaining threat that nuclear weapons pose.
“Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War offered a prospect of utter misery and desolation.” — Tony Judt
When we learn about the World Wars in American history classrooms, it is usually from the vantage point of American victory and heroism. While the United States was fully engulfed in both the First and Second World War, it was from a distance. With the exception of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the full destruction of the war did not come to our shores. For Europe, however, there was complete devastation left and right throughout the continent.
In his highly-acclaimed book Postwar, historian Tony Judt recounts just how devastating the war truly was for Europeans. He tells us that: “Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War offered a prospect of utter misery and desolation.” World War II was a total war; it not only took the lives of millions of soldiers who fought in it on both sides, but it also claimed scores of civilians swept up in the middle of the conflict.
It is estimated that anywhere from 50 to 85 million people died as a result of the Second World War. That is more than the entire current populations of New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston combined and then doubled. The loss of human life during this period was on a scale that is almost unfathomable.
All of this considered, it makes the accomplishments of post-war Europe (Germany in particular) all the more astounding. International cooperation among western allies — partially due to the looming Soviet threat — spawned agreements on a scale unseen up to that point in human history. It is tempting to look back at this period of time and see these accomplishments as inevitable. It was far from so. From the ashes of post-war Europe, institutions like the United Nations and what would eventually become the European Union arose. While they are imperfect, they witness to the ability of human beings to bring hope out of hopelessness, meaning out of senselessness, and optimism out of despair.
Fast forward to over half a century later, the primary instigator of the Second World War is now one of the most prosperous, innovative places on the planet, and far from calling upon the gods of war, Germany is among the leaders of the free world trying to reign them in. For most of that same period over the past fifty plus years, the leader of that push toward peace and prosperity was the United States. So much so that many scholars refer to that period of time as the “American century.”
As is noted by almost every history of the western world, the past 100 years was the era of superpower struggle: the democratic-capitalist Anglo-American sphere against the Communist Soviet sphere. When this power struggle between heavyweights tipped in favor of the United States upon the collapse of the USSR, it seemed like a new age of peace and prosperity would emerge (and for a while, that seemed to be the case).
With hindsight, we now know better, but in the moment, it seemed less far-fetched. A shadow of terror was lifted off of the world and a new chapter in world history seemed to be turning. Most importantly, the specter of nuclear annihilation seemed to dissipate — except it didn’t and hasn’t, which is one of McNamara’s main points in The Fog of War.
In reference to the fall of the Soviet Union, former CIA Director James Woolsey warned the US Congress in 1990 that: “Yes, we have slain a large dragon, but we live now in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes. And in many ways, the dragon was easier to keep track of.”
One of the main sword-wielders in helping slay that proverbial dragon was Secretary Robert McNamara. Appointed by President John F. Kennedy, he would serve during the height of the Cold War and America’s involvement in Vietnam. The film goes through McNamara’s retellings of his rise in the US Army, his time at the Ford Motor Company, and his tenure as America’s defense chief.
One of the many reasons that Fog of War is captivating is that there are few examples where we get to hear from history-shapers and critical decision-makers in the context of them admitting their mistakes and offering the public lessons for humanity moving forward. Specifically, the film is divided into McNamara’s 11 lessons that he wants viewers to learn from which stem from his successes and failures. While there are several moments in the documentary that are heart-wrenching (most notably McNamara describing the US firebombing of Tokyo), we are able to better understand the reality of what war means — and why it should be avoided at all costs.
Perhaps McNamara’s most salient warning is that the threat of nuclear destruction still hangs over the head of humanity. McNamara points out that a handful of human beings wield the power to destroy the world several times over with weapons hundreds of times more powerful than the ones dropped over Hiroshima and Nagosaki. While seventeen years have passed since the release of the documentary, the same crucial fact still remains today.
At this very moment, one of the most grave threats of the new century is religious extremists and politically-motivated terrorists acquiring nuclear weapons in unstable regions of the world that could threaten millions of lives. In the hindsight of the conflicts in both Iraq and Afghanistan, this possibility can seem overstated. Nevertheless, the threat of nuclear war has not gone away, it has simply moved from the forefront of our collective worries. However, as tension points, political instability, and economic shock around the globe have flared up in the last decade, the present moment is one of the most dangerous in human history.
Fog of War reminds us that war is brutal, and as US General William Tecumseh Sherman once said, “War is hell.” Many viewers will not like that McNamara is unwilling to claim full responsibility for some of the moral catastrophes of the twentieth century that he had a hand in. This notwithstanding, his warning to us from beyond the grave should wake us up to the sober reality that just because the worst has not happened yet, doesn’t mean that it can’t or won’t. For that reason among others, this film should be a course staple for students of political science, international relations, and public policy.
As Covid-19 has shown the world, once a full-scale crisis emerges, the warning signs will seem obvious in hindsight. However, those signs tend to happen when we are distracted by more pressing concerns. This was true of a global pandemic, but hopefully it will not be so for nuclear warfare. As McNamara warns us in the film, there will be no learning period for understanding the consequences of a nuclear fallout. One miscalculation or wrong move, and entire nations could be destroyed in an instant. Despite progress towards disarmament, the threat of nuclear war — and global conflict more broadly — still looms large over humanity.
In Fog of War, McNamara pleads with us to learn from the lessons of the past in order to secure a more peaceful future. Even those in the highest ranks of the intelligentsia are not immune to human error and misinterpretations. Luck, he explains, was what averted nuclear disaster during the height of the Cold War. Next time, he cautions, we may not be so fortunate. We would do well to heed his warning, as the fate of the world quite literally hangs in the balance.
