In The Fog of War Robert McNamara explains to viewers his life experiences as the Secretary of Defense during the Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis, and part of Vietnam, also his involvement in WWII and how he was the first ever president of the Ford Motor Company who wasn't part of the family. This film explains 11 rules about war and gives reason why some people make the decisions they do while in combat.
The 11 Rules are:
1. Empathize with the enemy.
2. Rationality will not save us.
3. There is something beyond oneself
4. Maximize efficiency.
5. Proportionality should be a guideline in war.
6. Get the data.
7. Belief and seeing are both often wrong.
8. Be prepared to reexamine your reasoning.
9. In order to do good, you may have to engage in evil.
10. Never say never.
11. You can't change human nature.
McNamara explains to us that these rules can and are used when people make war decisions such as dropping the atomic bomb in world war two or using agent orange in Vietnam, but he does acknowledge we have made some wrong decisions. One idea that he brings up is proportionality which was not seen during the fire bombing of Tokyo. McNamara argues that proportionality should be part of war so that we don't kill 100,000 women and children and men in one night. We shouldn't be killing innocent people in order to win the war. I is clear the McNamara used these guidelines and he suggests that everyone should use them, but really main guidelines are the first six rules as they specifically pertain to actions in the war and the last five rules is where we see a shift in McNamara's ideas because these five rules pertain more to human nature and explaining why people make the decisions that they do and there isn't much you can do to change it but trying to limit it or control it is what the first six rules do.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
In The Fog of War Robert McNamara explains to viewers his life experiences as the Secretary of Defense during the Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis, and part of Vietnam, also his involvement in WWII and how he was the first ever president of the Ford Motor Company who wasn't part of the family. This film explains 11 rules about war and gives reason why some people make the decisions they do while in combat.
ReplyDeleteThis whole film seems to be McNamara trying to gain any honor back that he can before he passes on as he is an elderly man. He describes how decisions made in war are difficult to make and are criticized in hindsight, but not at the time the decision is being made. In the first three lessons "Empathize with the enemy", "Rationality will not save us", "There is something beyond oneself", it appears that McNamara is trying to give the viewer and idea of prewar objectives and ideas leading up war. This part seems to be a general way to explain why we go to and gives credit to those making decisions at a time of war.
Then we see our first shift in the film when she moves to the section of lessons 4, 5, and 6 or "Maximize efficiency", "Proportionality should be a guideline in war", and "Get the data" respectively. These lesson pertain primarily to war tactics and guidelines to follow while in field. But McNamara seems to contradict him self in this section as he first describes how we should maximize our efficiency, but then talk how maybe dropping the fire bombs on Tokyo and killing 100,000 people in one night might have not been the correct thing to do. This section describes things essential to winning the war, but then he questions how essential the fire bombing was in lesson five.
The next five lessons, 7-11, is a big shift from being and overview of guidelines to almost explaining why McNamara made the decisions he did when being the secretary of defense. One of the most controversial lessons is lesson 9, "In Order to do good, you may have to engage in evil". One thing he is asked is if he was part of the decision to using Agent Orange , but McNamara for some reason had no knowledge of allowing it. America saw no good in Vietnam so if why would we engage in evil if we are not there to do good in the first place? He contradicts himself once again with lesson 8 which is titled "Be prepared to reexamine your reasoning". In this film he is trying to explain why his reasoning was not reexamined but one of the main lessons is to reexamine the decisions you made. Doesn't make much sense other than to say McNamara reexamined his reasoning and found that he was completely wrong. This whole section is McNamara's final effort to show his legacy and to explain himself and his decisions.