The Bore War

Bill Hicks, ‘61 – ’94 (American comedian, social commenter and all around genius) was on the money when he said, regarding the Gulf War - “I guess it was pretty amazing, to see a missile fly down an air vent”. Indeed it was, especially when it was an American missile NOT flying down the air vent of a British army tank (Zing!!) Ahem. Anyway.

He was right of course, it was pretty incredible. After a while though, as we may recall, it all fizzled out like a damp firework on a wet November night. Until, that is, 9/11. Yes, 9/11 (or 11/9 for those of us who still drive on the correct side of the road) provided George Bush Jr with the excuse he needed to pick up where his old man left off.

Almost immediately the Gulf War was rebranded the Iraq War, which became the Afghan War, became the War In The Middle East and finally settled on the all encompassing ‘War on Terror’. Suddenly we were at war with fucking EVERYTHING (spiders, mice, pumpkin pie, alligators, terrorists,) and it looked like things were hotting up again. The air vent missiles were forgotten and cool new science fiction type ordnance took over: Drones. Imagine android flying machines with little red dots going back and forth like Cylon raiders as they hone in on startled, yet evil looking men in evil looking Arab clobber. Yay for Drones.

And despite the fact that six thousand miles away servicemen and women were developing PTSD after guiding these red, white and blue drones of freedom into schools it was still, as Bill said ‘pretty impressive’.

At this point, I should say that this isn’t a diatribe on the evils of war. Nor upon the evils of George Bush and his cronies, the evils of guiding missiles into hospitals and schools or even the general evils of imperialistic military intent. It is all about the wearisome and depressing effect of a very boring war. And this has been a boring war – or not war, or whatever they're calling it this week.

Even the films have been cack. How bad must it be if they can’t make a watchable movie when they already have a kick ass title like War On Terror? Imagine it being spoken in a deep, foreboding American voice from massive speakers in a darkened cinema – WAR ON TERRORRRRRRRRR!!!! You see? Your date would be huddled up to you in no time.

But no. We got Green Zone. A far fetched bit of over-simplified tedium with Matt Damon tramping about the desert and failing to find WMD, only to discover what the entire world has known from day one – there weren’t any. Yawn and fade to black.

And what was Jarhead for? Not ‘what was it about?’ – but why was it? I faded to black within half an hour and never bothered again. But I guess it is hard to make good movies about a war where the enemy comprises kids and old men who have more experience milking goats (can you milk a goat?) than they have wielding Russian made automatic weapons. A good war movie needs freaks in black leather and death's head insignia – or at least black pyjamas and bamboo cages in unpronounceable deltas full of rats.

The only real high point has been Team America, but that wasn’t really about The War in Iraq. That was more about the ridiculous right wing media created idea that a highly organised and structured army of terrorists (generally evil people who have no reason to be evil other than they like it) are hiding somewhere out there. Probably in the same place as the WMD.

But let's call a spade a not spade: This whole war has been a bit of a let down from a mass entertainment point of view. It’s been dreary. No WMD, no evil overlords, no black leather and no good reason for being there. Nobody can really justify it so it’s hard to make a film that paints us as the good guys, and if we’re not the good guys then we must be….shit. No wonder it’s unpopular. No wonder the films are all crap; it’s us. We’re the baddies. We’re wearing the death's heads and the black leather pyjamas!!! It’s a war Jim, but not as we like it!

All that said, who really cares. The nature of entertainment is changing and that has never been more apparent. Instead of war movies that inspire kids to happily take the kings shilling, after spending long summer afternoons running around with sticks and shouting – drrrrraaa drrrrrraaaa – at each other, we have Call of Duty. Nowadays kids can tell the difference between a Barrett ‘Light Fifty’ and a Russian made semi automatic Dragunov. They know the fire rate of a Famas Assault Rifle and how many rounds you can speed load into a Colt Python. (Okay, that’s easy. We all knew that. Didn’t we?)

Which begs the question: If this whole thing really is all about peace, freedom and democracy, couldn’t we have just pointed nukes at 'them’ (the terrorists, the spiders, whatever) and said – we’re all playing Modern Warfare! Winner gets the oil, the minerals and installs a puppet government. Loser gets a new job title and nothing else changes. Are you in or do we press the button? After all, we have some pretty good 12 year old players here in the West and you can get Xbox live for less than £25 a year. It could change overnight from the ‘War on Terror’ to the ‘War on Terribly Expensive Equipment’. Which, let’s face it, the MOD isn’t paying for anyway. Sorry lads.

But, I digress. Outside of COD,  Modern Warfare 1, 2 and Black OPs – its all been a bit dreary and tiresome. Money is made and spent. Young men, women and children on all sides die and lose limbs while praying to Gods who seem to have forgotten them, and we all feel safe in our beds from the hordes apparently hiding behind every tree, just waiting to pounce. Go us. We really do rock.

In which case, I guess when I next want to feel good about death, destruction and slaughter on a vast scale, I’ll whip out the Band Of Brothers box set I got last Christmas and enjoy an accurate reproduction of a good old fashioned and wholesome war. ‘When I was a lad’, I’ll say to my daughter, ‘all this was wars, wars as far as the eye could see. Proper wars mind!’

Either that or I’ll follow the advice of that late, great American Mr William Melvin Hicks when he said, and I’m paraphrasing - ‘Can I suggest, instead of a war to feel good about yourself…..six to eight glasses of water a day? Sit ups? Maybe a fruit cup?.......’

God rest ye Bill.