I did not go to a war zone while in the army. As a draftee, I did what I was ordered to do. No one I knew from basic to AIT every showed a desire to go to Vietnam and fight. We openly discussed our resentment of a government that put us in that situation.
This is the first war movie I've seen in ages that questions the pointlessness of war. This movie picks up the thread of discussions that inevitably shows that each and every soldier, regardless of rank, lived in constant fear and had no desire to be there.
This is not the Band of Brothers, Platoon, The Big Red One, or We Were Soldiers. At no point in the film is war justified or explained. It only points out the fear of death and the psychological terror each man suffers anticipating his own death.
That said, those I knew, including myself. would have carried out orders regardless of our fear and anger. When you are in, you have no choice.
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