The Fog of War - Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara

This doc includes a biographically themed interview with Robert McNamara mixed in with some incredible archival footage from World War II, the Cold War and the Vietnam War. McNamara talks about his academic achievements which led to becoming Harvard's youngest assistant professor. When World War II began the government brought him into the defense department as a strategic specialist who was involved in planning the firebombing of Japanese cites which led to an enormous number of civilian casualities. After a stint working for the Ford Motor Company, JFK chose him to be his Secretary Of Defense. He was involved with the Cuban Missle Crisis. But is, of course, best known for the role he played in the Vietnam War.

McNamara comes across as a man haunted by the past who, at the age of 85, feels he must "set things right" about his role in US military affairs. He now admits the Vietnam War was a mistake. But still seems to contradict himself while discussing the actions he took. He attempts to cast LBJ as the primary villan and certainly Johnson comes across badly on several of their recorded coversations, including one where LBJ essentially says he wants to kill as many Vietnamese as possible. But McNamara also seems a bit disingenious at times, such as when he attempts to downplay his role in authorizing the use of Agent Orange. He also continually eludes to the fact that no good choices were available and that no one else can really understand the circumstances he was facing.

The main point that emerges for me is that the US government really had no clear understanding of Vietnamese history and that the Vietnamese people saw the US not as liberators but as an occupying force who had come to replace the French as colonizers. It's sort of amazing that so many smart people could have been so stupid. But this movie does an excellent job in putting a human face on people in power. It's not that there is some diabolical global conspiracy, as an earlier reviewer seemed to suggest. But rather that our leaders are simply human beings and are prone, like the rest of us, to failures, weaknesses and grave errors in judgemnent. The difference is that their mistakes become more tragic in times of war, when so many human lives are at stake.

This movie was very informative but the idea that McNamara was not at fault for the build-up of US forces in Vietnam is false. LBJ had his fair share but McNamara was still part of the overall pieces that accepted the idea of troop increase and additional commitment in South East Asia.

It's easy to talk about the "guilt" of the man. But remember,he served presidents, not the other way around. We learn from Morris' film that what once was thought of as McNamara's arrogance, might have actually been a certain shyness with being thrust into the limelight. McNamara said in the film that he told Kennedy he would take the job of Secretary of Defense if he didn't have to join in "that damn Washington social life." It seems too easy to hate a man simply because he didn't appear as warm and generous as his boss (Kennedy).
Now that we know more about Kennedy - who was the arrogant one?

Former secretary of defense Robert Mcnamara provides a very frank and illuminating version of his lessons learnt which are about 11 in total.The whole film is an interview session interpersed with images of previous incidents of world history which happened during his tenure as Secretary of defense. Each lesson or principle learned is explained by Mcnamara aided by his retrospective insight and his personal memoirs which run along with the images of news reports, interviews and photographs. The very interesting parts are hearing the real telephone tapes between President Nixon and McNamara / President Johnson and MCnamara.

Some of the things he talks about are

(1) His taking up of the offer from JFK to be secretary of defense thus leaving the presidency of ford motors.

(2) Cuban missile crisis and how close USA and Cuba was to nuclear war. There were 170 nuclear warheads in cuba supplied by Krushchev's Russia. McNamara's taped telephone converstaions with President John F Kennedy was very
interesting.

(3) The bombing of Tokyo and how 100's of cities were already bombed to a large extent before the decision by Johnson was taken to drop the N bombs. Were the N bomb's overkill ?

(4) The continuation of american loss of life in Vietnam and the unpreparedness of the Ameican troops for the unconventional guerilla warfare there. How much of the decision for vietname rests on him and how much on President Johnson

(5) The supposition that if JFK had lived he might have acted differently as compared to President Johnson with regards to the agressive stance on Vietnam.

(6) The misunderstood torpedo attacks reported by the sonar men which lead to bombing strikes against Vietnam.

(7) The use of agent green in Vietnam which intended as a chemical agent to removed the leaves from trees to removed enemy thicket cover was later found to also be a toxic and poisonous substance which caused loss of civilian life.

(8) His conclusion that if they had lost the war, could he have been called a war criminal ?

In summary he calls for proportionality in war ,strict nuclear detterance and to understand the enemy from his cultural and historical standpoint to avoid misunderstanding leading to avoidable military escalations.

regards, Vikram

This DVD was supposed to arrive in 3-5 days, but it took over 3 weeks. So I couldn't give it as a Christmas gift. I will never buy from Amazon again.