HOW—OH,
how—do you make a film about the war on Iraq? Would it be something
like Hollywood-type films that depict boorish violence, unbelievable
stunts, and high-tech operations where people are terrorized and militaristic
villains appear as heroes?
Or would it be a non-fiction documentary, similar to what Academy
Award winner Michael Moore calls living in "fictitious times"
and waging war for "fictitious reasons" in the same way
that he criticized US president George Bush on live television for
his shameless deeds?
Significantly, in the 60-minute documentary flick, "Hidden Wars
of Desert Storm" (produced by Free-Will Productions), film makers
and couple Gerard Ungerman and Audrey Brohy delineates the Gulf War
and its aftermath of crisis.
Fast-paced and Informative
"Hidden Wars" was publicly shown on video last March 16
at the College of Arts and Letters in the University of the Philippines
in Diliman, Quezon City, sponsored by the militant scientists group
Samahan ng Nagtataguyod ng Agham at Teknolohiya para sa Sambayanan
(AGHAM).
The film begins with a graphical text that read: "The government
of the United States of America created Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin
Laden. It is a fact, that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) recruited
and trained the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG). And our non-elected president
and commander-in-chief, with open arms, welcome US troops to train
and order our Filipino soldiers to kill the ASG terrorists as a pretext
for the basing of US troops in our soil. At the same time, this simply
proves that as commander-in-chief, non-elected president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
has no confidence in the ability of the Armed Forces of the Philippines
to address our internal security problems."
This was followed by a fast-paced scene where Iraqi military troops
under Saddam Hussein's command launched an attack against Kuwait on
August 2, 1990, which triggered the first major international crisis
of the post-Soviet Union era.
Film narrator, British actor John Hurt, critically asks: "Was
there any threat from the part of Iraq against Saudi Arabia or against
any of the other Gulf states? Why wasn't Washington's rhetoric against
Saddam ever matched by any real support to the Iraqi opposition groups?
What purpose can the embargo over Iraq serve if it is not to weaken
Saddam Hussein, a result it has evidently failed to achieve to this
day? What is true behind this mysterious Gulf War Syndrome that goes
on affecting hundreds of thousands of Gulf War veterans and local
populations and more and more of them every day?"
"Hidden Wars" is backed by detailed interviews of known
personalities such as Desert Storm Commander, General Norman Schwarzkopf,
former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark, former United Nations Iraq
Program Director Denis Halliday, former UNSCOM team-leader Scott Ritter
as well as testimonies of international arms trade analyst Bill Hartung,
Iraqi opposition leader Ahmed Al Bayati, former Iraqi oil minister
Fadel Chalabi, US State Secretary David Welch, international oil market
specialist Siu Hin Lee, US marine veteran Morocco Omari, Phyllis Bennis
of the Institute if Policy Studies, Paul Sullivan of the National
Gulf War Resource Center among others. Properly selected and used
as materials were recently revealed documents from the US Freedom
of Information Act, war archives of the Gulf War in the 90s as well
as rare footages on Iraq's history.
Bleak Pictures
The Ungerman-Brohy opus also looks at the health crisis situation
in Southern Iraq and by US war veterans who were unknowingly exposed
to depleted uranium (uranium 238) munitions, a highly toxic and deadly
metal, right after Gulf War and the sanctions imposed against Iraq.
Today, the UNICEF estimates that about 5,000 Iraqis die every month
as a direct result of the sanctions, primarily the very young and
the elderly who bare the harshest brunt of the food and medicine restrictions.
Scientists, doctors and veterans interviewed has sketched a "bleak
picture" of the health prospects, as images of Iraqi children
inflicted with cancer and leukemia may look scary for pampered teenagers.
"Hidden Wars" also unmasks US imperialism's hypocrisy of
war, whipping on its monstrous ambition for world hegemony. It is
a must-see documentary that gives provocative and honest-to-goodness
insight for students and analysts of contemporary world politics.
---------------
