Customer Reviews:

• I Have Four Sons
  I have four sons and have purchased a copy of this incredibly courageous documentary for each of them. I love my country and am heart broken to have to warn my boys against throwing away their lives for this insane war, or the next one that they dream up. A wonderful film. Pray that we can change before it is too late......more info
• A thought provoking cautionary that attempts but ultimately fails to convincingly explain "why we fight"
  A thought provoking cautionary that attempts but ultimately fails to convincingly explain why America has gone to war several times since the end of World War II.
  
  To its credit, it informs the viewer about the burgeoning business of war, that is, the commerce and industry that exists to manufacture weapons and materiel for war -- which President Eisenhower warned America about in 1961. But the film does not effectively make the case of how that industry has led us into wars.
  
  It does chronicle the lies and half truths that Americans have been fed over the decades and in this regard I think the film is successful. Certainly many Americans today believe that the rationale for war with Iraq was false; that indeed Bush, Cheney, and other neo-conservatives may have been part of a much bigger strategy of global domination through the projection of military power. It rightly points out that our Congress did little in the way of deliberating whether the Iraq war was advisable; that it abdicated its responsibility in this regard. However, the film is not even handed and sometimes is dishonest.
  
  In the latter half of the film, many scenes are added merely for shock value, and in the style of left leaning filmmaker Michael Moore, snippets of news footage of our soldiers in combat are juxtaposed in such a way as to suggest that our men and women in uniform are somehow indecent or even barbaric (for example, a scene of a soldier firing a shot at a combatant shortly after a deadly skirmish) as they go about the mission under extraordinarily difficult conditions that we civilians can never truly appreciate.
  
  Yes, this film does give us pause to reflect, but it does not answer its own question of "why we fight". Ask any survivor of the holocaust why we fought. Ask the French citizenry about Nazi occupation and their subsequent liberation by the Allies why we fight. There are two sides to this discussion -- unfortunately this film chose to only argue for one....more info
• Excellent: A Must See
  A very non-partisan and factual look into why America has and will enter(ed) into a war/conflict. ...more info
• The USA goverment fight, not the people.
  This outstanding documentary reflex the USA politician mentality. The capitalism view as war business. No respect, no moral values, no the essential commiment of the people who found this great nation. Now the nation os intimidation and war. What a shame....more info
• Military, Industrial Complex
  If you have questions on the complexity of war...It is beyond right and wrong, politictics of the day or popular opinion. Watch this documentary and make your own decision, after all it is our belife in the principles of OUR constitution( READ IT, KNOW IT, LOVE IT, LIVE IT!!!!!!) that make us FREE! USA!!!!!LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT!!!...more info
• A must see!
  This is an understated documentary, not a polemic. I am buying copies for friends, and encouraging them to show it to everyone they know. A remarkable, UNBIASED, look at the US military industrial complex. Tells how it works, what it does, and why it prospers. The only down side is that it could leave you despairing about how and where this is all going to end....more info
• great video must see
  this is a must see video. explains the establishment killed JFK to stop him from ending the cold war. ...more info
• Bottom Line: '...a MUST SEE movie for all Americans...'
  A very insightful look into our nation's plight... should be required viewing for all Americans. Also read Gore Vidal's books, i.e. 'Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace', and 'Imperial America: Reflections on the United States of Amnesia', and 'Decline and Fall of the American Empire (The Real Story Series)'...more info
• Why We Fight
  This is probably one of the best documentries I have ever seen. It is simply amazing. I recommend that every American that cherishs freedom should watch this movie. ...more info
• An Important Film
  I watched this film for the first time this evening and am very glad I did so. Prior to watching this film, I had come to similar conclusion such as wondering why the military-industrial complex was running around without a leash and pondering why more Americans weren't concerned about our government officials pandering increasingly to corporations in recent years. But it's been ingrained in us to be patient and to maintain faith in our government and the people.
  
  This film helps to expose what's really been going on behind the scenes and how the American people have done little to stop it. It helps us to connect the dots to finally accept the fact that we were taken for a ride. A ride paid for with our own tax dollars used to pad corporate pockets.
  
  I definitely recommend this film!...more info
• The military industrial complex has three legs, the third one is Congress
  What I most like in this documentary is that it gives an inside look into the military industrial complex. You see how weapon systems are first being proposed, and also how Lockheed celebrates the winning of a bid. But you also see how Congress supports the military industrial complex. The arms manufacturers act very intelligently, by distributing the production facilities over all the states of America, so each and every congressman applauds when defense budget is going up. You also will see some quite extraordinarily images of ordinary people inventing bombs and producing them. What most amazed me was the high number of women involved ! And when interviewed, one of them said that she would definitively prefer making toys. But that was the job she got... What kind of economy is this ? Well, this huge logistic machinery serves the troops on the front ! Therefore, the US needs to be at war permanently.
  
  When Eisenhower pronounced his farewell speech in 1961 he warned us that we should never let the weight of the military industrial complex "endanger our liberties or our democratic processes". However, he already knew, being president, that he himself was unable to stop them. The defense budget rose continuously when he was president, due to pressure of the Big Arms Producers on Congress.
  
  It is also clear that the huge profits made by this industry influence directly foreign policy of the US. In 1963 Kennedy was killed by the military industrial complex, because he wanted to retreat from Vietnam and make peace with the Soviet Union. In 2001, we got a big fireworks show in New York. Do you remember how many skyscrapers collapsed ? Two ? No : three. That's weird, isn't it, when only two planes hit the WTC-towers. How do they do that ? Maybe, to prevent us from asking too many questions, we got the Patriot Act, fulfilling Eisenhower's fear that one day we will suffer from "endangering our liberties". So less than 40 years after Eisenhower's farewell speech, his predictions rang true. The US abolished its democracy in 1963, and stopped being a free country in 2001. What is left is an Evil Empire - dominating the world.
  
  Why we fight ? For freedom ? No. For business ? Certainly. The arms industry is the biggest industry of the US, so it needs to fuel it profits by making war. And also, like a historian tells in this documentary : "The invasion of Iraq in 2003 is to reposition the US as the country that must be obeyed. It's an easy way to send a signal to the planet that the US is in charge and that it's gone do what it wants. Who defies the US must be punished." The US has no exit plan of Iraq, because 14 permanent bases have been constructed. The second biggest oil reserves of this world will be "safe" - for freedom ?
  ...more info
• A MUST READ
  LIBERAL OR CONSERVATIVE, RIGHT VS LEFT, REP & DEM ALIKE - REALLY SHOULD BE REQUIRED READING AT THE HIGH SCHOOL LEVEL. PROVIDES A DIFFERENT VIEW OR THE COUNTRY MARCHING TOWARDS WAR....more info
• Much better than Michael Moore's 9/11
  There's a sense of dreadful irony suffusing this documentary about Bush's war in Iraq. There's the case of the guy (Wilton Sekzer) whose son was killed in the 9/11 attacks. Fired with a desire for revenge, he writes the Pentagon to get his son's name put on a bomb that he hopes is dropped on those who killed his son. He's a retired cop and a Vietnam vet. He gets to see a photo of the bomb with his son's name on it. The terrible irony is the bomb is not dropped on somebody who might have killed his son. Instead it likely falls on civilians in Iraq.
  
  This up close and personal irony mirrors the larger one: Bush had little interest in getting bin Laden and those responsible for the 9/11 murders. Instead he used those attacks as a rationale to pursue a personal agenda of shock and awe so that he might be in a position to avoid the fate of his father, who was a one-term president.
  
  An even greater irony is in the title. "Why We Fight" is the name of a series of World War II films made by Frank Capra aimed at American soldiers going overseas to fight the Nazis or the Japanese imperialists. The irony is that in WWII it was clear why we had to fight. In Bush's war there was and is no clear necessity, moral or strategic, no sense of doing the right thing, of going against an enemy that would conquer us. Instead, there is just the terrible sense of waste, waste of over one hundred thousand human lives (and counting), waste of hundreds of billions of American dollars (that could have been put to better use at home)--all seemingly for the aggrandizement of one man and the twisted dreams of a handful of neocon chicken hawks drunk with power.
  
  Another irony is that of the intelligence/information officer, Air Force Lt. Col. (ret.) Karen Kwiatkowski, who learned that much of the information that she was required to disseminate and swallow was misinformation and outright lies. And then there is the irony of the young pilots who were interviewed, who dropped the bombs. One is lead to say what an honor it was to drop one of the first bombs in Operation Iraqi Freedom, an operation he saw as liberating a people, an operation that had previously been called (with telling dramatic irony) Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL).
  
  As the documentary reminds us, World War II was fought for oil as well, but it was the Japanese who started it to secure the oil fields in the South Pacific so that they could fuel further expansion in Asia, and by the Nazis who also had little to no domestic crude to fuel their maniac dreams of world domination.
  
  What sets this documentary apart from some others (especially the somewhat shallow exercise by Michael Moore) is how the war is put in historical perspective. Director Eugene Jarecki shows how the illogic of the present meshes with that of the past as we see Rumsfeld making nice with Saddam Hussein in the days when we supported him as our dictator in the Middle East. And further removed we see the grainy ghosts of Vietnam past: John F. Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon... And then there are the many mendacious statements of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, et al., juxtaposed against the damning analysis of military and political experts.
  
  In the final analysis Jarecki makes it clear that we fight to feed the vast military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about. As someone (Chalmers Johnson, I believe) remarks, with so much profit to be made in war, you can be sure that war will follow. How else to use up the munitions so that others might be manufactured and sold?...more info
• Things We Need to Know.
  This is a must see film. This documentary allows the viewer to see things that the American news industry has been and still is withholding from the American public. Please watch this film. ...more info
• Powerful, sobering and masterfully produced
  An amazingly frank look at the influences on war, and of war from several persectives. This is a MUST SEE....more info
• My thoughts
  Truly a "MUST SEE" video! I am shareing this with all of my family and many friends. We had better wake up to what is happening while we let "them" run the country and pay little attention to what is happening to our industrial complex. It may already be too late!...more info
• Please Watch It
  I found the main point of the movie, about the military-industrial complex and its influences, a bit exaggerated. No doubt they play a part in decisions to go to war, but the sole or even the primary reason ... is a bit exaggerated. However, a lot of the subterfuge I found particularly good. Chalmers Johnson's discussion of "blowback" in this movie led me to read his book. Also, there was a colonel taking about the Pentagon's Center For Strategic Plans, that was created to bypass the CIA and DIA with fabricated reasons for war, etc. These things, that were secondary issues, haven't appeared as well anywhere else. It's in these things that I found the most satisfying from the movie.
  
  It's definitely worth the watch, but the arms industry is exaggerated. I recommend that viewers also read Iraq: The Logic of Withdrawal for a better understanding of why we invaded Iraq. ...more info
• Well done - must see documentary
  Great documentary on the military-industrial complex and the forces that compel us to go to war. In my opinion, this documentary did not blatantly walk along partisan lines and placed responsibility equally onto the shoulders of every administration since WWII.
  
  There isn't any information that is necessarily new, but when it's all put together in this format, it can be overwhelming. You'll never look at the press and our nations motives the same again.
  
  One of the most staying impressions this film left on me was the idea that we are a nation without memory - this documentary so easily pointed out how we as a nation are involved in conflict after conflict every few years with virtually the same build up and marginal success. Even I found that I had forgotten a number of conflicts from my lifetime, until they were brought up in this film again. So considering that we haven't had a "cut and dry" victory since WWII, why do we fight? This documentary gives you a good start on answering that question....more info
• Why We Fight is a must see
  This video takes an iside look at war. It shows you behind the closed curtain what has put our country in so many wars. I recommend this video for everyone to see....more info
• If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, we have been anything but vigilant.
  Chalmers Johnson in the movie says, "If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, we have been anything but vigilant." I think this movie can be the first step in an awaking. The only way we can have a true democracy, is an informed public. Otherwise it will be business as usual where lobbies & moneyed interests run the country. ...more info
• A must see
  This documentary should be viewed by everyone that thinks the military is the answer to conflicts. Eisenhower was a visionary, unfortunately, he has been over shadowed by the neocon environment. ...more info
• great video must see
  this is a must see video. explains the establishment killed JFK to stop him from ending the cold war. ...more info
• Exellent
  Great example of explaining the meaning behind Dwight Eisenhower's farewell address. Beware the Military, Industrial, Congressional, Complex!...more info
• If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, we have been anything but vigilant.
  Chalmers Johnson in the movie says, "If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, we have been anything but vigilant." I think this movie can be the first step in an awaking. The only way we can have a true democracy, is an informed public. Otherwise it will be business as usual where lobbies & moneyed interests run the country. ...more info
• Why We Fight
  Along with "hijacking Catastrophe", this is essential viewing to get a clear and smartly compiled view of the history of US-led conflicts and the mechanisms that bring those conflicts about. Be prepared to learn (or re-learn) the meaning of such political esoterica as "national security", "our interests in the region" and "economic stability"....more info
• What a bunch of lies!
  I quit watching after hearing the outright lies from a so called expert who said Japan had been trying to surrender for the last year of WWII. What a bunch of crap. Any history book will tell you this isn't true. The worst battles of the war were fought against Japan the last year of the war. Many civilians committed suicide rather then surrender when the US won a battle. That's a funny way for a country to try to surrender. Watch Ken Burns "The War" to find out why we needed to drop the Bomb. No one alive at the time disagreed with that decision....more info
• A thought provoking cautionary that attempts but ultimately fails to convincingly explain "why we fight"
  A thought provoking cautionary that attempts but ultimately fails to convincingly explain why America has gone to war several times since the end of World War II.
  
  To its credit, it informs the viewer about the burgeoning business of war, that is, the commerce and industry that exists to manufacture weapons and materiel for war -- which President Eisenhower warned America about in 1961. But the film does not effectively make the case of how that industry has led us into wars.
  
  It does chronicle the lies and half truths that Americans have been fed over the decades and in this regard I think the film is successful. Certainly many Americans today believe that the rationale for war with Iraq was false; that indeed Bush, Cheney, and other neo-conservatives may have been part of a much bigger strategy of global domination through the projection of military power. It rightly points out that our Congress did little in the way of deliberating whether the Iraq war was advisable; that it abdicated its responsibility in this regard. However, the film is not even handed and sometimes is dishonest.
  
  In the latter half of the film, many scenes are added merely for shock value, and in the style of left leaning filmmaker Michael Moore, snippets of news footage of our soldiers in combat are juxtaposed in such a way as to suggest that our men and women in uniform are somehow indecent or even barbaric (for example, a scene of a soldier firing a shot at a combatant shortly after a deadly skirmish) as they go about the mission under extraordinarily difficult conditions that we civilians can never truly appreciate.
  
  Yes, this film does give us pause to reflect, but it does not answer its own question of "why we fight". Ask any survivor of the holocaust why we fought. Ask the French citizenry about Nazi occupation and their subsequent liberation by the Allies why we fight. There are two sides to this discussion -- unfortunately this film chose to only argue for one....more info