HollywoodOn Productions: Janet Donovan & Brendan Kownacki
“I think the military enjoys a great deal of prestige in American society right now compared to what it was,” Executive Co-Producer Peter Bergen told Hollywood on the Potomac in a one on one interview prior to the World Premiere of National Geographic’s “American War Generals” – Legendary Men – Incredible Stories – Exclusive Access!
Peter Bergen
“We start the film in Vietnam,” he explained, “and many of the people that we profile in the film actually joined right as the Vietnam War was winding down. They talk about how people would spit at them when they were in uniform. They were very conscious of the fact their peers were out growing their hair long. It was really quite a leap of faith for David Petraeus or Stanley McChrystal to go to West Point in the early and mid ’70s when the Army was at its low point.
All things have changed since then. There’s the whole volunteer Army which we discuss in the film. There’s the success of the first Gulf War………the professionalization of the Army of the time. I think that the Army and the US military in general enjoys a very different place in American society than it did at the tail end of the Vietnam War.”
Photo credit: Janet Donovan
Judging by the guest list that included Ret. General David Petraeus; Tresha Mabile, Executive Co-Producer; Courteney Monroe, CEO NatGeo Channel; Wesley Clark, Retired General US Army; Ed Henry, Fox New’s White House Correspondent; Former Rep. Dennis Kucinich; Margaret Warner, Anchor PBS; Barry McCaffrey, Retired US Army General; and Gerald Rafshoon, former Carter White House Communications, we’d say that was spot on. The Andrew Mellon auditorium reached overflowing capacity.
Generals McMaster, Clark, Petraeus, McCaffrey and Eikenberry
The Red Carpet Interviews:
“My wife and I met in Afghanistan and we are both comfortable in that kind of environment. Frankly, Afghanistan is certainly not Syria, it’s a lot safer. Going to Pakistan or Afghanistan entails some risks but Syria entails a great deal of risk,” Bergen explained regarding the ‘risk factor.’ Bergen was, afterall, the journalist that had an exclusive and first television interview with Osama bin Laden but doesn’t consider himself a war correspondent. “They had invited us to come. At that point Al Qaeda hadn’t beheaded Daniel Pearl. That was four years in the future, so I felt that it was low-risk. It turned out fine.”
Executive Producers Peter Bergen and Tresha Mabile
We were curious about the difference between ‘us’ and ‘them’ referring to the internal makeup of Generals. “A big difference, I think, is that so many Generals we profiled had fathers in the military or whose sons and daughters are in the military now which is a big difference from most civilians who have relatively limited experience with the military”
“The military itself is often a hereditary occupation at this point,” Bergen added. “Is that a good thing for American society? Maybe not. To become a four-star General – and almost everybody in the film is a four-star General – is an enormously competitive process; three are made every year, three four-stars. They know it’s a very small group of people. A lot of them have very different views about different subjects and all have their own interests and views about the world. We try and deal with that in the film.”
General David Petraeus
How does that work, a kaleidoscope of ideology? “Sometimes it works well and sometimes it doesn’t work so well. In the film we discus how it does. There was a conflict between a number of people in the military when the Iraq War reached its most difficult point. There was one group of people led by General George Casey, who we interview in the film, who was quite opposed to having more troops being sent in. He was concerned that the more American troops that were in Iraq, the more it would seem like we were an occupying force. On the other side of the coin, there were people like David Petraeus. President Bush felt that putting more troops in and having them get off their bases and moving among the population was a way to turn down the violence. At the end of the day that group of people won the debate.”
Did you ever get the feeling that maybe Colin Powell regretted his decision by backing the invasion of Iraq? “I think in the film he’s pretty explicit that we made pretty poor choices which was basically letting go of the entire Iraqi Army which put 400,000 military-age males out of a job all at once, then basically firing the top tier Ba’ath Party which meant that anybody with any bureaucratic experience was also out of a job. Everybody in the film, whether it’s David Petraeus or Colin Powell – who of course was Secretary of State at the time – acknowledges that major mistakes were made, setting the stage for the insurgency to grow.”
“Abolishing the Iraqi Army was a spectacular mistake,” said Bergen. “These are all guys without a job and a family to feed and obviously with military skills. It was a huge error. Yes, we get things wrong routinely. Of course we’re also capable of basically learning from our mistakes. I think one of the big themes of the film is that the Army will adapt. The Army tends to want to fight certain kinds of wars……..the wars that are tank on tank battles which we’re always going to win. It’s a question of what happens after you topple the dictator whether in Iraq or Libya or wherever. The day after is a lot of more complicated than just the first invasion in a sense.
One of the people we profile in the film says that ‘One of the mistakes that people took away from the first Gulf War was that technology was the solution for everything.’ You remember the shots of cruise missiles going into buildings on CNN ? Of course that was very impressive and it did a lot of damage, but at the end of the day it does take ground forces and it’s still a human endeavor. Technology helps but it’s not sufficient. It depends what kind of war situation you’re in. I mean drones are useful up to a point, but you have to take to the ground and hold territory and that’s going to be the Army or the Marines that are going to be doing that, not drones flying above.“
Retired General of the US Army, Wesley Clark
“I think one thing that you’ll find about the film,” Bergen told us, “is these are a very thoughtful group of men. They are quite critical of decisions that were made which I think in a way that might be surprising for audiences. I think that Americans probably think of the military as speaking with one voice, not necessarily having any kind of opinions. Of course there’s a good reason why we have a military that is subordinate to this civilian leadership, but it doesn’t mean that they don’t have their own views. They all have very firm views. Barry McCaffrey is absolutely scathing on the subject of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. H. R. McMaster is adamant about how we got Iraq wrong at the beginning. General Stanley McChrystal says that ‘If we’d known going in what the Iraq War was going to cost on every level than no rational person would have agreed to it.’
You’ll draw your own conclusions when you see the film, but I think it will be surprising. They’re not all cheerleaders as to what happened by any stretch of the imagination. They’re also American patriots who are all trying to do the right thing, whatever they were doing. A number of them of course were extraordinary successful.”
“American War Generals” – a two hour special – airs on the NatGeo channel on September 14th 8 PM. Don’t miss it.
