MovieChat Forums > Generation Kill (2008) Discussion > Is todays war really this boring?

Is todays war really this boring?


I have not served in the military but am interested in war series like Band of Brothers and like. I am from Sweden and was curious to this, especially when Alexander SkarsgÄrd is main character. BUT, why is it sooooo boring all the time?? Nothing happens, they drive around in their Humwees and talk about killing, sex (lots of dirty talk), and how stupid the Iraqians are but nothing happens. The fighting scenes are badly done compared to BoB and sometimes they are acting stupid. When they got stuck on the bridge they could not figure out to push the vehicle themselves and where acting very clumsy. I stopped watching after that episode, what have I missed?

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You have missed alot. You probably have played too much call of duty4. War is not non stop action, and this serie is build on a book by somone who where there. I dont think your as stupid as this post could lead to belive, but your probably very young.

"There is a thin line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot"

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I am not young (30 years old) and does not play computer games, but I have not served in the military. But I think there is a big difference between WW2 fighting and todays High-tech wars also. There is not that much close combat, men-to-men fighting and the Iraq army is not that strong as German army was in 1944.

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War is days and days of boredom punctuated by seconds of sheer terror. As already stated, war is not non-stop action.

As for comparing GK to BoB you need to remember that GK follows a unit for a span of a couple of weeks, at most. BoB follows the unit for over a year. Just from that fact alone you ar going to have a different level of "action".

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There were no rules back in 1944, well I mean there was but no one ever followed them (As in example, you weren't supposed to shot at paratroppers while they were falling to the ground, Ha that sure worked out).

As you see in the 1st episode of Generation Kill Iraq's come in white trucks but American Marines aren't allowed to shoot. This is what war is now, can we shoot blah blah. If that was in WWII those trucks would be GONE! Also there wasn't high tech weapons and all the goodies. World War II was a different Era in war standards, you really can't compare the two.

Also you can't compare anything to BoB, it is one of the best series ever shown on TV.

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I actually did get conscripted and we learned the basics of the laws of war. They specify that you are allowed to shoot at paratroopers but not allowed to shoot at someone ejecting. I'd imagine they were the same back in '44.

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Well - the initial invasion of Iraq, which this depicts, was not exactly a "hard" mission.

Not to undermine the US soldiers who did get killed... But the kill ratio of Saddam's popular Iraqi Army, Republican Guard, Fedayeen Saddam, etc. was like 1000:1; if not worse.

They were stupid to try and fight a standard war against the invading Americans, and British. It wasn't even what you'd call a "war." The Iraqi forces, when they did challenge, were wiped out horribly - dispatched quickly, and brutally.

Google "General Ra'ad Hamdani" and see his interview on youtube, and with PBS (written transcript - no video). He talks about how they were routed on April 2-3 when they tried to counter-attack the advancing Americans. How they lost all their armored vehicles, and tanks - literally not a single one undamaged. ANd this was the creme de la creme of Iraqi army; the Republican Guard. The popular army wasn't nearly as well trained, paid, and equipped.

That's what happens when you have air superiority, especially.

But overall, the Americans didn't meet much resistance anyway, and that they did, was quickly routed.

General Hamdani suggested to Saddam that they fight a Guerrilla war style - similar to Vietnam - stay hidden in the cities in civilian clothes. Hit and move style attacks, etc. He suggested only using a partial display of force aka standard warfare engagements, but overwhelming majority utilize guerrilla tactics. Ironically, when the civilians (most thought to actually be former Republican Guard members) started fighting like this, the death roll of Americans increased exponentially. Had they initially engaged in this style, with the remaining armored vehicles, and tanks they had left, could have been utilized MUCH more effectively, and they likely would have held out Baghdad from falling for 8 months, rather than three weeks. It would have been really ugly, casualty wise for Americans.

Anyway, this war was over before it even begun. A lot of top security officials, and Republican Guard, and Army officers had already cut deals with the CIA, and surrendered. They knew it was going to be like Gulf War all over again, only worse...

We had already obliterated most of Saddam's weapons during the Gulf War... Hell, they still hadn't rebuilt a lot of their basic infrastructure from over a decade ago. The sanctions were CRIPPLING... Never has a country been so heavily sanctioned for so long. So that, coupled with the fact most had already agreed to surrender, meant this wasn't even a war... It was a "slight" peep of a resistance by those who remained loyal...


SO yeah - if by boring you mean little to no armed combat engagements, and heavy, dangerous firefighting, then yes; it was like this. We steamrolled in... HOWEVER, if this depicted what it was like for soldiers from late 2003-2011/12, then you'd have seen A LOT more enemy engagements, and a lot more firefighting.. And loss of American soldiers.. Almost 5,000 soldiers have been killed in the decade post-invasion... Compared to like the 30 deaths or so (if that) during the initial taking of Iraq, and subsequent fall of Baghdad.

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There is no rule of law disallowing the shooting of paratroopers in the air.

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you're right that today's combat probably differs a little bit from 70 years ago but you have to remember that 9 episodes of Band of Brothers took place over the course of a year whereas 7 episodes of Gen Kill took place over the course of a couple of weeks. It's completely understandable that more combat and big combat would be portrayed in BOB than in GK. I reckon combat has always been pretty boring on some levels. You need only look back to the stale-mated trenches from WW2. Soldiers were dug in only a few hundred yards from each other and their position barely changed for years. That had to be some boring combat.

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That's actually WW1 you're talking about there. WW2 was a bit more fluid, because the Germans tried (and to some degree succeeded) to avoid that kind of combat.

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You have to understand these guys were 18 to 24 in 2003 I was one year younger
than that If I was a year older I could have been part of it the guys that were born in 1985 to 1986 are very different to guys born in 1980 that 5 to 6 year
gap is a huge difference. The american's and poms went over there to clean house
and its very matter of fact and hard to get your head around if you don't support the u.s.a or britan they feel a sense of intitlement to being the king
of war - btw this is not a low blow it's an observation. Ive seen trailer's
for the show - im in new zealand and it starts on monday here. I have to say I loved the scene where one of guys asks whats the population of this town and
he says about 400,000 and then a bomb goes off and another guy says you can
scratch a few off of that. Some people would find that outrageous to say such a
thing, people like me say the humour and irony of it. Im looking forward to this
series - why? because I havent seen many shows or movies on iraq other than
the hurt locker and in they valley of elah. It looks matter of fact for what it
is which is war (war is war man) if they sugarcoat it it's lying to the public.
I think it's going to brilliant because it's not WWI or WWII or Vietnam, its Iraq and I want to see more especially being that its my generation

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Is todays war really this boring?


If you're going there looking for nonstop action, then you would consider it boring. I had a good time when I was deployed. The occasional attack wasn't fun, though.

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American army go no resistance like it did back in the days. They fight weak countries where people live without weapons. Soldiers get bored and shoot some random people sometimes.. that's the reallity.

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Vart lÀrde du dig svenska? Inte helt illa mÄste jag sÀga. Eller Àr du svensk och glömde nÄgra ord? =)

And I have to agree with the general consensus here, comparing this to Bob(which I also happened to love) is like comparing apples to oranges.

"I am a leaf on the wind - watch how I soar."
Hoban 'Wash' Washburn

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[deleted]

haha

I just felt like I was at the Ikea store for a second haha


I am sure all wars were boring, waiting around waiting to day, well there's little you can do but clean and talk smack...

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It's more of an operation than a full scale war conflict. You cannot compare WW2 with this...

But yes, a third world war wouldn't look like the 2nd one. There would be smaller operations and nuclear explosions.

We have already passed the "army vs army" warfare. It's not effective and its costly.

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Gotta admit though, it was pretty stupid when the humvee got stuck and they needed a major to come all the way down there to tell them that they needed to push the damn thing...

"Even my parents called me Mulder" -Fox Mulder

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I SO agree with you on that one, benjtsang, as the head of department who, was supposed to oversee the digging of that stupid hole, I called in sick. I'm not a fan of humvees, but surely every body knows that even though they offer no protection to the poor Marine driving it, it terms of an artillery assault, it can drive over anything.

Did not get paid for the day, though, but it was SO worth it. GK's been shown quite a lot on SA DSTV, so I've seen the scene a number of times, and can only giggle at the thought of THAT day, it was hot, the location was far, accomodation sucked, I had a hangover, and I was NOT going to dig that stupid hole!

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The reason the fighting seemed boring is becuase it is. The Iraqi War stopped being the old style war like that of WWII and Nam after the first 30 days. There's a reason almost no one does movies about Desert Storm one and everyone keeps making movies of WWII, Korea and Nam is becuase that American and world perspective of war is hundreds or thousands of trained soldiers fighting on both sides, the two wars in Iraq are not that, they are planes from 10,000 ft blowing up a building with terrorists or a soldier driving on a bump in the road and getting blown up. That is todays modern war.

Evil triumphs when good men do nothing

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Roll on the advance of unmanned warfare I guess.

Talking about war being boring spare a thought for medieval warfare; peasant levies being pulled out of tedious, backbreaking labour, weeks of marching on foot and nothing at the other end but a flaming castle to park yourself in front of and wait around for the enemy to get hungry. And then back to the f'ing labour!

Humvee? Luxury!

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It really is that boring. I just got back from Iraq and you would not believe the boredom. Every now and then something would happen to make your heart beat faster, but for the most part we sat around and complained (like every other service member) during our down time. As I've been told far too many times, "A complaining sailor is a happy sailor." Being in Iraq proved that statement to be true to me.

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The ROE's are hugely different in today's war than the one's before. It's almost like those that have never or will never be in combat makeup the ROE. IMO. Therefore, if you do happen to get a round down range you have to go through hours of explaining and why you felt that shooting your weapon was justified. I myself went through two investigations in Iraq.

War is not boring, it depends on you status and mission. I mean of course you have down time, and I think that is why I like GK so much, it actually focusues on those that are behind the weapons and vehicles.

It is very real, I think. Your buddies become your family and I love how they have their goofy moments but yet very serious and realistic ones.

I thought it was superb mini and I was glad I watched it.



I'm pissed off and the whole world owes me!

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Though I haven't served in the military, I worked with a summer camp last summer that gave a free week of camp to kids whose parent/parents were or are deployed. We had a reporter from Fort Bragg who came to do a story on the camp and I spoke with him about the war. He was an army journalist and it was his job to go around and film, take pictures, and interview soldiers on the front lines. What he basically told me was that actual fighting was only 10% of less of conflicts in today's wars and the other 90+% was humanitarian, where soldiers deployed in engineering corps built schools, homes, repaired roads and bridges, and other things that didn't involve shooting a gun. To say that war is boring is to not really have an understanding or compassion for what really happens during it. I hardly think taking another human's life for whatever reason is cause for excitement, though like the TC, I am strangely fascinated with WWII and other conflicts in our history.

While I haven't seen any of these episodes yet, I do tend to agree that technology tends to spoil us in today's society. As far as pushing a vehicle off of a bridge, my dad had a similar situation. He was out making a run for the company he worked for and stopped for gas at a station off the interstate. He came across a woman who appeared very frustrated outside of car. My dad asked what was wrong and the woman, who was in the process of calling a tow truck, said that the battery in her keyless-entry remote had died and she couldn't get into her car. My dad asked to see her keys, which she handed over to him, and he then proceeded to stick the car key into the car lock and open the door. Needless to say, the woman felt quite ridiculous.

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You know what, I'd like to see you sit in a humvee for hours, waiting for contact, putting on and taking off your mask, sweating your ass off, having two guys cover you while trying to take a piss or dump because you don't want to get your balls blown off, freezing at night hopped up on no doze pulling security for not only your unit but a bunch of sorry truck drivers who are too lazy to watch their own asses, watching tracers flying all over the place and not being able to figure out how far off they are, having scuds shot down over you then hearing the NBC alarm go off thinking that scud that just got shot down had chems in it, having to clear a position full of rotting corpses and dragging hajis hiding in holes around your position, pulling security all day and finally getting some sleep only to get woken up my mortars, driving through towns seeing little girls strung up on light poles because they waved at Americans, having to stop every Iraqi male and search them because they may be fedayeen, and only getting to eat one MRE and drink one bottle of water a day because 3rdID forgot that your unit was attached to them.



**tl:dr sorry the invasion wasn't anything close to resembling a *beep* Cannon Group movie.

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ROFL. Cannon group movie! God bless, I bet most reading this will NOT get that reference!

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