War. What is it good for?

I saw the film Lone Survivor. It made me sick.

It was based on a true story about 4 men who were sent on a reconnaissance mission in Afghanistan to locate an enemy Afghan leader. They located the leader, who located them, and through a series of events, 400 enemy Afghans,  set out to kill the four men. The story is about their fight to escape.

Three of the men died and one man survived to tell the story. These men were brave, courageous, skilled with weapons and dedicated to saving one another from the enemy. The military backup to assist and save the four men was disorganized, discombobulated and blunderstruck. Eventually the military sent in several armed helicopters and destroyed the enemy.

The movie made me sick. Why? The military could have sent in the armed helicopters in the beginning and destroyed the enemy. The 4 men were proffered on a mission that made no sense. Until the armed helicopters were brought in, the enemy had better weapons than the 4 men. This make no sense. The communication system that the men were using and depended on for assistance, did not work. How could this situation not be tested and verified prior to the mission? This makes no sense.

War movies romanticize inexplicable killing. These movies make great action films, but they fail miserably to illustrate the senselessness of war in the first place. I have 5 sons and I just do not see the merit in watching people, other parent's sons, die in combat, and particularly when it is based on a true story. It is not a video game. Call me peacenik if you wish, but war is never the last resort.

Japan had lost WW II. Germany had surrendered. If we had just pulled all our troops back to America, who would Japan have fought. Nobody.