No End in Sight

It cannot be disputed that all that is presented here is factual, being that it consists of interviews and documentary footage. There may be some debate as to the truth of what some of the interviewees say, but the interviews did take place and those being interviewed are clearly identified. The material is edited to conclusively establish that the U.S. Iraq adventure is a monument to incompetence. The fact that most of the interviewees were high ranking officials in the Bush administration lends credence to the point of view.

To those who have diligently tried to follow the events of the Iraq war, this film will confirm suspicions as well as add some new insights as to how we have wound up in the mess we are in. To those who have not paid attention, this film should provide groundwork for further investigation. The film avoids sensationalism - it does not dwell on maimed bodies, casualties, troop morale, and so forth. It does not even cite things like Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech or Wolfowitz's estimate the the cost of the war would be two billion dollars tops.

It is not surprising that all of the principal players declined to be interviewed, but it would have been good to have had interviews with officials who supported going to war and continue to defend it.

What I was left with after viewing this was a great sadness that after well over a year since this film was released, and after over five years of the war, there is still no end in sight.

You may think that Charles Ferguson's documentary is filled with things we already know. That's what I thought. But the truth of the matter is I knew it like a rumor of sorts born and nurtured out of anger and frustration. What this riveting documentary does is to show it to us confirming what we thought we knew.The sadness is unbearable. The clarity of what lays at the center of this absurdity is startling, devastating. There were only five people in the theater. Why? I found out about the existence of "No End In Sight" through a radio interview with the film-maker. The film has been released practically in secrecy. Everyone is flocking to see Chuck and Larry while this masterpiece that concern us directly is practically ignored. I want to thank Charles Ferguson for this enormous contribution to the truth. I believe he put his own livelihood on the line for the privilege. Sir, you've just become a hero of mine.

As you may have inferred from my many sardonic comments about the neocons, I oppose the war in Iraq. The documentary No End in Sight confirms my opinion not shared by everyone to be sure. But this documentary, written, directed, and produced by Charles Ferguson, an information technology expert and member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Brookings Institution, shows in a rare non-ideological way, the mistakes made up to and during the Iraq invasion.

This is not an incendiary Michael Moore screed; it puts the left's argument in cool, rational light for the right to see clearly and attack as is its right. Ferguson grimly reminds us that information about the absence of WMD's was ignored to further an agenda that began immediately after 9/11 with the order to confirm a link between Al-Qaeda and Hussein's Ba'athist regime.

If you want more insanity, how about the order to disband the entire Iraqi army and Ba'ath party members from government service. That 2004 brought an insurgency of disaffected Sunni men who could have been serving in the necessary local army was no surprise. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's lack of preparation for post-invasion operations is just another depressing fact brought out by this sober, if not surprising or dramatically compelling documentary.

If you read the New York Times, you won't need the information in No End in Sight, but Ferguson puts it together so carefully and responsibly you might want to refer to it as you debate the neocons who claim the surge is working and the end is in sight. They need glasses, and not rose colored ones. But then retaining political power does mighty strange things to one's vision.

This is an amazing conformation of the Bush administrations utter failure in the handling of the Iraq war. A girl scoot troop could have made better and more informed decisions. Perhaps even a troop of monkeys would have done a better job then Bush's henchmen?

The errors in judgment and lack of military experience within the administration are both appalling and telling of the Bush white house. Every military expert was systematically ignored or sidelined. It's as if the Bush administration's primary and sole interest or concern was the protection and acquisition of Iraq's oil provisions.

This film is a testament to the complete and absolute failure of the Bush presidency.

In retrospect, I suppose 2007 will go down as the year in which filmmakers began addressing the problems in Iraq. The number of Iraq-themed films has piled up and disappeared at a breathtaking pace. Maybe it's not a surprise that the best of them so far is the one that doesn't try to turn the conflict into something fictional. All of the other Iraq movies have been well intentioned but limp; you can tell they want to address what's wrong without truly enraging anyone. Well, Charles Ferguson, the writer and director of "No End in Sight," has no such qualms, and his film enrages indeed.

Meticulously crafted, "No End in Sight" proves what everyone has already known for a long time: the Iraq conflict is a complete disaster. The film is certainly biased; anyone who wants to discount it based on that fact is welcome to. But anyone who wants to deny that America's handling of post-invasion Iraq has been anything but a complete "quagmire" (to borrow a word from the film) is hopelessly deluded. "No End in Sight" is not about whether or not the war in Iraq was justified; in fact, the film goes out of its way to affirm that at first many Iraqis were happy that the U.S. had deposed Saddam Hussein. Rather, the film is about what went wrong after the invasion, about how groups that actually had a reconstruction plan were met with indifference at every step by an administration that really cared nothing for the Iraqi people even as they fed the American public a lot of hooey about bringing freedom and democracy to them. This film makes clear that for all of its recent talk about dangerous nations destabilizing the world's peace, the United States is one of the most dangerous countries currently in existence.

It's terrifying that governments are run like this; if this film is accurate, my office at work is better managed than the project for occupying post-war Iraq. Ferguson can't be blamed if his film seems one sided. None of the key decision makers managing Iraq policy -- Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Bremer -- agreed to be interviewed for the film. The only consolation the film offers is that Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld now look like complete fools. Either they thought they had a good plan for rebuilding Iraq and proved themselves to be ridiculously incompetent; or (and more likely) they never really cared about what happened to Iraq in the first place and have proved themselves to be downright scary.

Grade: A