We all remember how Vietnam ended. After two lost ground wars in Asia in the last 12 years, after recourse to the history book accounts of the post-WWII era, you might expect Obama to have learned a lesson by now. And you’d be right.

Unfortunately the lesson he’s learned isn’t the obvious one (mind your own business, America!). Rather it’s that modern American wars aren’t meant to be “won.” The measure of success since 1945 is not military victory over a defined enemy, but dollars fed into the maw of “defense” contractors – the more and the longer the better.

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“[W]e are not about to send American boys 9 or 10,000 miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.” — US president Lyndon Johnson, October 21, 1964

“[W]e cannot do for Iraqis what they must do for themselves …” US president Barack Obama, September 10, 2014

A curious inversion: LBJ’s remark came near the end of the “advisor” era in Vietnam and prior to the massive, direct US military intervention there. Obama’s reprise comes after nearly a quarter century of massive, direct US military interventions in Iraq and proposes to make history run backward into an “advisor” scenario. Curious, but clearly not accidental.

We all remember how Vietnam ended. After two lost ground wars in Asia in the last 12 years, after recourse to the history book accounts of the post-WWII era, you might expect Obama to have learned a lesson by now. And you’d be right.

Unfortunately the lesson he’s learned isn’t the obvious one (mind your own business, America!). Rather it’s that modern American wars aren’t meant to be “won.” The measure of success since 1945 is not military victory over a defined enemy, but dollars fed into the maw of “defense” contractors — the more and the longer the better.

Obama’s perverse hat tip to LBJ might have been better framed as an invocation of Harry Hopkins, US president Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s closest political confidant. Hopkins summed up the past history and future goals of all states in 1938 thusly: “[S]pend and spend and spend, and tax and tax and tax, and elect and elect and elect.” World War II put the military-industrial complex at the center of the “spend, tax” web. It has remained there ever since and has every intention of remaining there until the end of time.

Nearly 65 years after the first shots of the Korean war, the US still maintains a force of nearly 30,000 troops along the 38th Parallel. Nearly 75 years after VE and VJ Days, the US still maintains huge garrisons and naval presences in Europe (nearly 70,000 troops) and the Pacific (80,000).

The purpose of these gigantic perpetual deployments? To justify expenditures of hundreds of billions of dollars per year on weapons, gear, ships, planes, barracks and so forth, all provided by our politicians’ friends in the “defense” industry. The killing isn’t the point, except to the extent that the weapons wear out, the ammunition gets consumed, etc. so that more stuff can be bought.

Vietnam was a long and lucrative war but pretty much a one-off affair. When it was over it was over.

The aim of successive US administrations in the Middle East seems to be a return to the Vietnam model, with some helpful modifications. The mythology of ISIS as a substantial (even, in the overheated words of certain Capitol Hill crazies, “existential”) threat to the US, combined with its actual status as an amorphous, ill-defined bogeyman that can never really be “defeated,” lends itself well to the further extension of 24 years of war.

And the aim of the current administration in Ukraine? To extend NATO’s 70-year career, on its own model and on that of Korea, instead of letting a long since militarily pointless “alliance” shuffle off to the retirement home.

The usual leading and fixed question set on matters of war is: “Can the state afford to have this war?” Quickly countered with “can the state afford to NOT have this war?”

The real question we should be asking ourselves is “can we afford the state and its perpetual wars?”

Filmen är med avsikt strukturerad som en bok. Som filmens fulla titel Concerning Violence: Nine Scenes From the Anti-Imperialistic Self-Defense låter förstå är den indelat I nio kapitel. Dessa kapitel behandlar en bred uppsättning historier om kolonialism och motstånd.

En scen visar en intervju med en rasist I Rhodesia som är rädd att svarta “terrorister” snart kan komma att ta makten och beklagar att svarta människor uttrycker en strävan efter välstånd och oberoende. En annan följer gerillakämpar som attackerar en Portugisisk militärbas i det territorium som idag kallas Angola. Svenska reportrar pratar med kristna missionärer som jobbar på att påtvinga monogami på afrikanska befolkningar. Rasistiska kolonisatörer och rebelliska infödda filmas båda i länder Afrika runt.

För mig är filmens kraftigaste delar de som belyser det brutala våld och den exploatering som utgör kolonialismens kärna. En särskilt upplysande scen visar en gruvarbetarstrejk vid en europeiskt ägd gruva i Liberia. Den liberianska militären skickades in för att slå ner strejken. Presidenten menade att arbetarna borde helt enkelt borde ha tagit upp sina klagomål med regeringen innan de gick ut i strejk, och att han endast skickade dit trupper för att hindra våld. En av soldaterna intervjuas sen, och beskriver hur han fått order att initiera våld. Det är en avslöjande skildring av hur ekonomisk exploatering och ojämlikhet backas upp av statligt våld.

En annan otroligt viktig scen avbildar hur NATO-trupper försöker stoppa antikoloniala rebeller genom att droppa napalmbomber på hela byar av civila. Trots att de som försvarar sig mot imperialism än idag förses med ”terrorist”-etiketter, var det genom terrorkampanjer västliga krafter upprätthöll kolonial dominans.

Karske är den mest chockerande bilden I filmen en kvinna vars arm har blivit avhackad, så att hon liknar Venus de Milo-statyn. Hon tar hans om sitt barn, som har en liknande skada, i ett sjukhus, med deras motbjudande skador som en stark avbildning av kolonialt våld

Dessa och andra scener knyts ihop av Frantz Fanons ord, utbasunerade som text på skärmen och lästa högt och passionerat av musikern och aktivisten Lauryn Hill. Fanons text berättar hur de infödda drivs till våldsamt motstånd under kolonialismen, om den ekonomiska orättvisan kolonialism främjar, om dehumaniseringen som är inneboende i kolonialismen, om våldet som begås av polisen och militären för koloniala regeringars räkning.

Den här filmen är för kort för att ge tittaren en full bild av kolonialismen. Istället får vi korta vinjetter som visar oss exempel på kolonisering och dekolonisering. Förhoppningsvis lockar detta tittare att lära sig mer om kolonisering, motståndsrörelser, och Fanons verk. Om inte borde den åtminstone ge alla ett hum om vad det är för värld vi lever i: en värld där fängelser, krig och polisvåld möjliggör massiva mängder ekonomisk exploatering, förbrytelser och rasism.

The film is deliberately structured like a book. As the full title, Concerning Violence: Nine Scenes From the Anti-Imperialistic Self-Defense, suggests, it’s divided into nine chapters. These chapters cover a diverse range of stories of colonialism and resistance.

One scene shows an interview with a racist in a Rhodesia who fears that black “terrorists” may soon gain power and laments that black people openly express desire for wealth and independence. Another follows guerrilla fighters attacking a Portuguese military base in the territory now called Angola. Swedish interviewers speak to Christian missionaries who are working to impose monogamy upon African populations. Racist colonists and rebellious natives both are filmed in countries across Africa.

To me the most powerful parts of the film are those that expose the brutal violence and exploitation at the heart of colonialism. One particularly illuminating scene shows a miner’s strike at European owned mine in Liberia. The Liberian military was sent in to suppress the strike.  The president argued that the workers should have simply filed their grievances with the government before striking, and that he sent in the troops to prevent violence. One of the soldiers is then interviewed, describing his orders to initiate violence. It’s a revealing portrayal of how economic exploitation and inequity is backed up by state violence.

Another incredibly important scene portrays how NATO forces attempted to stop anti-colonial rebels by dropping napalm bombs on entire villages of civilians. While those who defend themselves from imperialism are to this day labeled “terrorists,” Western powers waged campaigns of terror to maintain colonial domination.

Perhaps the most disturbing image in the film is a woman whose arm has been hacked off, making her appear reminiscent of the Venus de Milo statue. She nurses her similarly injured child in a hospital, their appalling injuries a visceral portrait of colonialist violence.

These and other scenes are tied together by the words of Frantz Fanon, emblazoned as text upon the screen and read aloud passionately by musician and activist Lauryn Hill. Fanon’s text tells of how natives are driven to violent resistance under colonialism, of the economic injustice colonialism fosters, of the dehumanization inherent in colonialism, of the violence enacted by police and military forces on behalf of colonial governments.

This movie is too short to show viewers a full picture of colonialism. Instead, we are given brief vignettes that show us examples of colonization and decolonization. We are shown excerpts from Frantz Fanon’s incisive psychological analysis of colonialism. Hopefully this entices viewers to research more about colonization, resistance movements, and Fanon’s work. If not, it should at least provide an inkling of the world we live in: A world where prisons, warfare, and police violence enable massive economic exploitation, crime, and racism.

Translations for this article:

• Swedish, Goran Hugo Olsson’s “Concerning Violence”.