Dabbling in history. Review on Charlie Wilson's War Movie

"One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once'The Unnecessary War'”. Always ready with a pithy repartee, that was the ever so consummate statesman and orator, Sir Winston Churchill(1874 - 1965), reflecting on the Second World War(1948). And here we are, six decades later, in a world that still hasn’t figured out a way to settle disputes without resorting to the savagery of wars.   One such glaringly ‘uncivilized’ aspect of the times we live in is the on-going war in Afghanistan that is nearly thirty years old, and which, as we all know, continues to act as the incubator for global terrorism, in addition to wreaking havoc in the daily lives of millions of people in that part of the world(including the western border of Pakistan).

The portion of this war that ‘Charlie Wilson’s War’ refers to is the Soviet-Afghan War(1979-1989) which started off as an ostensible fight for ‘liberation’, only to end up as a quagmire of global proportions.

Purportedly, at the request of the government of Marxist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan(PDPA), the soviets(under Leonid Brezhnev’s leadership)  invaded Afghanistan in 1979 when their 40th army moved in, to support PDPA against the fundamentalist resistance movement of Mujahedeen(Arabic for ‘strugglers’, or people engaged in Jihad). With the help of many Muslim nations, and primarily that of Pakistan, Mujahedeen found support from the US in their fight to drive the soviets away. The ‘cold war’ climate of those years obviously played its own part in getting US to join the(proxy) war against the soviets. After a nine year occupation, the soviets started withdrawing(under Mikhail Gorbachev’s leadership) in 1988, accepting defeat in what turned out to be their equivalent of a ‘Vietnam war’.  Subsequently, Afghanistan entered into two major phases of civil war(one under the soviet puppet regime till 1992, and other under the many warring factions of Mujahedeen till 1996) before finally coming under the control of a Sunni Islamist group, Taliban(Arabic for ‘students’), with much backing from Islamic nations such as Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and UAE. After the fall of Taliban’s regime in 2001, Hamid Karzai(himself an ex-Mujahedeen and a supporter of Taliban, and who had close contacts with CIA Director William Casey and President George Bush Sr) led an interim government with much backing from US, and was formally elected president in 2004.  Karzai's'independent' government has been fighting insurgency with the support of US military presence.

Let us pause now to reflect on what the war has wrought so far. The Taliban were ethnic Posthuns from southern Afghanistan and western Pakistan with volunteers from Islamic nations across North Africa, Middle East, and the former Soviet Union. They were getting training and arms from Pakistani government, particularly from the agency Inter-Services Intelligence(ISI), which in turn was getting help from the US. A similar support was coming from the broader Muslim world, bringing in contingents of so-called Afghan Arabs, to wage Jihad against the atheistic communists. Notable among them was a young Saudi named Osama bin Laden, whose Arab group eventually evolved into al-Qaeda(Arabic for'The base').

The movie is set against the back drop of these serious and grave world events.  Screenplay writer Aaron Sorkin(of ‘Schindler's List’ fame), takes a little sliver of the knotty history, as he dabbles in it for dramatic value,  to develop a rather engaging script  based on the 2003 book ‘Charlie Wilson's War: The Extraordinary Story of the Largest Covert Operation in History’ by George Crile.  Director Mike Nichols’s carefully chosen cast lights up the stage with life-like performances to make the package look as wholesome as this narrow window into history would allow them. The incidents shown only involve the 1981 efforts of Democratic Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson(Tom Hanks) to provide financial aid and arms to Mujahedeen through the then military ruler of Pakistan, Mohammed Zia-ul-Haq(Om Puri). Otherwise preoccupied with his liberal life style, and in the middle of a federal investigation for drug use(by prosecutor Rudy Giuliani), Wilson still manages to find time to take active interest in aiding Mujahedeen at the behest of his socialite friend, Joanne Heering(Julia Roberts), who was ex-consul to Pakistan. Wilson then recruits renegade CIA operative Gust Avrakotos(Phillip Seymour Kauffman) and his team of specialists to devise a better strategy to defeat the soviets, primarily by waging a proxy war to help Mujahedeen destroy the soviet helicopter gunships with US missile launchers.

As for performances, it is nice to see Tom Hanks getting an opportunity to redeem himself, after his uninspiring portrayal of Robert Langdon in the ‘Da Vinci Code’.  He is impeccable as Charlie Wilson. Phillip Seymour Kauffman is simply brilliant in his role as the maverick and over-zealous CIA agent. He got an Oscar nomination for his performance. Om Puri brings out  a convincing aura of disdain that perhaps was a trade mark of military ruler Zia-ul-Haq. Julia Roberts as the Houston socialite, politician, and businesswoman brings in the right air of notoriety needed for the role. On a similar note, the young actress Amy Adams, with her poise and confidence is equally impressive as Bonnie Bach, the unruffled(shaken, but not stirred) administrative assistant of Wilson.

Director Mike Nichols, who has had his ups and downs, is highly accomplished for his plays and movies(winner of many Tony and Oscar awards). And, he should have stepped back with his camera here just enough to widen the view so as to present the whole context of the war. But, the movie is still recommended for doing a good job of staying within the confines of being a piece of art while offering some food for our own thoughts and reflections on current history.