A French Philosopher Sees a Japanese Film in Baghdad

Marcel Proust described involuntary memories as more important than voluntary memories, as they bring with them a component of emotion and feeling.  These so-called Proustian memories also imply a level of absolutism that voluntary memories do not. For example, because my feeling are so tightly wound in to the memory, it is difficult to acknowledge or accept that things may have occurred differently from how I experienced them.  I was keenly aware of this when I draft Father of Money, and I strove to be as faithful to the facts as possible.  I believe it is a highly accurate portrayal of the struggles in Baghdad in 2004.

However, one of the first people to read a draft of FOM, a highly-respect counter-insurgency specialist and Army Lieutenant Colonel, named LTC X, told me that he could not endorse such a book under any circumstances, and that it would likely generate a large amount of controversy.”

He went on to add that if published it, “You [Jason] would never work in Government again.”

It was shocking. This is from a man that I long-regarded as a mentor. On numerous occasions we discussed the shortcoming of various Army operations, one-time even explicitly discussing the same problems I wrote about in Father of Money.  When I had asked him how he proposed to deal with the problem of on-the-spot retribution or certain other obligations the Army was failing to meet in Iraq, he had replied “the Army has Captains for that.” 

This dismissive answer revealed volumes about the problems inherent in how our Army institutionalizes memory. We suffer from the Rashomon Effect.

The Rashomon effect is the effect of the subjectivity of perception on recollection, by which observers of an event are able to produce substantially different but equally plausible accounts of it.  It is named for Akira Kurosawa's film Rashomon, in which a crime witnessed by four individuals is described in four mutually contradictory ways.

How does the type of memory we summon affect the Rashomon Effect? For  people who have been in Iraq, at the level of company commander and below (lets call these tactical level), the lessons learned are deeply formed by involuntary memories. Their actions and reactions blur into large swathes of memory that is emotive and not readily recalled. For those at the higher levels (operational and strategic levels), the lessons learned in those early years are not as emotional and more subject to manipulation. These are the voluntary memories.

Whenever these two stories are told at the same time, different conclusions are highly likely. The tactical level guy, for example, may remember that each day in the street he felt a hardening of the Iraqi population, they were losing their dignity, and would eventually start fighting back.  The operational guy may remember that same time as a period of relative peace for which he received accolades from above. (there are many other variables here, I am just being illustrative)

This brings us back to LTC X who commented negatively about the approach taken in Father of Money.  If he were to view things from the perspective of his Proustian Memory, he may well find that our views are not so dissimilar, but we are telling a story from not only different viewpoints, but also different levels of consciousness. Consider the following contrast.

Recently, I received a review from an enlisted soldier with whom I served previously.  He was a smart guy in our battalion (each battalion gets a few), but we were not in Iraq at the same time. SGT Y (he will get his real name here when the Army lets him go in October) and I remember things similarly. His memories from my book, unlike LTC X, coincide with the narrative as I remember it. He writes:

“I was at FOB Falcon, not far from Dora, 5 years after you left and it really was still the same. I was on a transition team, so instead of bribing council members we were bribing Iraqi Army commanders and XO's. All the while standing idly by as they squandered a mint's worth of American dollars, grinning in our face and serving us tea as they misinformed us about their missions and delivered information to the enemy”

Which only leaves us with one question. If the book only resonates with people who had similar experiences, then why write Father of Money at all? What is the point? Why does this book matter to those who have no memories, involuntary or otherwise, of Baghdad's brutality?

Because we are compelled to seek the truth, and in the words of  SGT Y

“People need to know that there's not always a silver lining; they need people like you that have the wherewithal to tell the masses like it is and, subsequently, that we (the USG and military, collectively, that is) may not necessarily be the hero in this one. To tell them that the real heroes are the Iraqi common folk who, despite having EVERYTHING stacked against them, are still plugging away to keep their families fed, clothed, sheltered.”

In other words, the truth cannot be told by those who are consciously trying to tell a story. It must be cobbled together as it is remembered: spasmodically, episodically, and savage. Reading  Father of Money will challenge how you think about soldiers and Iraq.  Hopefully, the results will surprise you. 
Clich here to buy Father of Money: Buying Peace in Baghdad