AOW #9: Last IRB Post

The last three sections of my independent reading book, “The Forever War,” by Dexter Filkins, discussed war in the Middle East further. Filkins focused on the fighting in Iraq in addition to continuing his reflection on the fighting in Afghanistan, which I discussed in my last post. He described different battles between the Northern Alliance, the Taliban, Al Queda, and the United States; by using different anecdotes he portrayed the overarching idea that these Middle Eastern countries have experienced war for a very long time, and probably will always experience war. Fighting is apart life there, and the only way men survive is by joining the stronger side before it marks them as enemies and kills them.

Rhetorical Analysis: Filkins was the rhetor of this story, and the audience was the American public, which is apparent by the way Filkins explained certain concepts. For example, in the beginning of the story, Filkins told that one of the only activities of entertainment was watching prisoners have their hands chopped off for petty crimes: it is apparent that he is writing for an American or Western audience because if he was writing to Iraqis or Afghans, this practice would not need such detailed explanation because it would have been commonly known. In his detailed explanations of such awful and almost unbelievable practices in the war-torn countries (i.e. the hand-chopping) Filkins is appealing to logos in order to give the reader insight into why these practices are followed today. Filkins appeals to ethos by citing interviews of specific commanders, soldiers, and civilians, and therefore proving to the audience that he is using primary sources. One prominent way Filkins appeals to pathos is by using diction that evokes sympathy for soldiers, even if they are jihaadis fighting against American soldiers. For example, on page 61, Filkins describes tending to a young Jihaadist soldier who was dying in an abandoned house. He describes the soldier as “very young,” “thin,” and “delicate”. By using such gentile language, Filkins evokes sympathy from the audience. This allows the audience to read the description of how the characher became a jihaadist (like many other Taliban and Al Queda members, he was tricked by other extremists into “killing the nonbelievers”) without automatically judging him as an enemy. In this way, Filkins shows that many of the jihaadists are actually pitiful young men who did not intentionally sign up to kill Americans. This alludes to the message of the book: the War on Terror is a complex war unlike any other because many of the soldiers fighting against the Americans do not mean to to fight the Americans. Filkins presents this message through short anecdotes he recorded during his time as a reporter in the Middle East. In addition to this style of using anecdotes, Filkins uses a mix of long and short sentences in order to quicken the pace of action scenes and build suspense (syntax). Being a reporter, Filkins tries to remain unbiased; however, it is clear that he views many events with an American perspective. For example, he wrote that, like many Americans, he was very surprised and disgusted when he watched the Taliban cutting off the hands of prisoners. This perspective was reflected in his use of imagery throughout the book. For example, his description of the man on page 61 might have been different from a Taliban’s description of the man; a Taliban might not have thought this man to be young because many Taliban soldiers are young.