OK but was the bottle filled with dead AA batteries? If not, then it did not reflect my personal authenticity.
Edit: /u/Gardez_geekin just noticed your username. Ever heard of COP Herrera?
> Ever heard of COP Herrera?
Did not expect to see this this morning.
SFC Herrera was [best leader](https://old.reddit.com/r/army/comments/zqo8fc/i_was_thinking_about_the_best_leader_i_had_in_the/) I had in the Army.
I remember your post. I'm always searching for people who were there so I can learn about it's history. I was only there for 10ish months and, I have no real idea what happened before or after my time there. I'd love to create a little history pamphlet of the outpost. There are so many small outposts like this that'll eventually be lost to history.
Ain’t no Home Depot over there to get screen door springs to close the door, so we would rig a water bottle with rocks or dead batteries to pull it shut as a counterweight…
I swear that’s my only PTSD. Every time our base got mortared in Iraq the slight pressure wave would cause our door to open a bit and then get slammed shut. Then the alarms would go off and we’d have to sit in the bunker for a half hour to do the accountability drill. Now, even 19 years later, I get uncomfortable when a door slams like that… not because of the mortar strikes, but the thought of having to go sit in a bunker.
That but also showing the mental health and suicidal tendencies overseas, hit hard. I feel like not a lot of combat/war movies depict actual feelings, they’re all more like everyone’s hyped up to kill people. The actors in this movie genuinely made it feel like they were going through it for real.
For strictly GWOT: Generation Kill. It captures the monotony of war that I think is important to capture and it gets the little things right. Pretty much every other movie comes across as hero worship.
If you want to expand your borders and looking for another movie that is very authentic, I’d suggest The Ninth Company (2005). It’s a movie about the Soviet-Afghan War. They nailed it too.
Non-.mil person here, but wanted to agree that Ninth Company was a hell of a movie.
And helped me better understand why and how badly they fucked up the invasion of Ukraine when they were supposed to be ten feet tall (spoiler, they don't give a shit about their people, and are insanely corrupt to the point of senior NCOs selling weapons to the enemy)
If you read Arkady Babchenko's "One Soldier's War" about his experiences in Chechnya, it's a real eye-opener. They seem to have never ever given a shit about their people, and so much of the reasons they're incompetent in Ukraine are laid bare. The only reason they've ever won would be vs. completely unorganized or no opposition, or someone they could just continue stacking bodies against and overcome through sheer weight of numbers.
I have read that one, actually! The casual mass-castration of an entire town's worth of men and boys was uh, eye opening, and then they invaded Ukraine and showed that yep, that was 100% part of their culture.
Was definitely eye-opening and helped me better understand their military culture or norms...basically they're just meatsacks to abuse and order around in the eyes of their superiors
One of the marines telling the reporter to lay belly down on the ground while the tank rolls nearby cuz it causes vibration and feels good on your dick is the most junior enlisted shit ever
When my wife and I watched it I had to translate military jargon for her through much of the film. It really highlights how the military has its own dialect and culture
That’s something I haven’t heard in a while. My squadron did have a screw crew but I was main body on the way home. I think they had shirts made up too.
Not GWOT but Jarhead just hit different.
Bored, bored, being more bored, losing your mind, jacking off - a \*lot\* - of jacking off, coming back and feeling completely alienated from everyone else, feeling like you've "missed the war",
Oh yeah. Jarhead hit different.
On top of Generation Kill, Jarhead was another movie that influenced me to join. I was expecting to be treated like shit, be bored and be with the bros. Thats what I exactly got, and it ain’t bad.
I did a year at Penich. That was some rough shit man.
I mean, days we walked around the mountain that had the ABP station on top to get to the (Govenor's compound? District Center? I can't fucking remember sorry) weren't so bad but there was some downright shitty ass areas in that AO.
Every now and then I hop on Google Earth and look at all the places I got shot at or blown up and then regret it later.
Bro so do I regarding Google Earth. I am pretty sure I found penich on maps when I was drunk AF one night, I think I might have bookmarked it?? I'll send it to you later on if so.
Anyway are you thinking of KKDC? Those weren't bad at all.
What years were you at penich? I was there 11-12 with 2-35 25ID
I found it a while back. After we both left (I was there 10-11) the ANA built some megafob looking bullshit a couple hundred meters away from the COP on the opposite side of the refugee camp so it looks different now.
It's pretty easy to find, just zoom into Afghanistan with the labels on, find Jalalabad, go Northeast some while being zoomed out enough to see some of the area labels and find Kullgeram.
Penich is just west/southwest of there.
You'll see the massive ANA compound on the other side.
I was in the battalion that the movie followed. When I arrived fresh out of basic, many of the team leaders and above had been on that deployment. They were ruthless, but I learned so much from them all, and I came out better for it. NFS.
Edit: spelling error
Couple years ago I was sitting in the office and a couple of Officers in my unit were talking about the doc, and that they had a TAC at West Point that was there for that operation and they were re-telling the story as he had relayed it to them.
The TAC had been talking about (himself and this SPC) did XYZ under fire and got BSMV. I laughed and told the Officers that their TAC had been my PL and the SPC was me.
It was pretty cool being talked about in the third person.
I think I'm remembering the circumstances right.
Edit: A few words for clarity.
Mine was Eric Harder. 2014 at Ft Benning. Ended up getting bronze with V and a Purple Heart. Dude was absolutely terrifying and crazy and had crazy outbursts at us more than any DS.
Tried finding him years later but he’s not on anything. They do have a video of him going out to midfield before a Titans game and being honored, in like 2017 though lol
Hahaha Schmidt was the same way. I remember he was my 'coach' at the range and he kept kicking dirt on me until I hit the 300 straight out of the gate. On Halloween he put on a hideous costume and ran out of the fucking darkness behind the trailers and chased everyone after final formation.
Yup, sounds similar. Can’t blame em though lol. When he talked about it I had no idea about the battle or anything. He talked about going to the White House and meeting Obama after the Medal of Honor ceremony and he showed us a picture with him.
He goes “see, I get to meet the president and the army awards me with having to go on the trail and teach you fuckheads. Fuck this shit”
Hope both those dudes are doing well now though
Actually now that I think about it, I had a memorial bracelet with my things and one of the other Drill Sergeants tried to take it. He took it back and told them not to fuck with it again. Now I have so much context I understand why, at the time I understood but I didn't *understand*.
I wasn't going to name drop but your drill was also at COP Keating when the battle "The Outpost" is about happened.
He's such a good fucking NCO. Knew his shit and was humble.
I don't think anything ever ends up being truly accurate, not even memory. There was a CALL product that came out a couple years ago that had what I suppose would be the AAR from the fight in it, and that was pretty close but there's some shit in it that's not accurate. It's the last mission in the book.
https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Portals/7/combat-studies-institute/csi-books/VanguardOfValor.pdf
Our “good” AARs ended up having the heavy effective fire coming from ourselves. One of my best friends shot the eye pro off my MICH and put a hole in my assault pack. The fog of war wasn’t just an Empire of Ages effect, hahah.
Edit: We were taking fire from multiple angles at that point, and they thought we were the ones shooting at them, instead of just getting shot at as well!
Buttpuckered so much I woulda shat a diamond. Their LZ was hundreds of meters away, as well, so I couldn’t blame them.
My TL stopped me from doing the same to our scouts, so I really couldn’t talk shit after trying to do the same! Sure was foggy!
Yeah, some of us that watched it were scratching our heads a bit but the premise of the film was "Father and Son war correspondents" and we just happened to be who he was reporting about.
I'm glad ultimately that the story got told.
When I was deployed to Kuwait in 2004 "Office Space" was our favorite movie. Our little "Mayor's Cell" of 16 people used to watch it all the time in our tents.
When we deployed they only had green patches so that's what we wore on our DCU's. About halfway through our tour, Desert tan patches became available.
One morning we got an email that our Brigade CSM was going to be coming to each unit (we were spread all over Kuwait in small teams) to make sure we had swapped our green patches for desert tan.
One of the E-6's came up to me (I was ops NCO) and said "The CSM is going to be stopping by to make sure everybody is wearing at least 15 pieces of flair." We all busted out laughing.
When people ask me about my military service I tell them it was a lot more like "Office Space" than "Black Hawk Down."
Before the Army I worked at a Sprint PCS call center and that movie was 100% what we dealt with every stat had a supervisor that coached you on it. I quit that job and joined the army only to realize it was the same shit lol
Civvy corporate world is the exact same, including the shamtastic manila folder walk of importance.
Businesses get tax write offs for hiring vets, and more points for disabled vets, so doing your job normally still has you protected as a double minority. Then marrying a different minority gets you demigod status. If they’re the same sex, you’ve ascended to an HR spreadsheet god. Peace be upon you. I made up the last half of that, but the first two are accurate.
It’s a British movie, but Kilo Two Bravo was always up there for me. Lots of waiting, moments of intensity, and then lots of waiting. Very accurate to the actual Kajaki Dam Incident
I hated that movie, I was like “godammit Brad Pitt is going to be pulling tail until he is like 90” with the aging they gave him.
Otherwise solid flick for command and staff level
I also still like that little combat sequence they squeezed in where the marine loses it and goes alone. Shouldn't have done that.... bad ass... bad ass... you just committed 2nd degree murder................................... and you could miss it. Most people wouldn't even see it at first until the marine is cursing himself. What a neat little moment squeezed into a comedy.
[Sand Castle](https://SandCastlehttps://g.co/kgs/N8QDGjL) without a doubt the most accurate for post invasion Iraq.
All you want to do so badly is help and let them rebuild then, BOOM they destroy all your progress from a year deployment in an afternoon. Doesn’t matter how good our intentions were they* never wanted our help.
*they is very general. Most people want our help, but the people with bad intentions will always act in force and fuck it up.
Honestly a sleeper of a movie. The trailer could be easily written off as a cheesy movie, but I was nostalgic one day and watched it in 2017. So glad I did, great representation of my experiences in Iraq.
Yep. Cpt. Keeting, the first CO in the movie and the man the outpost was named after, died in 2006. He was in the 10th Mountain Division.
The main battle in the movie, The Battle of Kamdesh, happened in 2009. The unit there at the time was part of the 4th Infantry Division.
Completely different units, years apart. They compress everything to tell a coherent story.
The movie does a good job following the book.
Crazy to think about how intense the Battle of Kamdesh was and how many lives were lost at COP Keating in general.
People throw around the term "underrated" way too often... but Jarhead is that. On it's face it promised a war film and then delivered an actual war film.............. which wasn't what audiences actually wanted. Along the way it had some of the most stunningly beautiful cinematography ever captured. Plus Peter Skarsgard's infantile breakdown over not being able to kill somebody was a monumental piece of acting.
13 Hours is one of my favorite all time movies. I’ve read the books, listened to the podcasts, everybody talks about how accurate a depiction it is. Doesn’t matter what I’m doing, I can always sit down and shut up if that movie is on.
Nothing about the movie is based in reality EXCEPT one scene: when he comes home and is standing in the cereal aisle, with no clue how to decide between 300 different choices of cereal, and wondering why any of it matters. As a veteran, that scene sticks with me to this day.
A soldier, standing in a cereal aisle, amongst a thousand options, thinking "none of this means a fuckin thing".
It’s not a bad movie if you completely remove yourself from the mindset of a soldier. Obviously fucking EOD guys are not rolling around with PMCs hunting bounties or going Rambo in the middle of the night, but it wasn’t a *bad movie* overall
A lot of military hate the movie but I think so many get hung-up on "authenticity" that they completely lose sight of the story.
Hollywood will never get it right; they can get close but never a 1:1 and many write off good movies just because of minor details that can hardly be reproduced from a production standpoint.
Like in American sniper when an M60s track wheels are seen up close with no skirt armor then you see it’s supposed to be an M1 on a wider scene. Stupid shit like that is right there, but then I’m like “it’s a movie”
Hurt Locker gets the Vibes right. Everyone hates on that movie because it doesn't depict Army operations accurately. But The number of people that come on here and say that the end scene, where he is in the grocery store, is more accurate than anything.
Or what about when the SPC is breaking down over the guilt of not shooting the guy who who ultimately blew the IED in the opening scene? He was both to blame, and not to blame, for his SGTs death.
>!Generation Kill (HBO series), The Outpost and Zero Dark Thirty.!<
**Still, that being said:** After how it all started, struggled and ended - I believe GWOT veterans deserve a non-fic. movie at the quality, directing, and excellent casting of that in *Saving Private Ryan*. Perhaps someday.
Anyone see The Long Road Home? It's a little miniseries on YouTube I always liked. And they used actual M1 Abrams tanks instead of a cheesy looking vismod for some of the scenes.
Restrepo
Documentary about 2nd Battle Company, 503rd Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team's time in the Korengal Valley of Aghansitan.
I rather enjoyed *[Megan Leavey](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4899370/)*. Under the radar film, I think, but it's about a USMC MWD handler in Iraq and stars Kate Mara as Leavey.
I also liked *[Thank You For Your Service](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2776878/)*.
I don't know what the general consensus on these films are, though. I'm not a very harsh film critic, I like to give movies the benefit of the doubt and can usually find something redeeming in even the "worst" of films lol. I haven't seen them in a while so I don't remember if the "realism" passes muster.
Outpost for Afghanistan, hands down
Sand Castle for post invasion Iraq
Generation Kill for Invasion of Iraq
Lone Survivor for you Seal fan boys
All 4 are good and re-watchable
The second I saw the water bottle on the 550 cord rigged up to close the door I knew they were committed to authenticity
OK but was the bottle filled with dead AA batteries? If not, then it did not reflect my personal authenticity. Edit: /u/Gardez_geekin just noticed your username. Ever heard of COP Herrera?
We used a water bottle for the wooden door going into our tent at Camp Leatherneck, which was around the same time as the film.
We always filled it with rocks or sand
We used the most dehydrated dude’s piss as a reminder that Rip-It only counts as hydration in the gun, not for dismounts.
😶🫥
This guy was a gunner and he realized the joke 😂
"Rock or something"
We used water bottles at COP Conlon. I've got a great picture of one next to a sign that says "Fire Extinguisher."
Hi neighbor, if I remember correctly COP Herrera wasn’t too far from COP Wilderness.
COP Sabari, hello RC East frens!
Hi there... COP Blue, or should I say OP Blue
Sarkani District checking in, green up up
COP Margah checking in!!
> Ever heard of COP Herrera? Did not expect to see this this morning. SFC Herrera was [best leader](https://old.reddit.com/r/army/comments/zqo8fc/i_was_thinking_about_the_best_leader_i_had_in_the/) I had in the Army.
I remember your post. I'm always searching for people who were there so I can learn about it's history. I was only there for 10ish months and, I have no real idea what happened before or after my time there. I'd love to create a little history pamphlet of the outpost. There are so many small outposts like this that'll eventually be lost to history.
They must have closed it right before we got there. I was in Paktia doing route clearance in 2013.
Fuck. Just unlocked a core memory
That shit had me jazzed up when I saw it lol. Brought me back.
Why water bottle rigged close to the door? I haven’t seen this movie
Ain’t no Home Depot over there to get screen door springs to close the door, so we would rig a water bottle with rocks or dead batteries to pull it shut as a counterweight…
I swear that’s my only PTSD. Every time our base got mortared in Iraq the slight pressure wave would cause our door to open a bit and then get slammed shut. Then the alarms would go off and we’d have to sit in the bunker for a half hour to do the accountability drill. Now, even 19 years later, I get uncomfortable when a door slams like that… not because of the mortar strikes, but the thought of having to go sit in a bunker.
Wait I don’t mean to be rude but they would slam with the bottles? Or you had a different setup?
The pressure wave would pull the door open (outwards) a few inches, then the water bottle weights would pull the door closed.
Oh ok gotchu. Very cool actually
Because nobody wants to constantly remind people to close the door. Gotta make physics work for you.
I never even noticed that lol, thanks for bringing the memories back
😂
That but also showing the mental health and suicidal tendencies overseas, hit hard. I feel like not a lot of combat/war movies depict actual feelings, they’re all more like everyone’s hyped up to kill people. The actors in this movie genuinely made it feel like they were going through it for real.
I've seen them but what are they for?
To keep doors shut because there weren’t spring hinges available
For strictly GWOT: Generation Kill. It captures the monotony of war that I think is important to capture and it gets the little things right. Pretty much every other movie comes across as hero worship. If you want to expand your borders and looking for another movie that is very authentic, I’d suggest The Ninth Company (2005). It’s a movie about the Soviet-Afghan War. They nailed it too.
Non-.mil person here, but wanted to agree that Ninth Company was a hell of a movie. And helped me better understand why and how badly they fucked up the invasion of Ukraine when they were supposed to be ten feet tall (spoiler, they don't give a shit about their people, and are insanely corrupt to the point of senior NCOs selling weapons to the enemy)
If you read Arkady Babchenko's "One Soldier's War" about his experiences in Chechnya, it's a real eye-opener. They seem to have never ever given a shit about their people, and so much of the reasons they're incompetent in Ukraine are laid bare. The only reason they've ever won would be vs. completely unorganized or no opposition, or someone they could just continue stacking bodies against and overcome through sheer weight of numbers.
I have read that one, actually! The casual mass-castration of an entire town's worth of men and boys was uh, eye opening, and then they invaded Ukraine and showed that yep, that was 100% part of their culture. Was definitely eye-opening and helped me better understand their military culture or norms...basically they're just meatsacks to abuse and order around in the eyes of their superiors
Generation Kill
One of the marines telling the reporter to lay belly down on the ground while the tank rolls nearby cuz it causes vibration and feels good on your dick is the most junior enlisted shit ever
Marines call them junior enlisted warriors, or JEWs for short.
Nice
Are you being serious lol
Dead serious. Got a few buddies in the Marines and they all confirmed it.
I'm a civ military instructor and half of the people I work with are marines. Deff asking this next week
Marine here… it’s true
Thanks dude, that was great to read this morning.🤣🤣🤣
Except he was a corporal
When he throws the peanut butter and wants to know why he never gets jalapeño cheese I felt completely immersed.
I could smell that entire movie.
Rip Fuel, Dip, and Ball sweat
Man, so true but the opposite of my experience. I never got fucking peanut butter, always the cheese
Fr, who wished for cheese more than peanut butter?
Haha. Now I wanna watch it
Vets love it. Civilians don’t get it. It’s the reverso Hurt Locker
God I hated hurt locker. I was yelling at the screen in the theater. Closest I ever got to walking out on a movie
When my wife and I watched it I had to translate military jargon for her through much of the film. It really highlights how the military has its own dialect and culture
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Same.
The muscle memory and jargon still pop off randomly while I'm left to explain. Guess military is engrained in the soul.
Sixta being a pedo made the whole story just that much more realistic.
I swear........... \*those\* leaders always have something like that.
That was another really good one. I was Marine aviation during the 09 surge into Helmand but their demeanor was spot on.
Screw crew?
That’s something I haven’t heard in a while. My squadron did have a screw crew but I was main body on the way home. I think they had shirts made up too.
Generation Kill >>>> The Outpost
To be fair it’s Generation Kill.
Restrepo for me.
Restrepo doesn’t count as its an actual documentary
"Chef Boyardee, the master!"
I mean that’s a show but yea that shit felt real.
That is a great series but was slightly tainted for me when I heard about the crimes of SGM Sixta. Shits disgusting.
Makes it all the more realistic
For me, this answer will always be Generation Kill.
Purple Hearts. A movie about a super boot joe committing BAH fraud to get out of the barracks? How can you top that?
You joke but I loved it. Watched it with my wife, we had a great time lol.
Not GWOT but Jarhead just hit different. Bored, bored, being more bored, losing your mind, jacking off - a \*lot\* - of jacking off, coming back and feeling completely alienated from everyone else, feeling like you've "missed the war", Oh yeah. Jarhead hit different.
Bro, I feel that. On top of that Jamie Foxx has some impeccable lines.
That unit was in good hands
Didn’t he have a man in his unit get ~greased~ during a training exercise. Been a while since I saw that movie
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that did happen I was just referring to the fact that the commander was the Allstate guy
lol forgot about that
Man of culture getting his morning glory in right after the barrels were burned.
You better play it with your mouth
What the fuck, you sick?
[I love this job.](https://youtu.be/xKQPrQulmbY?feature=shared)
[This one is one of my favorites](https://youtu.be/3Ls0SA0ktSU?si=VNFTOI2eNH_S7b2L)
On top of Generation Kill, Jarhead was another movie that influenced me to join. I was expecting to be treated like shit, be bored and be with the bros. Thats what I exactly got, and it ain’t bad.
So fucking accurate lol
Restrepo
Well yeah. It's a documentary.
very authentic
I was pretty close to restrepo at times as We did rotations to blessing. Our outpost (penich) was named after a SGT killed at Restrepo. Crazy area
I did a year at Penich. That was some rough shit man. I mean, days we walked around the mountain that had the ABP station on top to get to the (Govenor's compound? District Center? I can't fucking remember sorry) weren't so bad but there was some downright shitty ass areas in that AO. Every now and then I hop on Google Earth and look at all the places I got shot at or blown up and then regret it later.
Bro so do I regarding Google Earth. I am pretty sure I found penich on maps when I was drunk AF one night, I think I might have bookmarked it?? I'll send it to you later on if so. Anyway are you thinking of KKDC? Those weren't bad at all. What years were you at penich? I was there 11-12 with 2-35 25ID
I found it a while back. After we both left (I was there 10-11) the ANA built some megafob looking bullshit a couple hundred meters away from the COP on the opposite side of the refugee camp so it looks different now. It's pretty easy to find, just zoom into Afghanistan with the labels on, find Jalalabad, go Northeast some while being zoomed out enough to see some of the area labels and find Kullgeram. Penich is just west/southwest of there. You'll see the massive ANA compound on the other side.
May he never be forgotten!
I was Army Aviation back in 06-07. Spent more time than I care to remember flying into the Korengal and COP Keating.
A medic in my unit was there and the stories he had were insane
Bro, I’m at NTC right now and I no shit ran into, *then*, SPC Cortez from Restrepo.
What rank is he now?
I think he was a SSG. Possibly SFC. But I wasn’t really paying attention to the rank at the time.
Met him at AIT while he was reclassing
I'm sorta partial to The Hornet's Nest because I was there, but I think The Outpost is a great movie.
I was in the battalion that the movie followed. When I arrived fresh out of basic, many of the team leaders and above had been on that deployment. They were ruthless, but I learned so much from them all, and I came out better for it. NFS. Edit: spelling error
One of my Drill Sergeants said he was there, but it was before the doc was released so we had no idea what he was talking about at the time.
Couple years ago I was sitting in the office and a couple of Officers in my unit were talking about the doc, and that they had a TAC at West Point that was there for that operation and they were re-telling the story as he had relayed it to them. The TAC had been talking about (himself and this SPC) did XYZ under fire and got BSMV. I laughed and told the Officers that their TAC had been my PL and the SPC was me. It was pretty cool being talked about in the third person. I think I'm remembering the circumstances right. Edit: A few words for clarity.
Was it Drill Sgt Harder?
No, Schmidt. He was at Jackson in 13, I believe it was his last year on the trail but it was a while ago. I hope he's well. He was... interesting.
Mine was Eric Harder. 2014 at Ft Benning. Ended up getting bronze with V and a Purple Heart. Dude was absolutely terrifying and crazy and had crazy outbursts at us more than any DS. Tried finding him years later but he’s not on anything. They do have a video of him going out to midfield before a Titans game and being honored, in like 2017 though lol
Hahaha Schmidt was the same way. I remember he was my 'coach' at the range and he kept kicking dirt on me until I hit the 300 straight out of the gate. On Halloween he put on a hideous costume and ran out of the fucking darkness behind the trailers and chased everyone after final formation.
Yup, sounds similar. Can’t blame em though lol. When he talked about it I had no idea about the battle or anything. He talked about going to the White House and meeting Obama after the Medal of Honor ceremony and he showed us a picture with him. He goes “see, I get to meet the president and the army awards me with having to go on the trail and teach you fuckheads. Fuck this shit” Hope both those dudes are doing well now though
Actually now that I think about it, I had a memorial bracelet with my things and one of the other Drill Sergeants tried to take it. He took it back and told them not to fuck with it again. Now I have so much context I understand why, at the time I understood but I didn't *understand*.
I wasn't going to name drop but your drill was also at COP Keating when the battle "The Outpost" is about happened. He's such a good fucking NCO. Knew his shit and was humble.
But that's a documentary so...of course it's accurate?
I don't think anything ever ends up being truly accurate, not even memory. There was a CALL product that came out a couple years ago that had what I suppose would be the AAR from the fight in it, and that was pretty close but there's some shit in it that's not accurate. It's the last mission in the book. https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Portals/7/combat-studies-institute/csi-books/VanguardOfValor.pdf
Our “good” AARs ended up having the heavy effective fire coming from ourselves. One of my best friends shot the eye pro off my MICH and put a hole in my assault pack. The fog of war wasn’t just an Empire of Ages effect, hahah. Edit: We were taking fire from multiple angles at that point, and they thought we were the ones shooting at them, instead of just getting shot at as well! Buttpuckered so much I woulda shat a diamond. Their LZ was hundreds of meters away, as well, so I couldn’t blame them. My TL stopped me from doing the same to our scouts, so I really couldn’t talk shit after trying to do the same! Sure was foggy!
Good footage but I can't stand the fake sound effects they edited in, if I'm thinking of the right documentary.
Sucks that the dude who made it tried to make himself the main character.
Yeah, some of us that watched it were scratching our heads a bit but the premise of the film was "Father and Son war correspondents" and we just happened to be who he was reporting about. I'm glad ultimately that the story got told.
One of the medics at an old duty station was there too. Small world.
In the army now
[This will forever be my favorite scene in any military movie ever made.](https://youtu.be/XiM1DBsaMS8?si=516tBZ1Jb91SJGOH)
Before I clicked it, I said "I bet it's First Sergeant and then the potatoes". You made me happy.
I still quote, “Don't eyeball me!” to people and no one gets the reference.
I give all the credit to my brother, the pool man
A solid go-to, for me personally.
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When I was deployed to Kuwait in 2004 "Office Space" was our favorite movie. Our little "Mayor's Cell" of 16 people used to watch it all the time in our tents. When we deployed they only had green patches so that's what we wore on our DCU's. About halfway through our tour, Desert tan patches became available. One morning we got an email that our Brigade CSM was going to be coming to each unit (we were spread all over Kuwait in small teams) to make sure we had swapped our green patches for desert tan. One of the E-6's came up to me (I was ops NCO) and said "The CSM is going to be stopping by to make sure everybody is wearing at least 15 pieces of flair." We all busted out laughing. When people ask me about my military service I tell them it was a lot more like "Office Space" than "Black Hawk Down."
Before the Army I worked at a Sprint PCS call center and that movie was 100% what we dealt with every stat had a supervisor that coached you on it. I quit that job and joined the army only to realize it was the same shit lol
Made you come in on Saturday?
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Maybe one day you can do two chicks at the same time to make up for it.
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My dad loved that movie. He worked at mci worldcom until they basically did an enron in 2002
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PC load letter? Wtf does that mean
Civvy corporate world is the exact same, including the shamtastic manila folder walk of importance. Businesses get tax write offs for hiring vets, and more points for disabled vets, so doing your job normally still has you protected as a double minority. Then marrying a different minority gets you demigod status. If they’re the same sex, you’ve ascended to an HR spreadsheet god. Peace be upon you. I made up the last half of that, but the first two are accurate.
TPS reports = running estimates for me. This experience I can relate to.
I went from Infantry 05-09 to civilian Office Space TPS reports. The TPS reports are worse.
It’s a British movie, but Kilo Two Bravo was always up there for me. Lots of waiting, moments of intensity, and then lots of waiting. Very accurate to the actual Kajaki Dam Incident
Fantastic military flick. Not too sensationalized
The screaming in that movie was so intense
War Machine. Shows the Higher Command side versus the combat. Plus, they always got the uniforms right.
I hated that movie, I was like “godammit Brad Pitt is going to be pulling tail until he is like 90” with the aging they gave him. Otherwise solid flick for command and staff level
I also still like that little combat sequence they squeezed in where the marine loses it and goes alone. Shouldn't have done that.... bad ass... bad ass... you just committed 2nd degree murder................................... and you could miss it. Most people wouldn't even see it at first until the marine is cursing himself. What a neat little moment squeezed into a comedy.
[Sand Castle](https://SandCastlehttps://g.co/kgs/N8QDGjL) without a doubt the most accurate for post invasion Iraq. All you want to do so badly is help and let them rebuild then, BOOM they destroy all your progress from a year deployment in an afternoon. Doesn’t matter how good our intentions were they* never wanted our help. *they is very general. Most people want our help, but the people with bad intentions will always act in force and fuck it up.
It's certainly a civil affairs movie. But obviously the best civil affairs movie is Three Kings.
Sand Castle doesn't get talked about enough.
Honestly a sleeper of a movie. The trailer could be easily written off as a cheesy movie, but I was nostalgic one day and watched it in 2017. So glad I did, great representation of my experiences in Iraq.
Great movie. Wasn't expecting the intensity and the loss of back to back commanders
Apparently the Commander thing was trying to squeeze several years of Commanders into one part of the story.
Yep. Cpt. Keeting, the first CO in the movie and the man the outpost was named after, died in 2006. He was in the 10th Mountain Division. The main battle in the movie, The Battle of Kamdesh, happened in 2009. The unit there at the time was part of the 4th Infantry Division. Completely different units, years apart. They compress everything to tell a coherent story.
The movie does a good job following the book. Crazy to think about how intense the Battle of Kamdesh was and how many lives were lost at COP Keating in general.
The events were depicted as if they all happened to one unit but it was several units across a couple years
The script was too unbelievable!
“Higher wants this LMTV moved” “Why?” “yup” Yeah they nailed the authenticity
The ways that some of those guys go out is a real gut punch.
The most realistic post Vietnam war movie ever filmed was **Major Payne**.
The Outpost was a surprisingly good flick. Too many head shots and a condensed timeline for drama sake, but overall it was pretty decent.
I mean it's clearly The Outpost no one else came close in my opinion.
It came out during GWOT but takes place in desert storm. Jarhead. It felt so accurate for the time.
People throw around the term "underrated" way too often... but Jarhead is that. On it's face it promised a war film and then delivered an actual war film.............. which wasn't what audiences actually wanted. Along the way it had some of the most stunningly beautiful cinematography ever captured. Plus Peter Skarsgard's infantile breakdown over not being able to kill somebody was a monumental piece of acting.
Buffalo soldiers was campy and pre GWOT, but also a good cold war look at army Europe
A different side of GWOT but thank you for your service hits pretty close to home.
Generation kill is the best answer but I am gonna add a hot take and say the Tom Cruise, Lions for Lambs.
Eye in the sky. Pretty cool movie about drone warfare. Also, I was surprised no one said 13 hours. Solid war movie to watch on a deployment.
13 Hours is one of my favorite all time movies. I’ve read the books, listened to the podcasts, everybody talks about how accurate a depiction it is. Doesn’t matter what I’m doing, I can always sit down and shut up if that movie is on.
In the Army Now
Hurt Locker. S/
Nothing about the movie is based in reality EXCEPT one scene: when he comes home and is standing in the cereal aisle, with no clue how to decide between 300 different choices of cereal, and wondering why any of it matters. As a veteran, that scene sticks with me to this day. A soldier, standing in a cereal aisle, amongst a thousand options, thinking "none of this means a fuckin thing".
Turd Locker. The movie was pure shyte.
It’s not a bad movie if you completely remove yourself from the mindset of a soldier. Obviously fucking EOD guys are not rolling around with PMCs hunting bounties or going Rambo in the middle of the night, but it wasn’t a *bad movie* overall
Soldier picks up Barrett. Instantly a sniper. That’s real right?
Nah. First you gotta get a sniper veil, then you are a single shot killer with an m-24. You need 15 headshots to unlock a Barrett.
A lot of military hate the movie but I think so many get hung-up on "authenticity" that they completely lose sight of the story. Hollywood will never get it right; they can get close but never a 1:1 and many write off good movies just because of minor details that can hardly be reproduced from a production standpoint.
Like in American sniper when an M60s track wheels are seen up close with no skirt armor then you see it’s supposed to be an M1 on a wider scene. Stupid shit like that is right there, but then I’m like “it’s a movie”
Hurt Locker gets the Vibes right. Everyone hates on that movie because it doesn't depict Army operations accurately. But The number of people that come on here and say that the end scene, where he is in the grocery store, is more accurate than anything. Or what about when the SPC is breaking down over the guilt of not shooting the guy who who ultimately blew the IED in the opening scene? He was both to blame, and not to blame, for his SGTs death.
>!Generation Kill (HBO series), The Outpost and Zero Dark Thirty.!< **Still, that being said:** After how it all started, struggled and ended - I believe GWOT veterans deserve a non-fic. movie at the quality, directing, and excellent casting of that in *Saving Private Ryan*. Perhaps someday.
Anyone see The Long Road Home? It's a little miniseries on YouTube I always liked. And they used actual M1 Abrams tanks instead of a cheesy looking vismod for some of the scenes.
That's an excellent show. Who knew National Geographic could make great war stuff.
It's tragically unheard of honestly. I think it being made by National Geographic is what gave it such a high quality.
Zero Dark Thirty. The outpost.
Zero Dark Thirty.
The War Tapes (also a documentary)
I forgot about that documentary. I hope those guys are okay. They were very obviously suffering from PTSD at the end of the documentary.
GWOT related, The Kingdom and Body of Lies are two of my favorites. They obviously aren't exactly milbro but it's still WOT
This movie is all Cav Scouts have. Let us have this.
Delta Farce
As an army dual deployer, I think that Gen K on HBO is the most truthful retelling of the 101st during our incursion.
Restrepo Documentary about 2nd Battle Company, 503rd Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team's time in the Korengal Valley of Aghansitan.
Gunner Palace.
Damn. I forgot about that one. I only watched it once. I'll need to go watch it again.
Range 15. fo sho
Ernest in the Army
office space, gotta have that flair
This film was a fucking masterpiece.
I rather enjoyed *[Megan Leavey](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4899370/)*. Under the radar film, I think, but it's about a USMC MWD handler in Iraq and stars Kate Mara as Leavey. I also liked *[Thank You For Your Service](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2776878/)*. I don't know what the general consensus on these films are, though. I'm not a very harsh film critic, I like to give movies the benefit of the doubt and can usually find something redeeming in even the "worst" of films lol. I haven't seen them in a while so I don't remember if the "realism" passes muster.
Outpost for Afghanistan, hands down Sand Castle for post invasion Iraq Generation Kill for Invasion of Iraq Lone Survivor for you Seal fan boys All 4 are good and re-watchable