[Opinion] Saving Private Lynch

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton gave instructions himself to the American commander in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) during a rescue operation in March 1999. It was designed to find out an American pilot whose fighter crashed down to somewhere in Bosnia. The pilot sent radio signals while hiding himself from the Yugoslav, and was eventually rescued by a helicopter. The story was even made into a movie titled `Behind the Enemy Lines` three years later, and opened after the Sept. 11 incident to boost American patriotism.

Filmmakers like a war story. A hero emerges out of the remains of a war or a nurse falls in love with a wounded solider. `Saving Private Ryan (directed by Steven Spielberg)` is a story about a combat unit missioned to save a young solider whose three elder brothers all died in battlefields. It is set in France during the World War II. Eight soldiers finally found Ryan, but he insisted he would stay refusing to go home. Critics are not always kind to this kind of cheap sentimentalism. But filmmakers keep producing war dramas since they appeal to Americans.

Americans are now seeing an even more dramatic rescue operation. Private Lynch, a 19-year-old Texan girl who became a captive by Iraqi soldiers somewhere in Iraq, was rescued by a commando force in an operation backed by the Central Intelligence Agency. The American warlords were able to please Americans looking for good news from Iraq. They even videotaped the operation and televised it nationwide. It was a savvy move targeting the American audience.

Earlier in the 1990s, the U.S. government found the remains of 208 American soldiers killed during the Korean War back after an exhausting process of negotiations with North Korea. They reportedly paid $2 million for the remains. In 1997, they excavated remains of some 350 soldiers in Unsan, Pyongbuk-do in North Korea, inviting families of victims to the scene. It is not only happening in Hollywood movies, but in real. Americans never let their war heroes left abandoned behind the enemy lines. It is this American patriotism that encourages young people to wage a war, eve a war that is unjustified and mindless.

hthwang@donga.com