Editors note: Award-winning reporter and former KTVU news anchor Leslie Griffith sent us this dispatch.
By Leslie Griffith
Tonight you can watch the mother lode of reality shows. It’s called “Bad Voodoo War,” and it airs on PBS’ Frontline. “Bad Voodoo War” is the story of a platoon of 30 soldiers in Iraq armed with both military might and camcorders. Cameras are attached to their humvees and carried in their hands as they take us on a mind-molesting mine-field of monotony that turns into an eruption of violence and leaves viewers sitting as anxious as nervous fingers on a loaded gun.
Director Deborah Scranton (“The War Tapes”) uses her brilliant subject as reporter theme to tell “Bad Voodoo’s War.” With very few “embeds,” (journalists reporting from Iraq,) Scranton jars us into the reality of war by forcing us to see through the eyes of the soldiers.
She chose a California based National Guard unit with seasoned soldiers. Almost all of them have seen prior active duty. They are not wide-eyed “want to be” warriors. They know the ropes, and they know a meaningful mission when they see one. Viewers get the impression there are many reasons to doubt this mission is worth the lives of the extraordinary men Scranton’s cameras introduce us to.
At 18 years old, when most of our sons are working to get into someone’s pants, Jason Shaw learned how to tie tourniquets around his pant legs to keep himself and his fellow soldiers from “bleeding out” during battle. While fighting for control of the Baghdad airport in 1993, the 18-year-old Shaw was awarded the Military’s third highest award for valor, The Silver Star.
He lost six of his best friends during that tour, returned to the states and moved to California to help care for the child of one of those buddies killed in action. Shaw, suffered from post-traumatic stress syndrome, lost his girlfriend and his religion and insisted on returning to die with his “brothers” if he had to. He did not want them in a fight he might be able to help them win. His fear of them dying on the battlefield without him was stronger than his fear of returning to Iraq. He is now 22 years old in “Bad Voodoo War.” I wonder if he understands the bravest people are always afraid.