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At the age of eighteen, Miles Lagoze officially joined the United States Army as a cameraman. During the Afghan War, he filmed and edited videos that were later used by the US Marine Corps for propaganda purposes; the idea was to paint an authoritative picture of justice and moral integrity. However, it didn’t take long before Lagoze figured that there was something completely wrong with this story. Once he was back in the US, he and his crew decided to put together a documentary with all the footage they had recorded. The result is an unvarnished look behind the scenes of the war, showing how American soldiers’ daily lives consist of psychological breakdowns, drug use and the perpetration of senseless and deadly violence.

In terms of storytelling, Combat Obscura reminds me of documentaries such as The Thin Blue Line (1988) or The Act of Killing (2012); because the oppressors are the narrators, shocking contradictions and atrocities are continuously exposed through the wafer-thin leg they try to stand on. If there are any readers out here that think the US went to Afghanistan to bring democracy and fight terrorism, take this opportunity to gain some crucial knowledge. Be warned though, the truth is ugly. But it must be possible to address this truth, so that hopefully we can also collectively see why the borders should be open to Afghan refugees.

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