Only the Dead

“You deserve better than tyranny and corruption and torture chambers. You deserve to live as free people. And I assure every citizen of Iraq: your nation will soon be free.” These were the words with which President George W. Bush announced the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the U.S. invasion of Iraq intended to rid the country of its dictator Saddam Hussein. The Australian journalist Michael Ware reported on these events for Time magazine. The initial sense of adventure and excitement gradually gave way to fear and obsession when rebels started resorting to suicide bombings – the freedom that Bush promised never arrived. Instead, the country became embroiled in hopeless conflicts involving ever-greater numbers of rebel groups. The horrors are palpable in this compelling and deeply shocking documentary drawn primarily from Ware’s own footage. In voice-over, he explains how he made contact with insurgents, got permission to attend secret meetings and ultimately appeared on the radar of the Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Al Zarqawi, who would later become the second most wanted man on the planet, sent Ware videos of kidnappings and beheadings. Ware had thus become the messenger for Al Zarqawi’s holy war, and this fact threw him into a deep personal crisis. (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)