October 6, 2022

By Steve Jonas MD, MPH

"Either this nation shall kill racism, or racism shall kill this nation." (S. Jonas, August, 2018)

I did not see the original "Maverick," although, totally ignoring the Scientology connection, I have been a big Tom Cruise fan for many years now. As it happens, my favorite movie of his goes way back. (It is "The Firm," based on a John Grisham novel about, funnily enough, a crooked law firm.) This is so even though I do also very much like Cruise's "Mission Impossible" series, one reason being that I go back to the original television series by that name from the 1960s-70s. But the buzz, and then the previews, for this "Top Gun" sequel, drove me to see it. And on a big, big movie theater screen (although not I-max), from the technical, amazing cinema, incredible (truly unbelievable), special effects perspective, it is a fabulous movie. [Why publish this review now?  It is streaming, somewhere.)  As for the story and its politics (yes, its politics --- just remember whose column you are reading, folks), hardly (see below).

On the "fabulous move" side the screen/film play was designed to make you feel that you are in the cockpits of Cruise and his fellow pilots as they make an incredible run (on the not-fabulous-at-all political side) to destroy what the script tells us is a newly assembled stockpile of uranium --- assembled by an unnamed foreign power. Just which the foreign power is and why they would assemble such an incredibly valuable set of resources in one place, above ground, are facts not shared with the audience. Nor are we told why U.S. intelligence/military and, presumably, the Administration which they serve, want this done. Would the uranium be used (conditionally, that is) to make bombs for an imminent attack, to create a stockpile of bombs for future attack(s), to provide the fuel for a set of nuclear power plants which could in the future be subject to meltdown causing an environmental disaster? (Well, that latter one couldn't be the cause for a U.S. raid, now, could it?) Or, like the classic George Mallory line about why would one climb Mt. Everest, "Because it's there"?

Well, none of the above. Actually, it's more like "the uranium stockpile is being assembled, out in the open, for no stated purpose (in the movie), so that a truly visually fantastic Tom Cruise movie can be made about it." And it is visually fantastic. (I presume that at least some of the readers of this column will have already seen it and will agree with me). But let's now take a look at the plot. As noted, not so fantastic, unless you are a fan of potential nuclear war.

Cruise's character, Capt. Pete "Maverick" Mitchell is in the U.S. Naval Air Force. (One wonders if the name connection to Gen. William Mitchell, considered the founder of the U.S. Army Airforce, is coincidental. And yes, unlike the U.S. Air Force which became separated from the Army during World War II, this Mitchell's air force has remained attached to the Navy.) As one of the reviews says: "Maverick is one of the most impressive pilots to ever come out of the TOPGUN academy, but after over 30 years in the Navy, he hasn't been promoted beyond Captain [the equivalent of Colonel in the Army/Marines] due to his penchant for operating outside the bounds of his missions as he constantly flexes or outright disobeys the rules." (A friend of mine, one of the smartest career military men I ever met, never made it beyond Lieutenant ["Light"] Colonel in the Army, because he continually bucked the system with bright ideas that no one wanted to listen to. At over 30 years of service, Mitchell is on the verge of retirement. But then he is called back for one more run. (A nice note that I should think not too many viewers will notice is that at beginning and the end of the film Mitchell is seen doing maintenance on his personal military aircraft, which happens to be one of the "Red Tail" P-51 Mustang fighter escorts that was flown by the segregated Tuskegee Air Squadron during World War II, which Mitchell has scrupulously restored.)

But then, as a feature in The New York Times tells us, another attraction of this film beyond the phenomenal moviemaking is that: “ ‘Top Gun: Maverick' Enters the Pantheon of Conservative Fan Fiction. The American right has embraced Tom Cruise's latest blockbuster, hailing the movie as a patriotic gesture produced in defiance of 'woke' liberal elites and the Chinese Communist Party."

As it happens, this has happened both at the "on-the-street" level and the political one:

• "Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida: 'Any movie that's not, like, overwhelmingly woke can actually appeal to normal people.' (DeSantis had not seen the movie at the time; he later saw it with his wife for her birthday, he said.)

• "The Fox News host Jesse Watters: 'We've been longing to see a movie that's unapologetically American, and we finally got it.'

• "Tomi Lahren, of the conservative sports outlet OutKick and Fox: 'The undeniable success of Top Gun is proof Americans are sick of WOKE and just want to watch good movies without a grandstanding social justice message!!' "

[As it happens, there are passing references to homosexuality among the pilots and crew, but I guess the “anti-WOKE” folks above just missed them.]

But beyond those considerations, I am speculating here that on either a conscious or subconscious level this movie appeals to the Right politically at least in part because it reinforces the message that has implicitly been part of U.S. foreign policy, and the messaging campaigns that have supported it, since the end of World War II. That policy began, post-World War II, with the "anti-Communist Expansion" Truman Doctrine. It was first set up to deal with the post-War situation in Greece, where the Communist Party which had mounted the vast majority of the Resistance to the Nazi invasion/occupation, was being opposed for control of the post-war government by right-wing forces, at least some of which had supported the Nazis or just stayed out of the during-the-war conflict. That Truman Doctrine message was, of course: "the United Sates can violate international law, without consequence, as long as the U.S. says that it's OK." Before we get to a partial list of how the U.S. has done this, over and over again since World War II, without legal consequence, let's see how the plot of this movie supports, and fully justifies, that policy.

"Maverick" is called back to active service (not having yet retired, he is still on "active duty," even though for quite some time he has had nothing to do but take care of his beloved "Red Tail") to provide special training for a group of top "Top Gun" pilots. As noted, their upcoming special mission is to "take out" a growing collection of vessels that presumably contain uranium that presumably can be used for the production of nuclear weapons. Let's stop there for a moment. Although the vessels are conveniently labeled with the "nuke here" symbol, the movie-goer is not told (or if he/she was, I missed it) how it has been determined that they contain uranium, nor (unless I missed it too) has he/she been told specifically, what the uranium would be used for.

As noted, rather than being buried in a cave or some heavily reinforced concrete structure, the vessels are stored on the surface, in a very mountainous area, at the end of a deep, twisting valley, the top edges of which are defended by a vast array of multiple-rocket launchers (the assumption obviously having been made by the defenders that no one could possibly fly through that valley, below, out of the range of the rocket launchers which can be suppressed only just so far). And so on, and so forth. Further, interestingly enough again, there is no indication in the movie's script that that mission has been authorized under any kind of legal authority (other than that of the Executive Branch of the U.S. Govt.). If it had been, in the plot, surely the scriptwriters would have told us so. But that appears nowhere.

This attack then, takes place on the soil of a foreign country without, clearly, a declaration of war, or any indication that there had been failed negotiations and the United States had determined that there was an imminent threat to its territory. Not a threat down-the-road, mind you, but an imminent one.

The famous "Article 51" of the United Nations Charter says:

"Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defence if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security. Measures taken by Members in the exercise of this right of self-defence shall be immediately reported to the Security Council and shall not in any way affect the authority and responsibility of the Security Council under the present Charter to take at any time such action as it deems necessary in order to maintain or restore international peace and security."

Now presumably in this modern age of super-fast weapons, this Article can be correctly interpreted to mean, beyond "occurred," "clearly imminently threatened" (and here's the proof). But there is nothing like that in this movie (or if there is, again it went by so fast that I missed it). Indeed, there is nothing to indicate that this attack is NOT a violation of international law. On their own, the U.S. military/intelligence services have determined, as noted above, that a stockpile of uranium (not weapons), being assembled by an un-named foreign power, on the Earth's surface, in a very-difficult-to-reach (except for our super-trained "Top Gunners") location needs to destroyed, immediately.

OK. It is just a movie. But movies send messages. And the message of this one is: "The U.S. can do just about anything of this sort that it likes to do, and there will be no repercussions." Now, to be sure, the movie does end before any possible reaction of the attacked nation in revealed. But that message is clear, nevertheless. And thus, the point here is clear: "the U.S. can do this, and does do this over-and-over again, and it's OK."

Really? Well, let us count just a few of the ways that sort of thing has really happened.

1. The organization of the War on Viet Nam in the 1950s by the Dulles Brothers in clear violation of the 1954 Geneva Agreement that had brought the French-Indochinese War to an end in 1953.

2. George H.W. Bush's invasion of Southern Iraq. It occurred during negotiations between Iraq and Kuwait over, among other things, Kuwaiti "diagonal drilling" across the common border into Iraqi oil, and clear access for Iraq to the Arabian Gulf to which Iraq was entitled by international law. The attack took place two days after Saddam was told by the US Ambassador April Glaspie "We have no opinion on Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait." No warning. No legal justification provided.

3. The invasion of Iraq proper by "W" on the excuse that "Saddam has weapons of mass destruction," when two weeks before the ultimate invasion the U.S. had been assured by the Chief U.N. nuclear weapons inspector, Hans Blix, that there were none.

4. The apprehension of Osama bin Laden in 2010, which certainly could be justified. Osama was a former major CIA asset in organizing and carrying out, with major aid from U.S. weaponry, the campaign which eventually drove the Soviet Union, which had been called into help against the Right-wing guerillas, out of Afghanistan. (Under no provision of international law which I can find ---- after all the insurgency was being carried out against an internationally recognized Afghani government --- absent a Declaration of War, was that intervention justified.) Although Osama himself always denied any direct connection to "9/11," he was connected in one way or another to whichever conspiracy organized the raid. After he was caught, while on a Navy ship presumably to be transported to the United States for trial, he was assassinated. (Yes, the use of that particular word is justified and also apt. For the word is derived from the Arabic term for "political murder.") Yes, Osama was certainly hated in the U.S., but that does not justify a clear summary execution, with no justification in the law.

5. And now we have the assassination (again, that word is carefully chosen) of Ayman as-Zawahiri. He was, apparently, the current leader of al-Qaeda. He was involved in one way or another with the 9-11 attacks. From the perspective of many U.S. (including myself) he was clearly a bad guy, and a threat to U.S. interests (although he was ill and very far away, and the U.S. has been [thankfully] gone from Afghanistan for about a year). But this was, again, clearly an extra-judicial process, and once again the U.S. will have gotten away with it, without being held to account by any body or in any judicial forum.

Which brings us back to "Top-Gun, Maverick," very briefly. That is, to repeat, the U.S. carries out an action, un-sanctioned by any international law or body, and is held accountable by no-one, and in this movie the subject of sanctioned-by-international-law doesn't even come up. Which, underlying all of the other reasons, may be why the U.S. Right likes it so much. To which one might say, "do see it anyway; it is such marvelous movie-making." To which one might respond, "do see Leni Riefenstahl's 'Triumph of the Will.' It is such marvelous movie-making."

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An earlier version of this column was published at: URL:  https://www.opednews.com/articles/Top-Gun-Maverick--How-t-by-Steven-Jonas-International-Law_International-Policy_International-Politics_Law-220804-908.html

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Steven Jonas, MD, MPH, MS is a Professor Emeritus of Preventive Medicine at StonyBrookMedicine (NY) and author/co-author/editor/co-editor of over 35 books.  In addition to being a contributor to BuzzFlash.com, he is a “Trusted Author” for OpEdNews.com , and an occasional contributor to Reader Supported News/Writing for Godot; and From The G-Man.  His own political website, stevenjonaspolitics.com, is an archive of the political columns he has published since 2004.  He was also a triathlete (36 seasons, 256 multi-sport races), retiring after the 2018 season.

Dr. Jonas’ latest book is Ending the ‘Drug War’; Solving the Drug Problem: The Public Health Approach, Brewster, NY: Punto Press Publishing, (Brewster, NY, 2016, available on Kindle from Amazon, and also in hardcover from Amazon).  In 1996 he published a ‘future history’ of the United States entitled The 15% Solution: How the Republican Religious Right Took Control of the U.S., 1981-2022: A Futuristic Novel (Third Version published by Trepper & Katz Impact Books, Punto Press Publishing, 2013, Brewster, NY), and available on Amazon. 

He has a distribution list for his columns.  If you would like to be added to it, please send him an email at sjtpj@aol.com.