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"You don't go to war with a country, without going to war with its people."
Charles Anderson, Petty Officer, US Navy
"I was blessed that he was home and not in a body bag or coffin, but a part of him died over there… and I know he'll never be the same person."
Nickie Huze, wife of Corporal Sean Huze, US Marine Corps
THE GROUND TRUTH: After the Killing Ends, takes an unflinching look at the training and dehumanization of US soldiers, and how they struggle to come to terms with it when they come back home.
This film overrides familiar images of heroic soldiers in battle, and overjoyed returning faces, reunited with their families with one effortless stroke. Instead, we see a scenario that can include illness, amputation and injury, depression and post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD), of which Iraq has become a fertile breeding ground. While America's poor treatment of veterans is not news to most, The Ground Truth makes it so personal and real, it is impossible to dismiss its characters simply as war statistics.
The film gives us glimpses into a Marine Corps boot camp that allows us to comprehend how a man or woman can kill as part of their job. We get hit with more understanding of our soldiers' dehumanization by seeing Iraq combat footage that shows routine indiscriminate killing. Their jobs over, the confusion, guilt and shame that comes home with these "killers" is the tip of the iceberg. Left with few resources and families that cannot understand what they have seen or done, their anguish only intensifies. Foulkrod's graphic footage and still-photographs of the ground conflict in Iraq, should forever shatter the sanitized images found on the nightly news and provide a much needed wake-up call for all of us.
I produced and directed The Ground Truth: After the Killing Ends because I felt it was time to stop hiding behind the politics
It became clear while filming, that the broken hearts and shattered lives that I was seeing were so invisible. The suffering was profound and pervasive - whether people were for or against the Iraq War. I knew I had to show just how insidious the effects of killing in combat are - whether in self-defense or not -- and to create a dialogue about how we can change our "consciousness of killing." I wanted to capture the ongoing pain and betrayal that returning soldiers experience when their psychological and physical needs are not recognized or cared for.
So I tried to create a film that might blow the yellow ribbons off the trees, and encourage people to really wrap their arms around our soldiers and their families. I wanted us to sit with the broken hearts and troubled minds of these young veterans, so we can take responsibility for their suffering, that is being experienced in our name.
-- Patricia Foulkrod, January 2006
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