06 September 2018

Real World Elements in The Bourne Legacy (2012)


As a follow-up to the piece I wrote about Jason Bourne (2016), I thought some might be interested in a similar piece on the 2012 film.
Not as popular as the Matt Damon installments this movie also contained some interesting and suggestive elements. In some ways this episode took on a slightly more science-fiction based theme.


This film references secret projects akin to the well known Treadstone and Blackbriar programmes of the other movies. This time it's Outlook and Larx, super-soldier schemes involving genetic engineering and manipulation. These projects are so ultra-secret that apparently they are almost beyond normal intelligence channels, unknown to relatively senior figures.
Compartmentalization plays a key element in how the story unfolds. There are numerous parallel programmes, each all but hidden from the other, something we've seen before. The genetic scientists aren't aware of how their work is being applied. Field agents and programme participants aren't aware of other parties to the experiment(s). That's fairly realistic and key to how government secrecy functions. I remember when I unfortunately wore an American uniform that one sees all sorts of things (especially given my position) and yet it's often difficult to take in the full scope of what's happening. This is deliberate and yet the savvy and the interrogative can pick up a fair bit... but this can also garner some unwanted attention unless you're careful.
The puppet-master in this case is a 'retired' colonel running a seemingly innocuous agency known as the National Research Assay Group or NRAG. It sounds like a think-tank or auditing group but in reality it's the nexus of several top secret programmes that seem to function within or alongside the CIA.
Why alongside? There are hints in the movie (as well as the 2016 Bourne movie) of the internecine battles and shifts within the intelligence world. Just as the 2016 film deals with DNI/DCIA tensions, this film suggests intelligence agency detachments and/or overlapping with the Department of Defense. There are references to the Joint Special-Operations Command (JSOC) which under George W Bush was transformed into not just an umbrella organisation for Delta Force, Seal Team 6 and other elite special ops groups, but it also became the hub of CIA-type activities. Functioning as an alternate CIA, JSOC functioned within the Pentagon apparatus and was more directly answerable to and controlled by the White House. It became a source of controversy and many asserted that it was functionally the new means of 'legal' assassination, a way for the White House to bypass some of the restrictions and bureaucracy that had restricted the CIA.
Ironically it was Bush in the wake of 9/11 that effectively diluted the CIA by creating the new DNI position, a serious blow to the power of the Director of the CIA, who used to double as the Director for all US intelligence agencies, the now defunct DCI.
In the movie, the Ed Norton character in charge of NRAG is directly liaising with a JSOC general as they discuss deep cover infiltrations of the DPRK (North Korea), Iran and (perhaps controversially) Pakistani ISI.
Outcome and Larx, the super-soldier programmes are also run in coordination with a large pharmaceutical company whose scientists all have top level security clearances. Additionally pharmaceutical production is carried out offshore which also makes sense in terms of regulation as well as some of the research. The US has a long record of conducting experiments in Third World countries and is also able to pollute with impunity. All these aspects of the film were thoroughly realistic.
Not only are the various programmes and their aspects compartmentalised, there are parallels. This feature hinted at in other movies like Contact suggests the US will essentially replicate programmes in case something happens that causes them to suddenly abort. A programme can be ended (for whatever reason) but then the essence of the project continues because a parallel apparatus is already in place.
What's perhaps most controversial about the movie is the question of deaths. The movie hints at several 'mysterious' endings. Dr. Hirsh, the Sidney Gottlieb character in the films suddenly dies just before he's about to give testimony before Congress. The movie obviously means to suggest his death (the Hirsh character not Gottlieb's) was neither an accident nor a coincidence. In fact if anyone looks into the Church Committee and Rockefeller Commissions of the 1970's there were several 'suspicious' deaths, people who died or were murdered just before they were to provide testimony. It's nothing new.
Additionally the movie depicts a Manchurian Candidate scene in which one of the scientists is somehow 'triggered' and suddenly commits a mass shooting, attempting to eliminate all the scientists involved in the programme. For some this will seem far-fetched. Others will simply nod, as many believe the government (through MKULTRA et al.) has been involved in this sort of thing for decades and will point to several incidents as possible examples.
Finally, there's a (failed) case of murder by suicide. Agents attempt to murder someone but clearly intend to make the scene appear as a suicide, something that has been suggested on a multiple occasions regarding the suspicious deaths of journalists, whistleblowers and others.
One thing that struck me as interesting is the whole 'feeling' that was still in the air in 2012. At that point in time the intelligence agencies were viewed as being in a state of breakdown. Many viewed them as incompetent almost Keystone Cop figures in the wake of 9/11 and the WMD debacle. Of course I think sometimes the CIA wants to portray itself as less than competent. In the face of accusation many spokesmen have evoked past errors and suggested the agency is not able to pull of 'big' operations. It's a form of plausible deniability and a means of deflecting an argument by means of reductio ad absurdum, or reducing it to absurdity. I for one don't think the WMD episode was a debacle at all but a deliberate deception.
Additionally US intelligence agencies were still emerging from torture scandals and various Constitutional controversies involving everything from drone strikes, US citizen assassination, spying on the public etc... Just a few months after the film's release in the summer of 2012, the long rumoured 'Disposition Matrix' or Kill List would be revealed to the public.
While they weren't quite villains in 2012, the public perception of the intelligence agencies was under something of a fog.
What a change in 2016! Suddenly in light of Trump the agencies are held up as political and cultural stalwarts, beacons of truth, bastions of trust and the very marrow of the American order. It was quite a transition.
It was also amazing to watch the very people who in their 20's and 30's had witnessed everything from the Phoenix Program to COINTELPRO and the Pentagon Papers suddenly become great supporters of the CIA, FBI and the military establishment. The old radical Left joined the Democratic Party mainstream and subsequently abandoned the ideologies they once stood for. The 2016 Bourne film continued in its cynical portrayal of American intelligence agencies, but even these films hint at the problem being a 'rogue' element. Pam Landy turns on the agency in The Bourne Ultimatum saying 'this isn't us'.
But it is. I guess some are able to spend their careers inside and are not able to put it together. The movies are actually profoundly anti-American, which in terms of the larger cause of truth I consider to be a good thing. Those concerned with truth, such as Christians cannot possibly be pro-American in their sentiments. However, by retaining that 'rogue' factor a lot of the public can watch the films and never pick up on the fact that the very people portrayed as 'heroes' by the mainstream are in fact some of the worst villains in real life.
See also:

2 comments:

  1. Maybe the existence of a Landry depends upon a kind of warped perception of herself. The line might have been thrown in there from DOD money or because it's a part of the general trope, but there's no reason from anything in any of the movies to think that assessment makes any sense. The irony is that she's the anomaly, but maybe believing in the idea of the institution (despite the facts) is the only thing that can keep someone like her from sanely remaining in the first place.

    ReplyDelete
  2. In terms of the movies, she has the big wake-up moment during the 3rd (Ultimatum) film wherein Noah Vosen (David Strathairn) turns vicious and from her perspective unhinged and megalomaniacal and starts ordering the assassinations of CIA assets he has deemed to be treasonous.

    I would say she's not upset over killing but she's probably upset over the arbitrary standards and lack of perceived due process. Also, on a personal level she knows Nicky Parsons and already in film #2 (Ultimatum) she's beginning to sniff something funny about the Bourne narrative and figures like Conklin (Chris Cooper) and of course Ward Abbott. She initially has the narrative wrong but by the time Abbott is finished, she knows it's all a farce and starts to make overtures to Bourne.... which overlaps the 2nd and 3rd films. The phone call with Bourne at the end of the 2nd film takes place just after the Vosen out-of-control sessions in film 3.

    I think maybe looking at her role at the beginning of film 2, she's a task chief, involved in an investigation, seeking evidence, chasing corruption etc... She may not have been involved in the 'killing' and some of the other black ops/dark stuff.

    The revelatory moment is probably extreme when it comes to organisations involved in overt violence but even many seemingly innocuous organisations... medical, business, governmental, academic have their 'lines'.... their firewalls protecting their inner sanctums. Those that make it to that point are faced with a crisis as they suddenly realise that the heart that makes their organisation a living functioning organism is rotten, exploitative, deceitful, corrupt and vindictive. There's nothing noble, honourable, virtuous and redeemable about it.

    They have a choice, either move forward up to the front of the plane, into first class or jump out, probably with no parachute. Once you've crossed the bulkhead into first class you either have to join them or jump. Most sit down and order a cocktail. A handful try and pretend they're not seeing what they just patently saw.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.