by MATTHEW GAULT

Sebastian Junger is a rare filmmaker. His trio of documentaries about soldiers fighting in Afghanistan neither praise nor demonize America’s troops. Unlike most popular war films, he doesn’t turn soldiers into superheroes.

The Oscar-nominated Restrepo is about the job. Korengal is about the men. The Last Patrol is about those men trying to come home. In a long and discursive interview, we talked with Junger about warped perceptions of the troops, why he went to war and modern conceptions of manhood.

Junger argues that Americans are enamored with war, even when they say they don’t believe in it. He also thinks young men in the west no longer have a sense of what it means to be a man—and some of them go to war to find out.

“I’m a journalist,” he tells me. “I don’t put any political agenda into my work. I think the right wing tends to idolize soldiers—you can’t talk about them critically in any way. The left wing went from vilifying them in Vietnam to seeing them as victims of a military-industrial complex.”

He laughs over the phone. “Both views of soldiers are just absurd.” More than just absurd, Junger sees both views as harmful.

“No one should be beyond commentary and criticism,” he says. But he also cautions against thinking of soldiers as victims. The way Junger sees it, soldiers choose to fight.

“They’re very proud that they are soldiers,” he says. “It really undermines the idea that in our society people are able to make choices, and the choices they make are ones they can be proud of. It’s very elitist.”

The power of choice—and its consequences—is one of several themes Junger explores in his work. One of the most moving moments in Korengal comes when team leader and former Sgt. Brendan O’Byrne explains why he hates the phrase, “You did what you had to do.”

According to O’Byrne, he chose to go to war. He has to live with that choice. People telling him he did what he had to do robs O’Byrne of his agency.

“The whole society is fascinated by war,” Junger says. He tells me about giving lectures across the country. He’ll stop in the middle of his talk and ask people to raise their hands if they’re against war.

“Everyone raises their hands,” he notes. “And then I’ll say, ‘But who here has paid $12 to be entertained by a Hollywood war movie?’ Just about everyone raises their hand.”

“War is so compelling that you can even get a room full of pacifists to pay money to be entertained by it.”

It also makes for a strange media landscape. As I write this, American Sniper is number one at the box office. James Fallows’ recent article for The Atlantic—about the disconnect between soldiers and civilians—is the most talked about think-piece of the season.

Junger understands both the media’s obsession and the disconnect. “The narratives in war are just more powerful and dramatic than the narratives in peacetime,” he says.

His sister lives in a small, liberal town outside of London. “Every year,” he says. “They light bonfires and the teenagers—boys and girls both—reenact the Battle of Hastings with cardboard swords and shields.”

“My sister is a complete and utter feminist and pacifist,” he explains. “She doesn’t see the irony. She’s participating in this wonderful festival … that’s reenacting a battle. Nobody reenacts the Treaty of Ghent. [It] just isn’t that compelling.”

“We all want peace, but we’re all fascinated by the drama of war. It transcends our moral beliefs.”

“I think people would have a more honest, realistic relationship to the important topic of war,” he continues. “If they could actually acknowledge that part of themselves that responds to it positively.”