What if the 2024 election results end with a coup attempt, but better organized than the last? My greatest shock about the Jan. 6, 2020, attack on the US Capitol Building was not that it happened, but that it was met with such a limited response. I was thinking, “Gee, anybody from anywhere could easily take over the entire Capitol Rotunda at any moment.”
VET VOICE, a non-partisan Veterans organization, apparently thought something similar. Exactly 12 months after the original attack, the non-partisan Veterans organization was granted access to stage a secret national security war game steps from the US Capitol Building. Their burning question: Do we have the ability and strategy to thwart a home-grown attack?
The players consisted of retired government officials including a governor, three generals, members of Congress and retired military combatants. In an extraordinary break with tradition and risky publicity to participants, filmmakers were granted permission to film the six-hour exercise.
An insurgent force, infused with retired armed service personnel, wants to reverse the election and install their losing candidate, Governor Robert Strickland, well-played by a shaved Chris Henry Coffey.
A six-hour countdown clock was begun by the War Game masterminds with a notification to President Hotham (played with handsome finesse by retired Democratic Montana governor Steve Bullock) that the US Capitol Building was under attack. Hotham is given six short hours to prevent a take-over.
Chillingly, information is passed to President Hotham that there is also a synchronized attack on key state capitals. At one crucial point, critical contact is lost with a besieged Arizona governor.
Hotham receives ongoing advice from his cabinet, the Pentagon (General Wesley Clark, past Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, aptly plays the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff), and trusted advisers, but the president alone had to deliver a strategy within six hours to avoid an insurrection that would challenge the US Constitution and America’s democratic integrity.
Like regular war games played out by the US military and intelligence agencies, there is no script. The “players” encounter potential threats and must beat a clock to avoid chaos and disaster using their own combined judgment and intelligence.
With spine-tingling music and dark shadows in a reproduction of the Situation Room, simulated newscasts keep the participants (and the audience) informed as to the chaotic progress of the insurgents at the Capitol Building and other strategic state capitals.
“War Game” is must-viewing for Americans as we approach a razor-sharp November election. We’ve already been warned by one challenger that if he doesn’t win there will be a “bloodbath.”
Jesse Moss, co-director, has explained that “War Game” combines improvisational theater, documentary and dystopian science fiction. Along with an extraordinary cast, primarily consisting of retired politicians and armed forces personnel, this kind of presentation brings a gripping realism to the film.
With 13 executive producers, four producers, eight auxiliary producers and five outstanding directors of photography, “War Game” has plenty of support to be the go-to political thriller of the summer.
Credits
Directors: Jesse Moss and Tony Gerber
Official Website ad how to see: https://wargamefilm.com
Released: New York on Aug. 2, 2024, and Los Angeles and Chicago on Aug. 9, 2024
The Players and their Simulation Roles:
Steve Bullock, Governor of Montana (2013-21) as President
General Wesley Clark, Supreme Allied Commander (1997-2000), as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Heidi Heitkamp, North Dakota Senator (2013 to 2019) as Senior Advisor to the President
Linda Singh, retired major general of the Maryland Army National Guard, as Chief of The National Guard Bureau
Doug Jones, Alabama Senator (2018 to 2021), as US Attorney General
Alexander Vindman, retired US Army lieutenant colonel who was the Director for European Affairs for the US National Security Council – currently director of the Institute for Informed American Leadership, as Game Consultant
Elizabeth Neumann, former Trump administration homeland security official (2017-2020) as Homeland Security Advisor
Janessa Goldbect, former US Marine Captain and now CEO of VET VOICE, as Game Producer
Louis Caldera, White House Military Office Director under Obama, US Secretary of the Army under Clinton and California State Rep (1992-97) as Secretary of Defense
Gwen Camp, Executive Director of Team Democracy, as White House Chief of Staff
Kristofer Goldsmith, Iraq combat veteran who studies disinformation and domestic extremist movements, as Red Cell Leader
Doug Gordon as White House Deputy Communications Director
William Kristol, Chief of Staff to Vice President (Quayle), as Red Cell Operative
and others …
. . .
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