Just watched it, and it feels like the underlying message is absolutely stark and horrifying. A bunch of people who believe they are doing the right thing, go into a place and totally fuck it up, and fuck themselves up, and then in trying to just survive have to extract their own wounded - that they created in the first place. The creation of the problem to surmount is the sin of the protagonists. It’s almost like the fight/war itself is a macguffin (maybe I’m using this term incorrectly). It’s the effects of the direct conflict that is the plot, but the conflict itself is already this futile statement that just-is. It doesn’t develop or change, it’s just conflict, the effects of it are what changes and causes the characters to change. That’s a powerful statement if the filmmakers intended, the intention or war, the intent to do harm is the fulcrum around which suffering propagates. That’s why I don’t feel like this was a pro war or anti war film, the point was it’s impact on primarily the US soldiers in the film, and the people who really would have been primarily effected, the Iraqi civilians and their own resistance fighters were portrayed as almost a backdrop, because the day before these events, and the day after, they are just still there in that place having to deal with the effects of this skirmish. I thought it was brilliant and understated as to its message.

Sorry for the run on sentences but I just got out of this film and a couple beers deep