Adam Saldana
11/26/2018
Prof. Aguas
The Real Hitmen of the World: Sicario Vs. the C.I.A.
The Federal Bureau of Intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency is viewed as one of the main protectors from foreign and at home threats to the United States by many citizens residing in this country. What Sicario portrays these agencies as an organization that’s willing to bend and distort the laws to achieve their goals. I will be discussing whether these Hollywood portrayals of the F.B.I. hold any credibility as well as discuss some information and misinformation that Sicario characterizes towards this organization. I will be going over past incidents with the C.I.A. that closely resemble the plot of Sicario as well as address the credibility of the scenes and how they depict both agencies. Hollywood movies can distort and misinterpret the true function of the Criminal Justice system, leading many who watch Sicario to have a misconception of the true service of the agencies. With Hollywood having such a large impact on American culture I will lastly discuss the media, as well as the American public opinion on how the F.B.I. works and whether they follow the federal laws that are prescribed to them. First, I want to talk about a major theme that is seen within a large majority of movies that depict government agencies, advanced interrogation techniques.
Advanced interrogation techniques, also known as torture, is a theme that is seen among many Hollywood movies that portray the government agencies and is also plastered over our media with headlines such as “Gina Haspel’s Testimony about the C.I.A. Torture Raises New Questions”. In the movie Sicario, torture is depicted in the form of waterboarding, hints of rape, and also physical violence. With waterboarding being such a controversial topic regarding the ethics of this advanced interrogation technique we have to go over the facts about what happened inside the room between Matt, Alejandro, Guillermo and the DEA agent. Although there was a camera recording what was going on during the interrogation of Guillermo, it was turned off to hide the evidence that Guillermo was undoubtedly being tortured by Alejandro via waterboarding. The legality of this technique has been a controversial topic within multiple government organizations, being both praised and criticized by the public and the government.
A question that has been asked by many is whether this interrogation technique is affective/humane and whether the F.B.I. participates in these techniques in the first place. Upon looking at multiple records released in response to the freedom of information/privacy act request regarding the F.B.I. and torture I did not find any information on this agency torturing the individuals they had under interrogation. Not surprisingly however, I did find information of the C.I.A. performing these interrogation techniques under the fake title of being F.B.I agents to keep their animosity and many more that are within the grey area of legality.
The United States government has said multiple times that it does not condone the use of torture but believes in the use of “Advanced Interrogation techniques”. Although they do not believe waterboarding to be a form of torture, under the Bush administration, waterboarding and other forms of torture-like interrogation techniques were banned within the Military. This was not the case for the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Justice and the Office of Legal Council and see waterboarding as a technique that should be carried out by the C.I.A. With many agencies supporting the C.I.A. carrying out interrogations of this caliber the question that should be asked is whether this technique is effective and whether the public of the U.S as well as other countries think this technique falls under the category of cruel and unusual punishment.
The psychological and physical pain that one goes through when being water boarded causes extreme stress on the victim and according to our current president Donald Trump he supports the use of interrogation techniques and apparently more than just torture, stating “I would bring back waterboarding, and I’d bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding” This leads me to believe that if the president believes that waterboarding and other interrogation techniques should be used so do other agencies on the grounds that they work and aren’t really considered “real torture” according to the president. This technique for interrogation has mixed reviews among the public in both the United States and other countries as well.
According to a poll done on Reuters.com within the United States, more than half of Americans believe that torture should be used to get the information needed from terrorists along with suspected terrorists. On the other hand, more than half of the population believed that waterboarding is a form of torture, with twenty-five percent not believing it is torture and an additional seventeen percent not being sure on whether it is torture or not. With the majority of the public believing that torture is a method that should be used to extract information the next question that should be asked is does it work? According to a peer reviewed journal, Does Torture Work? A Sociolegal Assessment of the Practice in Historical and Global Perspective, torture has been viewed and criticized by many to have its benefits as well as its disadvantages. Although Sicario does hint at both water boarding torture as well as sexual interrogation, the representation that this movie portrays of the C.I.A. is true, in this case with some instances of sexual humiliation/mutilation, religious humiliation and dehumanization. After the attacks on the Twin Towers under the Bush administration many forms of torture were authorized in order to fight the War on Terror. I believe that Sicario not only overlaps these key features of tactics used to interrogate after the infamous 9/11 attacks, but also plays with our emotions by introducing terrorism mixed with the war on drugs. Without a doubt Sicario shows the side of the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. that sheds some light on the practices they are willing to act upon to collect information by any means necessary. A question that I had about the movie was whether the different government agencies that were portrayed in the film were being misrepresented to those watching regarding what they do publicly as well as secretly. Upon watching the movie for the second time I wanted to understand and distinguish the real representation of these government agencies to the fake “Hollywood” representations.
Sicario depicts a very exaggerated, Hollywood representation of some of the more crime ridden cities of Mexico with Ciudad Jaurez being a main area of interest to the agents. Although this movie does a good job and depicting the levels of violence that occurs in the turf/drug wars in the city of Jaurez, most of the scenes that were filmed were either filmed in Tijuana or New Mexico, creating a lot of controversy within the movie. This controversy does not just reach out to the citizens of Mexico or those watching the movie, but is seen within the Cartels of Mexico.
In the scene where Guillermo is being extradited to the United States the method of extradition is through the bridge between El Paso and Jaurez. This bridge better known as the Paso del Norte International bridge not only is the epitome of suspense in a movie, it is also the epitome of something that neither the C.I.A. operatives nor the Mexican drug cartel would ever do. As C.I.A. agents were extraditing Guillermo across the International bridge an exchange of bullets between the Cartel members and the Agents ensued. I believe that this scenario would never have happened because of the steps that the C.I.A. would take to extradite someone of high value in a cartel. The C.I.A. would undoubtedly steer clear of one of El Paso’s busiest and most spacious bridges to extradite a person of extreme interest. Using a more secure highway with more visibility would more likely be an option that the C.I.A. would take. Not only is the C.I.A. smarter than that to use such a busy border crossing but would absolutely not take the risk of waiting 2 hours with a high-valued target. As for the Mexican Drug Cartels, in my opinion I doubt that they would consider bringing guns to an extremely high protected and well-guarded border crossing. With Mexican Military at every corner I believe the Cartel members as well as the Cartel would find it insulting that they would go on a suicide mission just to kill one of the witnesses and could not find a better, more creative way of getting rid of witnesses. If extraditing a prisoner was as difficult as the C.I.A. makes it seem in Sicario I guarantee the United States would never be able to extradite anyone ever again.
As I started watching more I started picking up on little things that the director put in that may portray cities of Mexico a lot worse than they are, more likely for dramatic effect. One thing that caught my eye was the amount of explosions and firefights that could be heard around the city of Juarez. Although turf and drug wars are extremely frequent between many blood thirsty cartels, firefights and explosions are a rare instance within these areas. Juarez is infamously known for its ruthless streets and crime ridden areas but explosions are the least common method of attack in Juarez with the last attempted bombing happening in 2010. I think Sicario represents Juarez Mexico as a city where explosions and firefights are happening daily, when in reality cartels are much smarter and prefer to hire hitmen to get the job done quick, clean and with the least amount of media presence as possible.
Although there are many small things that the movie Sicario got wrong, in my opinion, there are even more things that they got right. Sicario hits the nail on the head of the attitudes of the multiple federal agencies to the life and attitudes of Mexican police officers and Agents. With such a successful movie comes critics, both by public opinion and by the media. The media and the public both have first-hand experience regarding not only the credibility of the depictions of Mexico and their criminal justice system but also the crime that happens in Mexico as well.
Sicario stirred up enough controversy to have the C.I.A. post an article on their official website of the authenticity of this amazing Hollywood film. This movie was reviewed by both highly respected federal agents John Kavanagh under the NSA and James Burridge under the C.I.A. Along with their review on Sicario, they aim to clear the air at other movies depicting the C.I.A. and other agencies in a bad light such as Three Days of the Condor, Clear and Present Danger, and the Bourne series just to name a few. To start the review off they first bring to light a statement that I found funny yet concerning that the C.I.A. would have to reassure their readers. “C.I.A. has always been an easy target for filmmakers looking to exploit themes of corruption and conspiracy in high places” This leads me to believe that not only is the C.I.A. aware of the fact that they viewed as a corrupt agency that is willing to do anything to get their way through legal loopholes, but citizens, Hollywood and other countries are aware as well. What Sicario aims to point out is the lack of transparency that the C.I.A. and other federal agencies have when conducting missions that are less than legal. Although Sicario does not claim to be based on true events, one can assume that what the C.I.A., F.B.I., N.S.A. and other agencies do behind the curtain is to the extent of what Sicario portrays them to be, if not much worse. What I believe the C.I.A. were trying to explain in this review of Sicario was that they are much smarter and use much more precise tactics than what is portrayed in the movie.
With the C.I.A.’s review on Sicario trying to portray their agency as anything but fiction is something that I wanted to investigate further and understand if the C.I.A. is involved in operations like this. With multiple agencies being involved in this movie, primarily the F.B.I. and the C.I.A., I wanted to dive deeper on some of the facts that the C.I.A. has done to drug cartels in Mexico in the past. While researching what the public felt about the movie I stumbled across a D.E.A. agent named Enrique “Kiki” Camarena Salazar, a former DEA agent that was tortured and killed by a Mexican drug cartel. Kiki was taken by the Mexican drug cartel for destroying thousands of acres of marijuana and just like in the movie, was turned on by corrupt Mexican police. He was subsequently tortured and murdered but the agony that this man went through would not go unpunished. The D.E.A went on the largest man hunt done by their agency to find and convict the men that were responsible for this atrocity. This story relates to the movie Sicario so well because the word “Sicario” in Spanish means hitman and that is the underlining message of what the C.I.A. does in both the movie and in the case of Kiki Salazar. In 2013 of October two former C.I.A. agents told news networks that other C.I.A. agents were in on the abduction, murder and torture of Kiki. Their statements would shock everyone around them stating that the C.I.A. was working with drug traffickers employed by the Mexican cartel in order to move around cocaine, and other drugs into the United States. What this proves to me is that the C.I.A. has and may be currently partnering up with cartels in Mexico for their own gain, just as they were doing in Sicario. They knew they couldn’t stop the drug war because of the high supply of narcotics that the United States needs. Although the C.I.A. has denied these allegations, I feel like the ending of the movie really sets this whole conspiracy theory in stone as Alejandro puts a gun to Kate Macy’s head and makes her sign a paper that legitimizes the operation as being within the scope of being legal. These statements made by Ex-C.I.A. agents along with what the movie portrays the C.I.A. to be solidifies both my and I am sure many others beliefs that the C.I.A. is willing to break the laws in order to achieve their goal.
Throughout contemporary America the border between what is legal and illegal for independent agencies such as the C.I.A. and dependent agencies such as the F.B.I and the D.E.A are blurred. This Laissez faire attitude that America has with these agencies is prevalent with their whistle blowers we see in the media and the United States’ willingness to turn a blind eye away from these agencies. Sicario not only portrays these agencies in a way that is transparent but also dives deep into the lives of everyone involved in the drug war, even going as far to peer into the lives of civilians after the drug lord was killed. Throughout this essay I have gone over how Sicario portrays the Central Intelligence Agency is compared to their level of corruptness in contemporary America by evaluating their reputation throughout the media as well as files given to me by the Freedom of Information Act. The scenes in Sicario show a level of transparency that these agencies do not want the public to know or get any ideas of what they are doing behind closed doors. Although this movie does have a Hollywood exaggeration lingering behind it, the motives of both the Cartels and the Federal Agencies as well as their means of operating are believable. This movie has showed me the realm of possibilities that the United States takes in order to get what they want, even if it means breaking the laws that they put in place. Sicario shows the dark side of reality, not a side that everyone must see, but a side that everyone must accept as being genuine but also alarming. From the C.I.A.’s involvement in torture to working with the Mexican Cartel, everything that I found disturbing with this movie ended up being true and really showed me the power that Hollywood has in exposing the validity of these agencies. Not only does it scare me, but it should scare those who look up to these agencies and praise them for the work that they have done that is without a doubt kept behind closed doors.
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