Discovery Times Channel's Off to War Returns

"This is our first interaction with the Iraqis. Be polite, be professional, and be prepared to kill."

Discovery Times Channel this Saturday will begin the second season of Off to War, one of the most important television programs of our time.

The return of Off to War, the first season of which was telecast in August 2004, continues the dramatic stories of the men, women and children of Clarksville, Arkansas, one of many small towns in America hit hard by the ongoing war in Iraq.

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During season one, which ran for only three episodes, we learned that more than 3,000 soldiers and airmen in Arkansas -- citizen soldiers of the state's National Guard -- were going to be called to war. Governor Mike Huckabee said it was "the largest call-up in deployment that we can ever remember in Arkansas." Indeed, in the second year of the war in Iraq, 2,800 members of the Arkansas National Guard were called to active duty. Fifty-seven of them came from Clarksville.

Only on basic cable could three hours of series programming be referred to as a "season." But as created by filmmakers and brothers Brent and Craig Renaud, those three episodes offered more human drama and thought provoking content than other shows with considerably longer seasons, including FX's Over There, a scripted series that came along between the first and second seasons of Off to War that similarly seeks to address the experiences of soldiers in Iraq and their loved ones at home. Over There seems bold and effective, until one watches the people of Clarksville overcome their deepest fears and deal with the challenges of war with humbling grace under monstrous pressure. Of course, it isn't fair to compare scripted entertainment with documentary filmmaking, but comparisons are invited when a network, in this case FX, chooses to produce a dramatic series about a war while that war is still in progress.

Last summer, the Off to War audience got to know many residents of Clarksville, including Specialist Matt Hertlein, a 17-year-old who initially regarded his deployment as "an opportunity" that would "be fun" (and who quickly changed his mind once he landed in Kuwait, even before he saw combat in Iraq); Sgt. Ronald Jackson, a turkey farmer who had to leave the difficult job of his large business in the hands of his wife; and Sgt. Joe Betts, whose marriage suffered while he was in Iraq. It was impossible not to be moved by the individual stories of each of these people and the many others included here.

The first season of Off to War functioned on two levels: It followed the National Guard soldiers from Clarksville from their brief training to their arrival in Kuwait and their chilling entry into Iraq, when the harsh reality of their circumstances and the utterly unreal quality of it all became unnervingly clear. It also chronicled the hardships at home, as their wives became single mothers, some forced to quit their own jobs or drop out of school to take on their husband's responsibilities, all of them terribly afraid for their men and all terribly lonely at times. The series also made clear that some people in Clarksville believed that the war in Iraq would prevent another terrorist attack ("They did attack us and kill a lot of people that shouldn't have been killed on September 11," said one soldier of the people he was going to fight) while others couldn't understand why the United States was still involved. ("What's goin' on over there right now I don't understand," said another. "Obviously the government has their reason why they want us over there.")

The pressure, fear and grim resolve mounted as the short season continued. "We're about to head north into Iraq," the men were instructed before leaving Kuwait and plunging into the war zone. "This is our first interaction with the Iraqis. Be polite, be professional, and be prepared to kill."

One of the most unforgettable sequences showed little children running alongside the trucks transporting American soldiers into Baghdad, desperately begging for food. There were other telling moments as well, as the men grappled with the reality that they might be killing other human beings. Many were simply overwhelmed by the heat (well over 100 degrees by day) and endless sand (which is blinding and also jams the soldiers' guns). Meanwhile, at home, viewers saw Betts' wife Amy struggle with caring for their young children herself and Jackson's wife struggle with the physical demands of turkey farming. She had to quit her job to take on her husband's responsibilities; eventually she put the farm on the market.

The second season continues the stories of all of these people, and others.

It would have been accomplishment enough had the Renaud brothers -- Arkansas natives who grew up with many of the people featured in this series -- simply succeeded in capturing the horrors of the Iraq war, particularly as it is experienced by men who never thought they would see combat when they joined the National Guard. But they did something equally impressive: They captured the lives of a cross-section of ordinary working class people and poor people in small town America; people who already work hard just to survive made to deal with an entirely new set of pressures brought on by the war. The camerawork, direction and editing are simple, but the content here is highly detailed and emotionally complex. The result is powerful and profound, bringing the realities of the war as it is being experienced by thousands of Americans at home and in Iraq into painful focus in a way that television news coverage simply does not or cannot, for whatever reasons.

Note: The second season premiere of Off to War is Saturday, October 15 at 10 p.m. ET. Discovery Times Channel that evening will repeat the three episodes from the first season beginning at 7 p.m. ET.