Restrepo, Infidel, And A Quick Chat With Tim Hetherington

You may remember that a while ago in the magazine we ran a selection of harrowing photographs taken in Liberia during the brutal civil war. They were taken by Tim Hetherington, whose new projects include the feature length documentary Restrepo, and the book Infidel. If you haven't seen the trailer for Restrepo yet you can watch it here.We caught up with Tim and found out about the two projects, their subjects, and what it's like to be stuck on the side of a mountain while people shoot at you all day.

Firstly - tell us about the film, Restrepo. Who did you make it with, when, where and how did it come about?
In 2007, I went on assignment to Afghanistan for Vanity Fair with the writer Sebastian Junger. Sebastian had an idea that he wanted to follow a platoon of US soldiers over the course of a deployment, and had first come across Battle Company of the 173rd Airborne while in Zabol province in Southern Afghanistan in 2005. He was impressed by the soldiers, and decided that if they redeployed, he’d follow them. This time they returned to the Korengal Valley, a mountainous valley in the north east of the country.
We arrived in the Korengal while the world’s gaze was still firmly centred on Iraq, and were shocked by the amount of combat was actually taking place there. By the end of October 2007, 16% of all combat in the entire country was taking place in that six-mile long valley, 70% of US ordinance being used in Afghanistan were being used in the Korengal’s area of operation (AO), and Battle Company was running a casualty rate of 25% killed or wounded.
The public had no idea that US forces were involved in heavy fighting in Afghanistan. We knew pretty soon that this was an important story and we had the focus and access to make powerful work.

How long were you embedded with the troops for, over all?
We did five trips each, sometimes together, but often apart. Each trip lasted around a month, so the actual filming in Afghanistan started with Sebastian’s visit in June 2007 and ended with mine in July 2008. We also made post-deployment interviews with the soldiers three months after they had returned to their base in Vicenza, Italy.

And you are also just about to release your new book, Infidel. Is this a sort of still accompaniment to the film? Or do you see it as a separate project?
I’m primarily interested in the subject matter and in creating different things out of the material I gather. I’ve never been particularly interested in the still image as an isolated experience instead, I always prefer to work with groups of images, editing them into some kind of narrative form, and re-working them to present across a range of visual mediums that include books, films, mixed-media art installations, fly-poster exhibits, hand-held devices, and magazines. I’m interested in that translation and possibilities that happen in terms of audience and experience. There’s not a hierarchy in this process – although some forms may take more energy, or inevitably have different audiences and scope. In this way, I wouldn’t classify myself strictly as a photographer or even a journalist even though my work does utilize these platforms.

How close did you get to the soldiers you were with? And did that ever make your work harder? Either on the film or the book?
I seek to become emotionally embedded with my subjects, and in the end I became very close to the soldiers. That’s the point. I’m not necessarily interested in the illusion of ‘Journalism’ or ‘Objectivity’, although I am interested in remaining honest and true to my experience. Getting close to people is the hard bit - once you’re close to someone then making an image is not hard.

You are possibly most famous for photography, but actually have a long history of moving image projects, right? For example we spoke recently to James Brabazon, who you were with in Liberia. How did your time in Liberia compare to time in Afghanistan?
Yes, making Restrepo was not my first foray into the moving image - I’ve worked with the medium for over ten years. It’s funny to hear people say that I’m now moving away from photography, or I’m trying to reinvent myself – the truth is I’ve been experimenting with the still and moving images since I began working – it just wasn’t obvious to people because there wasn’t much cross-over before, but advances in technology are now blurring the lines between the still and the moving image.
I worked with James in Liberia in 2003 on the film Liberia: an Uncivil War where we lived with a rebel group as it tried to overthrow Charles Taylor from power. I photographing and filming in pretty extreme circumstances – we were the only outsiders behind rebel lines. The country had essentially been emptied, and there was not much food and no electricity so to speak. I had an AC/DC converter that we’d hook up to car batteries that the rebels had to charge batteries. It was also the rainy season, so we had to wrap everything in plastic and carry it. There was no easy way in or out – no plane to get out on, and at times we felt like we were totally out of control. I remember one point being attacked by Taylor’s forces, and we were on a bridge in a convoy that was taking fire and we’re deciding whether we needed to make a run for it alone and which direction to take. That’s pretty crazy situation to be in. I think the difference to those situations to the type of more modern embedded experience is that you really have to think for yourselves.  By comparison, I was very much part of the unit in Afghanistan – I mean there were still some pretty bad times like when the US lines were overrun by insurgents, but on the whole you didn’t need to logistically think too much about survival apart from the obvious of not getting yourself or anyone else killed.

Did you come away with altered feelings about the war in Afghanistan? How does it compare, morally, with other conflicts you have witnessed?
You know, here in the US, the far right would have us believe it’s unpatriotic to examine the rationale for the war, while the far left suggests you’re a coward if you don’t morally condemn the war. Both these views are really not useful if you’re trying to have a practical conversation on how to resolve the situation. War is a terrible business and innocent civilians bear the price – I think this is a pretty universal truth – but unfortunately it’s also something hard-wired into human beings, and so perhaps a more nuanced examination of it may be useful.
I think one of the most important things I present in the work from Afghanistan is an intimate portrayal soldiers that goes beyond what we are used to seeing. As an image-maker, I’m aware how the media uses images of missiles or Apache gun-ships or some kind of hardware to illustrate the ‘war machine’ (think back to the first Gulf war). However, I think what I show in Restrepo and Infidel is more accurate - take a group of young men, train them together, stick them on the side of a mountain, and they will kill and be killed for one another. It’s that brotherhood which lies at the heart of the war machine – something profoundly human that we prefer to obscure in our desire to sanitize war.
I’ll leave the dinner table discussion about the morality of wars to others. Finally, did you follow up on any of the guys you were out there with? How is OP Restrepo doing now?
We’re in touch with a lot of the guys – through Facebook and on the phone. I’ve also been traveling across the US to promote the film and some of them have joined in to do Q+A’s. It’s very gratifying that they like the work and feel that it also accurately reflects their experiences.
US forces pulled out of the Korengal Valley in April 2010. An Al-Jazeera cameraman embedded with insurgent forces filmed as they took over Outpost Restrepo and you can see the clips from this on the web. I know many of the US soldiers felt very conflicted about this – I mean that’s pretty understandable despite the rationale for the strategy. They are young guys who went through traumatic experiences and lost their friends out there – it would be strange if they didn’t get upset about it.

Tim's latest show, Infidel, opens at HOST Gallery today and will run until the 15th of October. The book will be out on the 6th of October via Chris Boot, and Restrepo is out on the 8th of October.