By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO – At the Asian Film Festival in New York, there is a Hong Kong-produced film titled Operation Red Sea. Always interested in stories about waterways near Israel, I requested and received a screener for review purposes.
It’s a well-done, riveting war film—on the order of Dunkirk or Saving Private Ryan – in which viewers find themselves rooting for the Chinese Navy in fights against Somali pirates and later against terrorists in a fictional Arab country that one might equate to Yemen.
Besides high-tech war scenes, we follow the stories of Chinese Marines, who are humanitarian in their outlook toward the civilian population, and highly loyal and supportive of each other.
We watch them rescue the Chinese consul in a rebel-held, fictional Arab town, disarm suicide bombs that had been forcibly strapped onto terrorized innocents, and, despite misgivings about departing from their authorized mission, risk their lives in an effort to capture stolen yellowcake that the terrorists have obtained to construct a dirty bomb.
One scene that will have many viewers do a doubletake is a Chinese Navy ship shooting down in rapid order several rounds of incoming mortars as easily as if the enemy projectiles were nothing more threatening than floating balloons.
The movie is intended to impress audiences with Chinese might, while at the same time humanizing members of its armed forces.
Except for a heavy-handed and unnecessary ending, in which a Chinese Naval Flotilla sails out of the disputed South China Sea to intercept a foreign fleet – perhaps American –to warn it, as it did the Somali pirates, to cease activities, the movie might make friends for China. But threats—explicit or implied—always have the opposite impact.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com