Phil Strub

In less than 10 years Marvel has created the biggest money-making film franchise of all time with the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, this probably wouldn't have been possible without the help of the Pentagon. In this episode we examine the rise of the MCU, the Pentagon's involvement, and the fallout of their disagreements when making The Avengers.

9/11. The 7/7 London Bombings. The Boston Marathon. The Paris Massacre. This episode we take a look at the false flag exercise theory, which has become the default alternative media interpretation of these events.

Tomorrow Never Dies is perhaps the most military-heavy Bond film of recent times, benefiting from production support from both the British and American armed forces. Despite this the Pentagon's Hollywood liaison Phil Strub denied that they provided any assistance to the film-makers.

The Department of Defense maintains a database summarising its collaboration with Hollywood productions. The master list for this database was released to me two years ago as the DOD Film List and since then I have obtained a handful of entries. Getting a little more creative I asked for entries on over a dozen films and today got a response with details on Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Contact, Tears of the Sun, Indiana Jones, Deja Vu and others.

My good friend Pearse has been given the opportunity to do his show on the radio so he invited me on as his guest for the very first episode. We took on an old favourite – Chase Brandon – and discussed his relevance to the world of state-sponsored entertainment before engaging in a multi-faceted conversation going into the reports from the Pentagon’s entertainment liaison offices, the expansion of the DOD’s role in the entertainment industry, the total lack of accountability.

United 93 was one of the first major films on the 9/11 attacks, and was praised for its in-depth research and docudrama realism. However, underneath the engrossing cinéma vérité style is a story of the US air defences that morning based almost entirely on the 9/11 Commission.

Phil Strub has been the Pentagon's Hollywood liaison since 1989, in which time the entertainment liaison offices have helped produce over 100 films. In this episode we take a closer look at Phil Strub, his background, how he came to be the DOD's Hollywood liaison and his curious habit of downplaying or minimising the role of the Pentagon in the entertainment industry.

Jack Valenti's career as head of the MPAA spanned nearly 40 years and saw the end of the production code and the establishment of the movie ratings system, the failure of the Vietnam War, the arrival of home cinema followed by the internet, and culminated in the post-9/11 propaganda push. New details provided by the FBI files on Valenti show that throughout this period (1966-2004) he remained close to the establishment.

Tom Clancy was one of the most popular spy authors of all time, but was he a spy himself? What are the nature of his government connections? How were the film adaptations of his novels supported by the Pentagon and the CIA? What script changes were made by the DOD in exchange for their support? In Part I of this two-part podcast we examine five Tom Clancy films - The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger, The Sum of All Fears and Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.

The philosophy of Carl Schmitt asserts that for a state to be identifiable and legitimate it has to employ an enemy image - the perception of a threat from the Other. In this episode we explore whether this philosophy has been adopted by the Pentagon as part of their operations in the entertainment industry.