Aiming to be the Top Gun

Military Recruitment, Propaganda, and Shaping the Image of War Through Popular Media

Abstract

The United States military and pentagon have a history of partially funding and providing resources for the creation of military/war movies and video games. These moves and video games are typically created for commercial audiences and are made by independent non-governmental institutions. These movies can have a conventional military setting like Top Gun (1986) and Black Hawk Down (2001) but can also include more unconventional war movies like X-Men: First Class (2011) and Transformers (2007-) movie franchise. Regarding videogames, this paper will look at how recruitment tools like America’s Army (2002-2008) have ingrained themselves into videogame culture and have provided the groundwork for future games like Full Spectrum Warrior (2002), Call of Duty (2003-) and Halo (2001-). This paper will investigate the role of military-centred media and how they relate to recruitment, the role of the United States military, and the perception of the military in society. Additionally, looking at the role of recruitment and how certain tropes that play a role in conventional advertisement transfer into popular media. This paper will argue that media about war, whether sponsored by the military or not, are inherently perpetuating positive messages about military/war and act as “psychological propaganda” influencing people’s perception of the institution and encouraging people to enlist.