Why did they want him dead so badly? I think it’s the potential for bad publicity.
Kurtz was a highly gifted, honorable soldier who went mad, presumably from the horrors of war. That the war could throw this gifted person so far down means the war was extremely traumatizing, which could spur public backlash if word even got out.
Plus, Kurtz was a soldier who went AWOL and was commanding his own army without supervision or rules; he even had certain government people killed. The U.S Army will look bad if the public ever realizes that one of their soldiers could run away and cause all that trouble; how could the military organization let that happen? Didn’t they have any checks on the troops ability to go rogue?
Related to that last point, that Kurtz was operating without supervision, is that they can’t ensure that Kurtz won’t violate international treaties, or support the enemy, or just otherwise commit atrocities (which he did). Indeed, Kurtz was operating in Cambodia, an area that was supposed to be off-limits in the war. The U.S. would have a ton of negative press if people found out.
Now that said — as the viewer watches the film, Kurtz is hardly the most offensive thing that appears in the film. Hence, I do agree that Martin Sheen’s mission doesn’t feel worth it to the viewer, which makes your question valid.
For example, the movie shows that Robert Duvall’s character is equally as insane and violent as Kurtz is (maybe more), yet they don’t make any trouble over Duvall’s character the way they do over Kurtz. There’s also the scene where they murder the family on the boat when the girl runs for the puppy. Or the entire scene involving the black soldiers on the bridge, with no commanding officer.
I think that that was the point, highlighting the lack of sense in the war. They go through all that trouble for Kurtz while ignoring the other stuff that worse or equally bad.
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