In the 1984 Cold War movieย โRed Dawnโ โย as Soviet troops battled their own real insurgency in Afghanistan โ characters played by Patrick Swayze, Charlie Sheen and Jennifer Greyย lead a guerrilla band of high school students from a small town in Colorado to fight a fictional Russian invasion of the United States.
Their battle cry, like their school team's vicious little mascot, was โ โWolverines,โ and they would leave their Wolverines tag whenever they would strike the Soviet Russian invaders.
And now, in a perfect case of life imitating art, that same tag is increasingly showing up on destroyed Russian vehicles in Ukraine as the movie inspires Ukrainians to resist their own Russian invaders.ย
In one case we see what appears to be a burned-outย BTR-80ย armored personnel carrier, near Brovary, a suburb of Kyiv.ย
In another, we see aย destroyed T-72ย tank with โWolverinesโ painted on the side of the turret.
One study showed the 1984 movie has seen aย 500% surgeย in video on demand worldwide since the Russians invaded Ukraine in late February.
It's unclear if Ukrainian soldiers or local civilians are tagging these destroyed Russian vehicles, but what is clear is that โWolverines' is spreading like wildfire throughout Ukraine and appearing all over Russian vehicles.
Asย โRed Dawnโย makes clear, and their own occupation of Afghanistan should have also taught the Russians, occupations breed insurgencies, and they often end badly for the invaders. As Task and Purposeย notes:
โฆinsurgencies are nearly impossible to defeat with conventional military means. Every citizen is a potential combatant, and fighters blend seamlessly into the populace. They have anย inherent home-field advantage, not just through a deep personal knowledge of the terrain, but of the people and culture. As such, they also tend to enjoy considerable local support.ย
This was the case in the fictional Colorado town where the young insurgents defeat a powerful Russian military force and will also likely be the case if the Russians attempt to occupy parts of Ukraine.
Whileย โRed Dawnโย was roundly bashed at the time by the left for its strong patriotic appeal, that criticism hasn't aged well. It is clear that patriotism and resistance to foreign invaders is a universal phenomenon that deserves our praise.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions ofย American Liberty News.