James Der Derian argues that we can no longer think of society as a simple ‘military-industrial
complex’ in which the government, business elites and the military run things in a cosy triad.
Contemporary society must now be understood as a ‘military-industrial-media-entertainment-network’
– or MIMENET – in which technologies such as computer simulations have erased the line between
the virtual world and the real world. He explains, for example, how Hollywood has joined forces with
the military to produce computer-generated ‘simulation-based training environments’ in order to
make combat more real for soldiers in training. Why practise killing ‘fake’ enemies when you can kill
very realistic computer-generated ones? Such simulations are also shaping the thoroughly digitized
battlefield as soldiers now rely on computer technologies to transform foreign territory into fully
functional 3-D images that help them effectively track, expose and target their enemies. Der Derian is
concerned with how all this computer technology effectively sanitizes the consequences of war: what
happens when enemies are reduced to pixels on a screen – when war is effectively reduced to a video
game? He argues that we are living in an age of virtuous war where violence is actualized and executed
‘from a distance – with no or minimal casualties’ (Der Derian 2001: xv). This distance radically changes
the soldier’s moral proximity to the enemy, who has now become thoroughly dehumanized and
digitized. As Der Derian argues, ‘virtuous war has an unsurpassed power to commute death, to keep
it out of sight, out of mind. Herein lies its most morally dubious danger. In simulated preparations
and virtual executions of war, there is a high risk that one learns how to kill but not to take
responsibility for it’ (Der Derian 2001: xvi)