”;They're trying to kill me,”; Yossarian told him calmly.
“;No one's trying to kill you,”; Clevinger cried.
“;Then why are they shooting at me?”; Yossarian asked.
“;They're shooting at everyone,”; Clevinger answered. “;They're trying to kill everyone.”;
“;And what difference does that make?”; — “;Catch-22”; by Joseph Heller

  We live in a time of war, and it's getting kind of hard to imagine the world in any different mode. There are certainly enemies out there, and the official tenor of the last eight years assumes everyone is an enemy, thereby making sure that actually happens. It alters your view, in that it narrows it: It's like perceiving reality through a gunsight. No wonder conspiracy theorists are flourishing like flies on cowpies—in a time of inverse human values, the only logical explanation is unwavering faith in the illogic.

Those who react to the times with creativity are called artists. They may not create exact representations, but they capture the undertow flowing deep and violent beneath the benign placidity of current events.

The ongoing sticky swamp of Iraq peacekeeping has spawned any number of films and novels, some of which will become classics and others sputter like a damp squib, and it's too soon to know which.

Curiously, in the comics world, where violence, anarchy and troubled introspection are business as usual, the conflict in the Middle East has made barely a dent, except as a plot device or background reference. Only Garry Trudeau's “;Doonesbury”; has dared stay in the ring for longer than a round. Comic-book writers in the past decade have been more inspired by Administration hypocrisy—it's so noir!—than by nuts and rivets detail of everyday combat for the average dogface.

That has begun to change, and brilliantly so, with Kyle Baker's ”;Special Forces”; limited series (Image Comics), based on the true tale of a man with autism who was accepted into the Army. His whole squad, as it turns out, are more special-needs than special-training, and the work is horrifying and mind-blowingly clever.

Baker is an amazingly deft hand with a brush—a bit like the legendary “;Mad”;man Jack Davis—and has a keen ear for dialogue and plotting. His previous stuff was hilarious and cartoony, and the same style is being used to create an adreneline-crazed view of combat that is subversively skewed in tone. The primary character, in fact, is the very vision of a camouflage-clad pin-up girl who's bulging right out of her scanty BDUs. No one seems to notice this except the reader, and Baker is making a needling comment on the relationship between sex and violence and the way we absorb both greedily.

Much of the book is simply horrific, and then we discover that Baker is often just recreating images and attitudes posted online by real soldiers. Ouch.

Three issues have been published, with another due soon.

EVEN FRESHER is Vertigo's reincarnation of the old DC Comics “;G.I. Combat: Haunted Tank”; series. The original had the ghost of Confederate cavalry legend J.E.B. Stuart watching over a descendent commanding a—what else?—Stuart light tank in the North Africa campaign. It was a clever series, in that the commander was the only one who could see or hear the ghost, and his troops thought he was crazy, but the advice he received from his hallucinations helped them to survive, so no bellyachin,' right?

The new edition takes place in Iraq aboard an M1A1 Abrams tank, but it's still Gen. Stuart haunting the tank, and the whole crew can see him—but there's a possibility that they're all already dead from an insurgent's rocket round. There's added complexity when it seems that the Stuart descendent is black, and he wants no part of a slave-owning Confederate hero.

Written by Frank Marraffino, ”;Haunted Tank”; is adults-only profane, which is a reasonable response to the terrors of combat and the mundanities of regimentation. The art is by Henry Flint, whose hyper-detailed way with military technology makes him a worthy successor to Russ Heath, who drew the original book.

We'll see where they go with it. Tanks can get bogged down.

In the meantime, a prime part of the U.S. propaganda war these days is production of an Arabic comic book that touts the bravery of Iraqi police forces. Even Yossarian didn't see that coming.