YMMV / The Pentagon Wars

• Aluminum Christmas Trees: When first getting to know one another, Sergeant Fanning asks Colonel Burton where he's from, upon which he says he's from a small town outside of Chicago. Fanning asks him what town, in specific, and Burton answers "Normal", at which point Fanning asks incredulously about "Normal, IL". However, the town of Normal is a real place, and the home of Illinois State University, though it is located near the middle of the state and not all that close to Chicago as one might think.
• Based on a Great Big Lie:
  • As numerous historians have pointed out, everything the film tries to portray as proof of a cover up is actually standard operating procedure for development and testing of equipment. Blowing up a combat loaded vehicle is difficult to analyze concretely due to having to sift through microscopic fragments of steel. Hitting vehicles loaded with water in the fuel tanks or sand in the shell casings tells you what the attacks will do in a way you can actually analyze. A 30mm bullet hole leaking water in a fuel tank is easier to analyze than a burned out hulk of steel half melted into the ground because your fuel tank full of flammable liquid ignited.
  • Furthermore, the film portrays the Bradley designers as having no idea what the vehicle is actually supposed to do, while also having changes mandated by superior officers with little logic behind them. In reality, while there was some indecisiveness from the top they had to work around, the Bradley was always intended to be an IFV from the start. The film also suggests that Burton was the driving force behind the Bradley receiving protection upgrades when in reality the Army always intended to implement those upgrades once testing was completed.
• Catharsis Factor: Seeing General Partridge dragged across the coals and asked so many humiliating questions by the congressional committee is immensely satisfying due to his sociopathic incompetence and disregard for frontline troops.
• Condemned by History: When it was first released, the film was often touted as a real life example of the corrupt military industrial complex. However, as time passed and people did actual research into the Bradley program, it was very quickly discovered that most of the events in the film and Burton's book were at best exaggerated and at worst completely fictional, completely discrediting the film. While the film is still serviceable as political satire, it by no means should be considered an actual historical work.
• Do Not Do This Cool Thing: The corrupt generals who prioritize their career attend swanky black-tie parties and have nice private offices, and then go on to cushy high-paying defense contracting jobs. The officers who do the right thing but make trouble in doing so get buried in paperwork, Reassigned To Alaska, and then forced into early retirement.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • General Robert Smith who designed the Bradley and is trying to help Burton stop its premature production, but only to a point.
  • The incredulous congressional committee, for being involved in some of the movie's best dialogue and being Reasonable Authority Figures
• Funny Moments: Colonel Burton steals the door off an ammo dump to show how defective the ammunition being used to test the Bradley is. That's funny in and of itself, but the stonewalling he gets from Those Two Guys is utter hilarity. Burton's trying to prove their testing methods are inadequate, they're just just concerned about their "destroyed" (read, slightly dented and moderately scorched) door. Culminating in:
  Burton: (aggravated sigh) I'll buy the Army a new goddamned door.
  You can't afford a door like that. Did you see what it just stood up to?
• Misaimed Fandom: Online discussions will often see the film quoted by Armchair Military types as "proof" the Bradley Fighting Vehicle is bad, even dismissing actual veterans' experiences. Not only does this miss the fact it's a comedy and not meant to be taken seriously (on top of its many errors and fictional events), this ignores the film's ending, where changes are made, turning the Bradley into an Awesome Personnel Carrier.
• One-Scene Wonder: Dan Florek as an Army general with hilarious contradictory standards for the Bradley's development. He comes off like a kid in a candy store obsessed with the next cool idea they can put on the vehicle.
• Retroactive Recognition: Future Best Supporting Actress winner Viola Davis had one of her first film roles here.

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