This three-part documentary is quite probably the most thought provoking production; regardless of your political orientation, in recent years to have come from the BBC. Indeed, had it not been from “The Beeb” it would have most likely been dismissed as crazed rantings from the Tin-foil Hat Brigade™. The synopsis from the BBC Two website is quite eye opening:
This series shows dramatically how the idea that we are threatened by a hidden and organised terrorist network is an illusion. It is a myth that has spread unquestioned through politics, the security services and the international media. At the heart of the story are two groups: the American neoconservatives and the radical Islamists. Both were idealists who were born out of the failure of the liberal dream to build a better world. These two groups have changed the world but not in the way either intended. Together they created today’s nightmare vision of an organised terror network. A fantasy that politicians then found restored their power and authority in a disillusioned age. Those with the darkest fears became the most powerful.
The rise of the Politics of Fear begins in 1949 with two men whose radical ideas would inspire the attack of 9/11 and influence the neoconservative movement that dominates Washington. Both these men believed that modern liberal freedoms were eroding the bonds that held society together. The two movements they inspired set out, in their different ways, to rescue their societies from this decay. But in an age of growing disillusion with politics, the neoconservatives turned to fear in order to pursue their vision. They would create a hidden network of evil run by the Soviet Union that only they could see. The Islamists were faced by the refusal of the masses to follow their dream and began to turn to terror to force the people to ’see the truth’.
The films are each an hour long and constituent parts are:
Google News shows that American based news sources have yet to pick up on this though has been reviewed by The Guardian, Al-Jazeerah, The National Review Online and The Christian Science Monitor. Through the wonders of the Internet, all three parts are downloadable via that lovable rogue of a Peer-to-Peer client that is BitTorrent. The files require DivX or VideoLan for playback and unfortunately do weigh in at a rather mammoth 1300 MB (give or take a bit). As far as I’m aware, redistribution of these videos is fine as long as they are not for profit and would (if I’m correct) be protected under the BBC’s Royal Charter.
Where does it go from here if this little Pandora’s box has some thruth? Bush = Hitler? USA PATRIOT Act = Nuremberg Laws? “War on Terror” = “Mein Kampf”? Osama bin Laden = Stalin? America in the 2000’s = Germany in the early 1930’s? The “Coalition of the Willing” with the Neo-Conservatives against al-Qaida = The West’s appeasement of the Nazi Party as a balance to Stalin’s Soviet Union? Switzerland = Switzerland? Okay, okay… I’ll stop it with the satire. :P & ;)
Anyway, at least Bush finally got elected (4 years late) and we will probably get to see which way current history will goes. American political refugees still have some hope before it all goes completely pear shaped!