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Is Al Qaeda Just a Bush Boogeyman?
Los Angeles Times
January 11, 2005
Is it conceivable that Al Qaeda, as defined by President Bush as the center of a vast and well-organized international terrorist conspiracy, does not exist?
To even raise the question amid all the officially inspired hysteria is heretical, especially in the context of the U.S. media's supine acceptance of administration claims relating to national security. Yet a brilliant new BBC film produced by one of Britain's leading documentary filmmakers systematically challenges this and many other accepted articles of faith in the so-called war on terror.
"The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear," a three-hour historical film by Adam Curtis recently aired by the British Broadcasting Corp., argues coherently that much of what we have been told about the threat of international terrorism "is a fantasy that has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It is a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, the security services and the international media."
Stern stuff, indeed. But consider just a few of the many questions the program poses along the way:
• If Osama bin Laden does, in fact, head a vast international terrorist organization with trained operatives in more than 40 countries, as claimed by Bush, why, despite torture of prisoners, has this administration failed to produce hard evidence of it?
• How can it be that in Britain since 9/11, 664 people have been detained on suspicion of terrorism but only 17 have been found guilty, most of them with no connection to Islamist groups and none who were proven members of Al Qaeda?
• Why have we heard so much frightening talk about "dirty bombs" when experts say it is panic rather than radioactivity that would kill people?
• Why did Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld claim on "Meet the Press" in 2001 that Al Qaeda controlled massive high-tech cave complexes in Afghanistan, when British and U.S. military forces later found no such thing?
The Power of Nightmares
This highly revealing BBC documentary digs deep into the roots of the war on terror, only to find that much of the widespread fear in the post-9/11 world has been fabricated by those in power for their own interests. The intrepid BBC team presents highly informative interviews with experts and top officials in combating terrorism who raise serious questions about who is behind all of the fear-mongering.
These experts and riveting footage also show how the media have been manipulated to support secret power agendas.
This eye-opening documentary shows that, especially after 9/11, fear has been used widely in the media to manipulate the public into giving up civil liberties and turning over power to elite groups with their own hidden agendas. The Power of Nightmares clearly demonstrates that the nightmare vision of a powerful, united terrorist organization waiting to strike our societies is largely an illusion. Wherever the BBC team looked for al-Qaeda, from the mountains of Afghanistan to the sleeper cells in America, they found that we are chasing a phantom enemy. For all citizens who care about the future of our world, this is a must-watch video.
View Free: All Three Parts of the BBC Documentary Power of Nightmares
Each episode is 1 hour. If you have time for only one, Part 3 is the most revealing.
Click here to watch Power of Nightmares on Google Video.
Click here to watch and read reviews of Power of Nightmares on archive.org.
To order all three parts of Power of Nightmares on one DVD, click here.
Originally posted by Pjotr
And to add something more actual: even the CIA reported a couple of weeks ago that Al Qaeda is not operational anymore.
Originally posted by Pjotr
And to add something more actual: even the CIA reported a couple of weeks ago that Al Qaeda is not operational anymore.
Originally posted by princeofpeace
Being that other countries even Russia speak of and acknowledge the existence of Al-Queda.