Michael Terceiro The Power of Nightmares is a fascinating look at the war on terror. It's central thesis is that Western politicians have effectively manufactured the war on terror in order to make themselves needed and relevant to the general public. In support of this thesis, the film makers present a range of experts, including many former CIA operatives, who all confirm that: (1) the islamist terrorists were generally poorly organised and lacked an an overarching structure and (2) that Western leaders, particularly Bush and Blair, knew that the Islamic terrorists operated in an ad hoc and fairly chaotic manner but nonetheless have been trying to convince the public that there was a well-organised and centrally controlled global terrorist organisationSome of the interviews with the neo-conservatives are very amusing, particularly Professor Pipes who headed up a committee during the Cold War to examine Soviet military capabilities. Accordingly, to Pipes the absence of evidence that the Soviet's had a particularly military capability, was proof that they did in fact have that capability.The only criticism I have of this documentary is its use of images. There are fairly lengthy periods of the three hour plus film when all the filmmakers do is flash up a series of images which have a loose relationship to what the narrator was saying. I found this technique quite annoying after a while. I think it would have been more engaging if they had simply had an on-screen narrator rather than a voice-over narrator.Overall this is a very fascinating and well put together documentary which is available for free download at the Internet Archive - http://www.archive.org/index.php.

khuban This remarkable documentary, well written, researched, and articulate, traces the odd, parallel paths of the rise and failures of the Islamist movement and the movement of the American neoconservatives. What makes this documentary so outstanding is not just that it clearly exposes many of the myths of the so-called "War on Terror," but the fact that it places the power of these myths in a larger and very important context. This film's position is clearly that it is the failure of belief and of ideology in Western societies that has allowed neoconservative extremists to fill the gap with nightmares in order to assert power and influence. Fear works well when people do not believe in anything, since that lack of faith makes them quite vulnerable. For the Islamists, fear attempts to fill the gap in societies that have lost their Islamic faith and roots. The dirty little secret underlying all this is that both groups, the Islamists and the Neoconservatives, are, at the core, nihilists, in spite of their ideological rants and pretensions. One can only hope that a discerning public will eventually be exposed to the hollow, vain, and arrogant "men behind the curtain" in both societies, so that all can realize that these wizards of terror are just empty charlatans. The sooner that happens, the sooner we can all click our ruby slippers together and return to Kansas, and, hopefully, to some measure of sanity, and, perhaps to a genuine faith.

fedkad This BBC documentary together with "Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)" must be in the list of everyone trying to understand the 21st century, i.e., the days we are living. Even if you are in the "neo-conservative" camp, you should watch this documentary to realize what kind of harm their ideas have done: By making the "enemy" look larger and more important than what it is, they both make us fear of a not so organized enemy and also make the enemy more self-confident for launching suicide attacks on us.Starting from the 1950's, this documentary tries to explain the changes the western (Christian) and Islamic societies have undergone in the last 50 years. The startling thing is that so few people have influenced and manipulated us. And this is becoming easier and easier with the help of mass media today.Just a note: Recently, I watched "Joyeux Noël (2005)". Although it has nothing in common with this documentary, you can see in the end of the movie that the "politics of fear" was always an instrument for controlling and manipulating the masses and unfortunately religion is one of the helping tools.This documentary is highly recommended.

eandubh I've seen the three BBC episondes as they are available online - in rather poor quality versions, that is. And I know that the film maker condensed it into a theater-length movie, and received acclaim at Cannes over it. He proclaimed that he didn't want the "Michael Moore treatment" - too bad! A little showmanship might have brought the film to the United States, where it has been basically excluded, censored, omitted and overlooked. That more accessible movie-style version is NOT being shown in the US, nor is it, apparently, available on DVD - which of course is a shame, since the film exposes much of the thinking behind the US' current maniacal drive to empire. Not only has the documentary never been aired on American TV - the film seems to have been very thoroughly and effectively suppressed - something to think about the next time you use the phrase "free country."