Breaking The Silence - Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (HQ) by John Pilger: Breaking The Silence
- Truth and Lies in the War on Terror (HQ Copy) by John Pilger John Pilger dissects the truth and lies in the 'war on
terror'. Award-winning journalist John Pilger investigates the discrepancies between American and British claims for the
'war on terror' and the facts on the ground as he finds them in Afghanistan and Washington, DC. In 2001, as the bombs
began to drop, George W. Bush promised Afghanistan "the generosity of America and its allies". Now, the familiar
old warlords are regaining power, religious fundamentalism is renewing its grip and military skirmishes continue routinely.
In "liberated" Afghanistan, America has its military base and pipeline access, while the people have the warlords
who are, says one woman, "in many ways worse than the Taliban". In Washington, Pilger conducts a series of remarkable
interviews with William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, and leading Administration officials such as Douglas Feith,
Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, and John Bolton, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security.
These people, and the other architects of the Project for the New American Century, were dismissed as 'the crazies'
by the first Bush Administration in the early 90s when they first presented their ideas for pre-emptive strikes and world
domination. Pilger also interviews presidential candidate General Wesley Clark, and former intelligence officers, all the
while raising searching questions about the real motives for the 'war on terror'While President Bush refers to the
US attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq as two 'great victories', Pilger asks the question - victories over whom, and for
what purpose? Pilger describes Afghanistan as a country "more devastated than anything I have seen since Pol Pot's
Cambodia". He finds that Al-Qaida has not been defeated and that the Taliban is re-emerging. And of the "victory"
in Iraq, he asks: "Is this Bush's Vietnam?"
"Paying the Price: Killing the Children of Iraq" by
John Pilger - 75 min. After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the United Nations (backed strongly by the US and UK) imposed harsh
sanctions on Iraq that lasted for 10 years (1991-2001); the harsh restrictions on imports of everything, including access
to key medicines, resulted in over a million deaths, more than half a million of which were women and children. That's
more deaths than the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan and 9/11 combined. The purpose was
regime change, but it never came. The overwhelming majority of those killed were the poor, elderly, women and children. Empirically,
sanctions overwhelmingly punish the poor, the destitute. While the sanctions were in place, the richest people in control
of the resources (Saddam Hussein et al.) still had everything they wanted: food, cars, mansions, access to the best medicines,
etc. Award-winning journalist John Pilger has documented the reality of UN harsh sanctions in this hard-hitting film.
Truth Game - 79 min - John Pilger looks at world-wide propaganda surrounding the nuclear arms
race. John Pilger's penetrating documentary which looks at world-wide propaganda surrounding the nuclear arms race. When
the two American atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
in 1945, they were code-named 'Fat Man' and 'Little Boy', and President Truman announced after the event:
"The experiment has been an overwhelming success." "These", says Pilger, "were words used to describe
the awful and horrific carnage of nuclear war. By using reassuring, even soothing language, this new kind of propaganda created
acceptable images of war and the illusion that we could live securely with nuclear weapons". Official 'truths'
are examined in connection with the bombing of Hiroshima, the build up of arms by Russia and America, the siting of nuclear
bases by the US in Britain and Europe, Ministry of Defence statements about the Cruise missile base at Greenham Common, and
other US bases, the amount of government money spent on weapons, 'Civil defence' arrangements and a NATO 'limited'
nuclear and chemical war exercise in West Germany, which Pilger describes as 'a dry run for the unthinkable'. Many
experts give their views, including Paul Warnke who thinks arms reduction is feasible -- 'All we need is the political
will to go ahead with it'
