GET IT WHILE IT'S HOT...

[justdrew]

Wow. What a disappointment. This is "The Official Story" as done by Curtis.

Unbelievable. It's "Osama bin Laden did 9/11". The West had a "dream" of Democracy in Afghanistan. The banks decided to loan money to anyone and everyone to "help the economy as a whole".

What a FUCKING CROCK OF SHIT.

How did they get to Curtis?

I was disappointed there wasn't more footage of college women and freedom in 1960's and 1970s Afghanistan. Hate to say it but life looked pretty good under Soviet Russia before the Saudi CIA shenanigans.

well, things looked ok back before then too, with the King and the Americans (who built the water infrastructure needed to turn Helmand into Poppy Central) too.

I don't really think there's a problem, at all, with his telling of the Official Story, anything else would be VERY short on documentary proof, and anyway, is not something any audience is prepared to deal with, his take on the Official Story is quite accurate and a fair Public telling of the tale. What he says regarding national motivations is what MOST people involved believed, and that is what he set out to tell. it seems to me. That we could not do what the british, earlier americans, the soviets, couldn't do is hardly a surprise, and as far as history goes, I find this a satisfactory end to the sorry tale, let our part in it be done. I mean, come on, we've been in Afghanistan basically half a generation now FFS.

The real question is why the bush admin could get away with selling this asinine foolish activity to such a large portion of the US population, the reasons are: republican identity politics and general ignorance.

[Nordic]

Watched the film last night. The usual rare archival footage mixed with odd b-roll, hypnotic strange ambient music and his narration asking rhetorical questions.
I liked it, sort of. But I have two criticisms:

1. I felt the interspersed post US invasion Afghan footage dragged on a bit long, without much explanation for certain scenes.

2. Even bigger, Adam Curtis prides himself on finding vetted obscure facts to jolt the audience with a reveal....yet he actually does EXACTLY what he accuses
the storytellers of doing: simplifying. He actually does a worse job than Power Of Nightmares. He makes his central theme of the film the Saudi political and wahhabi
influence but he uses *THE* most generic of stories:

That bin Laden felt betrayed by the Saudis in 1990 for their use of US forces to route Saddam, and then bin Laden plotted 9/11 as revenge down the road.
Worse, he makes it sound like al Qaeda and Sunni extremist groups that formed in the 90s and acted out terror in the 90s and 2000's was completely independent
of all this.

- No mention of the Saudi Bin Laden Group, nor their relation to the very construction of the Twin Towers. Both of which were designed using Saudi Islamic influence by architect
Minoru Yamasaki.

- No mention of the Saudis involvement and support of al Qaeda and other terror groups, like the 1996 Khobar marine barrack bombing in Saudi Arabia which was falsely blamed on Iran

- No mention of the Saudis involved with the 9/11 hijackers

- No mention of Pakistani ISI in relation to al Qaeda or the Taliban or even the ISI links to the Massoud assassination

- No mention of bin Laden's time in Sudan

- No mention of other Muslim countries ties to Islamic terrorism, such as Dubai's financial centers, the governments of Qatar and Turkey(ISIS), etc.

- No mention of pipelines in Afghanistan or the mineral grab post US invasion by European, Chinese and American companies

- Hardly any mention of Iraq

I was actually surprised Adam Curtis creates this generic vacuum...usually his documentaries reveal all sorts of interesting buried revelations and news stories.

Yes! Exactly. Not only is it basically wrong in some regards, it is ridiculously simplified.

And how can you tell that story with no mention of the Pakistani ISI indeed?

And the pipelines, as you said.

And to end it with the rise of ISIS. This was like something Wolf Blitzer on acid could have made.

[82_28]

Nordic wrote:

Yes! Exactly. Not only is it basically wrong in some regards, it is ridiculously simplified.

And how can you tell that story with no mention of the Pakistani ISI indeed?

And the pipelines, as you said.

And to end it with the rise of ISIS. This was like something Wolf Blitzer on acid could have made.

I took it as Curtis' main point! The deliberate making of it all "simple" by politicians and media. The whole thing is about how we were all intentionally dumbed down. At least that's my take-away. Thus, I still deem the effort to be good. Not great. But good.

[justdrew]

Nordic wrote:

Yes! Exactly. Not only is it basically wrong in some regards, it is ridiculously simplified.

And how can you tell that story with no mention of the Pakistani ISI indeed?

And the pipelines, as you said.

And to end it with the rise of ISIS. This was like something Wolf Blitzer on acid could have made.

I took it as Curtis' main point! The deliberate making of it all "simple" by politicians and media. The whole thing is about how we were all intentionally dumbed down. At least that's my take-away. Thus, I still deem the effort to be good. Not great. But good.

It could though, use a part two, but any more detail would take a lot more time.

[8bitagent]

Wow. What a disappointment. This is "The Official Story" as done by Curtis.

Unbelievable. It's "Osama bin Laden did 9/11". The West had a "dream" of Democracy in Afghanistan. The banks decided to loan money to anyone and everyone to "help the economy as a whole".

What a FUCKING CROCK OF SHIT.

How did they get to Curtis?

I was disappointed there wasn't more footage of college women and freedom in 1960's and 1970s Afghanistan. Hate to say it but life looked pretty good under Soviet Russia before the Saudi CIA shenanigans.

well, things looked ok back before then too, with the King and the Americans (who built the water infrastructure needed to turn Helmand into Poppy Central) too.

I don't really think there's a problem, at all, with his telling of the Official Story, anything else would be VERY short on documentary proof, and anyway, is not something any audience is prepared to deal with, his take on the Official Story is quite accurate and a fair Public telling of the tale. What he says regarding national motivations is what MOST people involved believed, and that is what he set out to tell. it seems to me. That we could not do what the british, earlier americans, the soviets, couldn't do is hardly a surprise, and as far as history goes, I find this a satisfactory end to the sorry tale, let our part in it be done. I mean, come on, we've been in Afghanistan basically half a generation now FFS.

The real question is why the bush admin could get away with selling this asinine foolish activity to such a large portion of the US population, the reasons are: republican identity politics and general ignorance.

He missed such a big one though. CIA, Saudis, etc pumping Syrian jihadist militants with arms and money in 2011 to topple Assad, exactly 30 years after 1981. Just, instead of taking 20 years to roost, it took two years...he just dives into ISIS and the narrative of al Qaeda in Iraq before it without really even mentioning the folly of Afghanistan happening right now in Syria. Also zero context is given of bin Laden even within the official narrative, though he does explore that in Power of Nightmares(which I found a bit more compelling) Then again Adam Curtis could do his Adam Curtissy style about the secret history of Twinkies and I'd be enthralled

I liked his new addendum companion short tho. He touches upon Magpie/Seville, ebola, Ukraine, Russia, ISIS, etc

[justdrew]

well, remember the part about the first Saudi king murdering most of his army to get rid of their inconvenient desire to keep going?

Curtis says, at the end, that 'now the west is trying to do the same thing again with isis' - and if you recall, that's exactly what I said was the ultimate disposition of isis, it's a honeypot that will be used to draw in and eliminate the jihad-jeneration. When and not until, the PTB is through with them. I suspect that's just a few years away at most.

[82_28]

Another thing is that I happened to notice all these rag-tag groups over the years using exclusively toyota pick ups -- 91 up to now -- just bouncing around in the desert with guns in the air like professional terrorists. More like professional propaganda. Again, I liked it. I am fascinated of/by where he gets his footage. I can't even imagine what kind of team he has and its size for such little narration but mucho footage.

[82_28]

Why aren't they in GMCs, Fords, Chevys etc? I think that is a good question, honestly. One he does not touch on, but I appreciated the archival footage the most.

[brainpanhandler]

Why aren't they in GMCs, Fords, Chevys etc? I think that is a good question, honestly. One he does not touch on, but I appreciated the archival footage the most.

An experiment conducted by British TV show Top Gear in 2006 offers one explanation. The show’s producers bought an 18-year-old Hilux diesel with 190,000 miles on the odometer for $1,500. They then crashed it into a tree, submerged it in the ocean for five hours, dropped it from about 10 feet, tried to crush it under an RV, drove it through a portable building, hit it with a wrecking ball, and set it on fire. Finally they placed it on top of a 240-foot tower block that was then destroyed in a controlled demolition. When they dug it out of the rubble, all it took to get it running again was hammers, wrenches, and WD-40. They didn’t even need spare parts.

http://www.newsweek.com/why-rebel-group ... ilux-74195

[Sounder]

justdrew wrote...

The real question is why the bush admin could get away with selling this asinine foolish activity to such a large portion of the US population, the reasons are: republican identity politics and general ignorance.

Yeah, I'm gonna say that general ignorance scores higher than 'republican identity politics' in this contest.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?ti ... n_Progress

The Center for American Progress was begun in 2003 with funding from philanthropists Herbert M. Sandler and Marion O. Sandler[1] It is a Washington, DC-based liberal think tank created and led by President and Chief Executive Officer John D. Podesta, the head of Barack Obama's presidential transition team after the 2008 election and former Chief of Staff for President Bill Clinton.

In 2009 CAP's Progressive Media project emerged as a major communications war room on behalf of Obama's domestic and foreign policy agenda and CAP became a strong advocate for escalation in Afghanistan. Progressive Media is run through the Center for American Project Action Fund, the more political 501(c)4 arm of CAP. It coordindates closely with the Common Purpose Project, an effort to create message discipline among the pro-Obama organizations, with a direct tie to the White House.
CAP is the parent organization of Campus Progress. The Center publishes a daily emailed Progress Report, described by the National Review to be "The most aggressive, most energetic opposition research in politics."

Supporting Escalation of the War in Afghanistan

In March, 2009 CAP strongly supported Barack Obama's escalation of the US wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan, issuing a report titled Sustainable Security in Afghanistan by Lawrence J. Korb, Caroline Wadhams, Colin Cookman and Sean Duggan.[2] CAP was also prominent in Americans Against Escalation in Iraq with MoveOn, a coalition that used the Iraq war to attack Republican politicians and candidates in 2007 and 2008.

The report was formally released formally on April 3, 2009, at a CAP forum titled A New Way Forward in Afghanistan featuring the following speakers:
• Minister Ali Jalali, Former Afghan Interior Minister; Distinguished Professor, National Defense University
• Frederick W. Kagan, Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute
• Fred Kaplan, columnist, Slate Magazine
• Lawrence Korb, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress

Good old John D. Podesta, the great white hope for AGW advocates everywhere.

He's the guy that's gonna save your bacon.

[Jerky]

I thought it was amazing, but it's not the doc we were promised based on the recent excerpt from the 2014-wipe special on BBC!

So much reason for sadness... so many human moments in the midst or absolute horror.

Jerky

[82_28]

His documetation of the girl who had lost her limbs and her right eye was unfortunately, sublime. It brought me to tears. I think he did good as far as impact.

I also "enjoyed" the nail shop scene of our "warriors" with hip-hop in the background as though it was just "business as usual". Masterful, to include that and to EVEN come up with the footage.

I'm going to "double down" and say it was actually great.

[Nordic]

His documetation of the girl who had lost her limbs and her right eye was unfortunately, sublime. It brought me to tears. I think he did good as far as impact.

I also "enjoyed" the nail shop scene of our "warriors" with hip-hop in the background as though it was just "business as usual". Masterful, to include that and to EVEN come up with the footage.

I'm going to "double down" and say it was actually great.

I actually remember seeing that nail shop scene somewhere else, not too soon after the invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan. Probably 2003 or 2004. In fact, the program did bring back a lot of memories for me, stuff I had forgotten from all these years of "outrage fatigue".

Not that there's anything wrong with that, there's not. The one thing I did like about it was all the footage. I just didn't like what the footage was assembled into.

[8bitagent]

Regarding 82_28's point:

As someone(me) who believes Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda were intimately involved in 9/11, I found Curtis narrative of bin Laden and al Qaeda absurdly simplistic contradicting his own fetish
of pulling up obscure facts. The omission of Saudi Arabia's role in funding and spearheading Sunni terror and extremist groups is strange

However I do agree with 82_28 that Curtis hits home the larger message and point he was getting at: how for decades, hell centuries the West has tried to turn Afghanistan into it's own
little pet project, yet every time they are cursed. And even worse, it seems to be sending Afghans back farther back in time.