The Power
of Nightmares
Should we be worried about the threat from organised terrorism or is it
simply a phantom menace being used to stop society from falling apart?
In the past our politicians offered us dreams of a better world. Now
they promise to protect us from nightmares. The most frightening of
these is the threat of an international terror network. But just as the
dreams were not true, neither are these nightmares.
In a new series, the Power of Nightmares explores 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
neo-conservatives 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
neo-conservative 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 neo-conservatives 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".
Part 1
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