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Support KPFK – Make a pledge at 818-985-5735, or online at www.kpfk.orgA new study by the RAND Corporation has concluded that Pakistan’s Intelligence Agency and some of its paramilitary forces are actively backing the Taliban in Afghanistan. The study, funded by the US Department of Defense points the finger directly at the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate or ISI, an agency with a history of acting independently. Individuals from the ISI, says the study, have in some cases directly assisted the Taliban and other so-called insurgent groups.
Pakistan had long been the main sponsor of the Taliban, but after the 9-11 attacks, changed its official policy to support the US’s so-called “war on terror” and the ouster of the Taliban in Afghanistan. Nearly 7 years after Afghanistan’s regime change, the Taliban are gaining ground and have changed their tactics to use suicide bombings against the US-NATO occupation. Instead of the peace promised by the Bush administration, the South and Central Asian region encompassing Pakistan and Afghanistan has descended further into a chaos with no end in sight.

Today, back by popular demand, we bring you the definitive documentary, which comprehensively analyzes the origins of the current “global war on terror.” It’s called The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear, a three-part documentary produced by British film maker Adam Curtis for the BBC. The Power of Nightmares lays out a comprehensive, chronological, and compelling account of the rise of the two sides of this war, going back decades to today. It traces the origins of the American Neo-conservative Movement, and Islamic Fundamentalism in three hour-long episodes, which we are pleased to offer today on a single DVD as a thank you gift for your donation.

The Power of Nightmares features interviews with neo-conservatives William and Irving Kristol, Richard Pipes and Richard Perle as well as with prominent Muslim scholar Azzam Tamimi of the Institute of Islamic Political Thought, political scientist Roxanne Euben, and General Commander of Afghan Arabs in Northern Afghanistan Abdulla Anas, to trace the rise of the violent fundamentalist movements in the Muslim world. When it was made, the film aired on television in Britain, Canada and Australia, but has barely been viewed in the US aside from a few film festivals. Even HBO refused to air it.