1 00:00:05,442 --> 00:00:08,162 In the past, politicians promised to create a better world. 2 00:00:10,042 --> 00:00:11,522 They had different ways of achieving this. 3 00:00:12,002 --> 00:00:15,202 But their power and authority came from the optimistic visions 4 00:00:15,522 --> 00:00:16,962 they offered to their people. 5 00:00:19,442 --> 00:00:20,601 Those dreams failed. 6 00:00:21,362 --> 00:00:23,722 And today, people have lost faith in ideologies. 7 00:00:25,522 --> 00:00:27,802 Increasingly, politicians are seen simply as 8 00:00:27,881 --> 00:00:29,202 managers of public life. 9 00:00:30,882 --> 00:00:32,882 But now, they have discovered a new role 10 00:00:33,162 --> 00:00:34,601 that restores their power and authority. 11 00:00:36,162 --> 00:00:37,522 Instead of delivering dreams 12 00:00:37,962 --> 00:00:41,842 politicians now promise to protect us from nightmares. 13 00:00:47,642 --> 00:00:50,002 They say that they will rescue us from dreadful dangers 14 00:00:50,322 --> 00:00:52,762 that we cannot see and do not understand. 15 00:00:53,642 --> 00:00:56,522 And the greatest danger of all is international terrorism. 16 00:00:57,322 --> 00:00:58,842 A powerful and sinister network 17 00:00:59,242 --> 00:01:01,642 with sleeper cells in countries across the world. 18 00:01:02,922 --> 00:01:05,442 A threat that needs to be fought by a war on terror. 19 00:01:09,322 --> 00:01:11,322 But much of this threat is a fantasy 20 00:01:12,122 --> 00:01:14,162 which has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. 21 00:01:15,922 --> 00:01:17,002 It's a dark illusion 22 00:01:17,362 --> 00:01:20,282 that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world 23 00:01:20,802 --> 00:01:23,482 the security services, and the international media. 24 00:01:25,162 --> 00:01:26,522 This is a series of films 25 00:01:26,802 --> 00:01:29,362 about how and why that fantasy was created 26 00:01:29,962 --> 00:01:31,202 and who it benefits. 27 00:01:34,722 --> 00:01:36,642 At the heart of the story are two groups: 28 00:01:36,882 --> 00:01:40,561 the American neoconservatives, and the radical Islamists. 29 00:01:41,801 --> 00:01:42,882 Both were idealists 30 00:01:43,122 --> 00:01:45,241 who were born out of the failure of the liberal dream 31 00:01:45,602 --> 00:01:47,082 to build a better world. 32 00:01:47,841 --> 00:01:49,761 And both had a very similar explanation 33 00:01:50,322 --> 00:01:52,081 for what caused that failure. 34 00:01:54,001 --> 00:01:56,002 These two groups have changed the world 35 00:01:56,522 --> 00:01:58,401 but not in the way that either intended. 36 00:01:59,602 --> 00:02:03,562 Together, they created today's nightmare vision of a secret 37 00:02:03,842 --> 00:02:05,842 organized evil that threatens the world. 38 00:02:07,122 --> 00:02:10,922 A fantasy that politicians then found restored their power 39 00:02:11,202 --> 00:02:13,922 and authority in a disillusioned age. 40 00:02:16,042 --> 00:02:20,682 And those with the darkest fears became the most powerful. 41 00:02:22,242 --> 00:02:26,002 The Power of Nightmares 42 00:02:26,082 --> 00:02:29,882 The Rise os the Politics of Fear 43 00:02:30,641 --> 00:02:34,601 Part 1 Baby it's cold outside 44 00:02:34,802 --> 00:02:37,322 The story begins in the summer of 1949 45 00:02:37,361 --> 00:02:39,722 when a middle-aged school inspector from Egypt 46 00:02:39,762 --> 00:02:43,002 arrived at the small town of Greeley, in Colorado. 47 00:02:45,282 --> 00:02:47,081 His name was Sayyed Qutb. 48 00:02:48,402 --> 00:02:51,162 Qutb had been sent to the U.S. to study its educational system 49 00:02:51,201 --> 00:02:54,122 and he enrolled in the local state college. 50 00:02:54,162 --> 00:02:57,202 His photographs appear in the college yearbook. 51 00:02:59,002 --> 00:03:00,722 But Qutb was destined 52 00:03:00,762 --> 00:03:01,682 to become much more than a school inspector. 53 00:03:03,082 --> 00:03:05,402 Out of his experiences of America that summer 54 00:03:06,161 --> 00:03:08,601 Qutb was going to develop a powerful set of ideas 55 00:03:09,362 --> 00:03:10,801 that would directly inspire those 56 00:03:11,081 --> 00:03:13,922 who flew the planes on the attack of September the 11th. 57 00:03:18,322 --> 00:03:20,001 As he had traveled across the country 58 00:03:20,401 --> 00:03:23,002 Qutb had become increasingly disenchanted with America. 59 00:03:24,362 --> 00:03:25,722 The very things that, on the surface 60 00:03:26,282 --> 00:03:27,802 made the country look prosperous and happy 61 00:03:28,682 --> 00:03:31,762 Qutb saw as signs of an inner corruption and decay. 62 00:03:33,282 --> 00:03:34,762 This was Truman's America 63 00:03:35,122 --> 00:03:37,001 and many Americans today regard it 64 00:03:37,281 --> 00:03:39,042 as a golden age of their civilization. 65 00:03:40,082 --> 00:03:43,721 But for Qutb, he saw a sinister side in this. 66 00:03:44,442 --> 00:03:47,362 All around him was crassness, corruption 67 00:03:47,961 --> 00:03:55,962 vulgarity. Talk centered on movie stars and automobile prices. 68 00:03:57,362 --> 00:03:59,002 He was also very concerned 69 00:03:59,442 --> 00:04:01,122 that the inhabitants of Greeley 70 00:04:01,642 --> 00:04:04,402 spent a lot of time in lawn care. 71 00:04:05,121 --> 00:04:08,161 Pruning their hedges, cutting their lawns. 72 00:04:08,802 --> 00:04:12,562 This, for Qutb, was indicative of the selfish 73 00:04:13,242 --> 00:04:17,402 and materialistic aspect of American life. 74 00:04:18,882 --> 00:04:23,842 Americans lived these isolated lives surrounded by their lawns. 75 00:04:24,562 --> 00:04:27,002 They lusted after material goods. 76 00:04:28,242 --> 00:04:30,602 And this, says Qutb quite succinctly 77 00:04:30,921 --> 00:04:32,401 is the taste of America. 78 00:04:33,121 --> 00:04:34,601 What Qutb believed he was seeing 79 00:04:34,922 --> 00:04:36,722 was a hidden and dangerous reality 80 00:04:37,162 --> 00:04:39,722 underneath the surface of ordinary American life. 81 00:04:41,282 --> 00:04:44,282 One summer night, he went to a dance at a local church hall. 82 00:04:45,242 --> 00:04:47,481 He later wrote that what he saw that night 83 00:04:47,801 --> 00:04:49,082 crystallized his vision. 84 00:04:50,641 --> 00:04:53,322 He talks about how the pastor played on the gramophone 85 00:04:53,561 --> 00:04:55,481 one of the big-band hits of the day 86 00:04:55,721 --> 00:04:57,162 "Baby, It's Cold Outside." 87 00:04:57,801 --> 00:05:01,361 He dimmed the lights so as to create a dreamy, romantic effect. 88 00:05:01,921 --> 00:05:03,401 And then, Qutb says that 89 00:05:03,681 --> 00:05:07,562 "chests met chests, arms circled waists 90 00:05:07,921 --> 00:05:10,762 and the hall was full of lust and love." 91 00:05:18,042 --> 00:05:19,721 To most people watching this dance 92 00:05:19,922 --> 00:05:22,722 it would have been an innocent picture of youthful happiness. 93 00:05:23,441 --> 00:05:25,122 But Qutb saw something else: 94 00:05:26,562 --> 00:05:29,922 The dancers in front of him were tragic lost souls. 95 00:05:30,802 --> 00:05:32,522 They believed that they were free. 96 00:05:32,842 --> 00:05:34,001 But in reality 97 00:05:34,202 --> 00:05:37,441 they were trapped by their own selfish and greedy desires. 98 00:05:38,801 --> 00:05:41,521 American society was not going forwards; 99 00:05:41,841 --> 00:05:44,202 it was taking people backwards. 100 00:05:44,561 --> 00:05:46,282 They were becoming isolated beings 101 00:05:46,522 --> 00:05:48,642 driven by primitive animal forces. 102 00:05:50,802 --> 00:05:52,602 Such creatures, Qutb believed 103 00:05:52,882 --> 00:05:56,002 could corrode the very bonds that held society together. 104 00:05:57,201 --> 00:05:58,801 And he became determined that night 105 00:05:59,081 --> 00:06:01,721 to prevent this culture of selfish individualism 106 00:06:02,042 --> 00:06:04,002 taking over his own country. 107 00:06:13,962 --> 00:06:15,721 But Qutb was not alone. 108 00:06:16,521 --> 00:06:18,321 At the same time, in Chicago 109 00:06:18,561 --> 00:06:19,401 there was another man 110 00:06:19,561 --> 00:06:22,082 who shared the same fears about the destructive force 111 00:06:22,281 --> 00:06:23,641 of individualism in America. 112 00:06:25,082 --> 00:06:26,882 He was an obscure political philosopher 113 00:06:27,122 --> 00:06:28,682 at the University of Chicago. 114 00:06:29,561 --> 00:06:32,841 But his ideas would also have far-reaching consequences 115 00:06:33,961 --> 00:06:35,642 because they would become the shaping force 116 00:06:36,202 --> 00:06:38,041 behind the neoconservative movement 117 00:06:38,402 --> 00:06:40,681 which now dominates the American administration. 118 00:06:42,681 --> 00:06:44,722 He was called Leo Strauss. 119 00:06:45,082 --> 00:06:46,522 Strauss is a mysterious figure. 120 00:06:46,882 --> 00:06:48,922 He refused to be filmed or interviewed. 121 00:06:49,522 --> 00:06:52,721 He devoted his time to creating a loyal band of students. 122 00:06:53,482 --> 00:06:55,122 And what he taught them was 123 00:06:55,361 --> 00:06:57,482 that the prosperous liberal society they were living in 124 00:06:58,081 --> 00:07:00,642 contained the seeds of its own destruction. 125 00:07:02,802 --> 00:07:08,241 He didn't give interviews, or write political essays 126 00:07:08,682 --> 00:07:11,562 or appear on the radio 127 00:07:11,842 --> 00:07:14,801 there wasn't TV yet-or things like that. 128 00:07:15,162 --> 00:07:18,202 But he did want to get a school of students 129 00:07:18,442 --> 00:07:21,162 to see what he had seen: 130 00:07:21,442 --> 00:07:25,722 that Western liberalism led to nihilism 131 00:07:26,522 --> 00:07:29,562 and had undergone a development 132 00:07:30,041 --> 00:07:33,802 at the end of which it could no longer define itself 133 00:07:34,401 --> 00:07:35,641 or defend itself. 134 00:07:38,681 --> 00:07:43,601 A development which took everything praiseworthy and admirable 135 00:07:44,001 --> 00:07:44,961 out of human beings 136 00:07:45,162 --> 00:07:47,082 and made us into dwarf animals. 137 00:07:49,002 --> 00:07:52,761 Made us into herd animals-sick little dwarves 138 00:07:52,961 --> 00:07:55,401 satisfied with a dangerous life 139 00:07:55,681 --> 00:07:58,882 in which nothing is true and everything is permitted. 140 00:08:01,642 --> 00:08:04,802 Strauss believed that the liberal idea of individual freedom 141 00:08:05,041 --> 00:08:07,041 led people to question everything 142 00:08:07,402 --> 00:08:09,401 all values, all moral truths. 143 00:08:11,522 --> 00:08:14,962 Instead, people were led by their own selfish desires. 144 00:08:15,321 --> 00:08:17,562 And this threatened to tear apart the shared values 145 00:08:17,842 --> 00:08:19,482 which held society together. 146 00:08:22,321 --> 00:08:24,481 But there was a way to stop this, Strauss believed. 147 00:08:26,121 --> 00:08:28,841 It was for politicians to assert powerful and inspiring myths 148 00:08:29,242 --> 00:08:31,162 that everyone could believe in. 149 00:08:32,242 --> 00:08:35,962 They might not be true, but they were necessary illusions. 150 00:08:36,482 --> 00:08:38,282 One of these was religion; 151 00:08:38,522 --> 00:08:40,722 the other was the myth of the nation. 152 00:08:41,442 --> 00:08:43,482 And in America, that was the idea 153 00:08:43,721 --> 00:08:45,721 that the country had a unique destiny 154 00:08:46,281 --> 00:08:49,681 to battle the forces of evil throughout the world. 155 00:08:50,961 --> 00:08:53,681 This myth was epitomized, Strauss told his students 156 00:08:53,882 --> 00:08:57,281 in his favorite television program: Gunsmoke. 157 00:08:58,042 --> 00:09:00,001 Strauss was a great fan of American television. 158 00:09:00,202 --> 00:09:01,602 Gunsmoke was his great favorite 159 00:09:01,801 --> 00:09:03,681 and he would hurry home from the seminar 160 00:09:03,881 --> 00:09:05,881 which would end at, you know, 5:30 or so 161 00:09:06,041 --> 00:09:07,001 and have a quick dinner 162 00:09:07,161 --> 00:09:09,361 so he could be at his seat before the television set 163 00:09:09,601 --> 00:09:10,801 when Gunsmoke came on. 164 00:09:11,681 --> 00:09:13,402 And he felt that this was good, this show. 165 00:09:13,601 --> 00:09:15,322 This had a salutary effect on the American public 166 00:09:15,761 --> 00:09:19,962 because it showed the conflict between good and evil in a way 167 00:09:20,201 --> 00:09:23,561 that would be immediately intelligible to everyone. 168 00:09:24,001 --> 00:09:24,721 Let's see what happens! 169 00:09:24,882 --> 00:09:25,602 No! 170 00:09:28,202 --> 00:09:29,402 The hero has a white hat; 171 00:09:29,881 --> 00:09:32,121 he's faster on the draw than the bad man; 172 00:09:32,481 --> 00:09:33,921 the good guy wins. 173 00:09:34,161 --> 00:09:35,241 And it's not just that the good guy wins 174 00:09:35,521 --> 00:09:36,682 but that values are clear. 175 00:09:37,041 --> 00:09:38,042 That's America! 176 00:09:38,322 --> 00:09:41,001 We're gonna triumph over the evils of 177 00:09:41,161 --> 00:09:42,361 that are trying to destroy us 178 00:09:42,681 --> 00:09:45,561 and the virtues of the Western frontier. Good and evil. 179 00:09:46,562 --> 00:09:49,162 Leo Strauss' other favorite program was Perry Mason. 180 00:09:49,961 --> 00:09:52,841 And this, he told his students, epitomized the role that they 181 00:09:53,041 --> 00:09:54,601 the elite, had to play. 182 00:09:55,401 --> 00:09:57,682 In public, they should promote the myths 183 00:09:57,921 --> 00:10:00,081 necessary to rescue America from decay. 184 00:10:01,001 --> 00:10:04,122 But in private, they didn't have to believe in them. 185 00:10:05,041 --> 00:10:06,801 Perry Mason was different from Gunsmoke. 186 00:10:07,081 --> 00:10:09,602 The extremely cunning man who, as far as we can see 187 00:10:10,002 --> 00:10:12,521 is very virtuous and uses his great intelligence 188 00:10:12,841 --> 00:10:15,721 and quickness of mind to rescue his clients from dangers 189 00:10:16,042 --> 00:10:19,921 but who could be fooling us - because he's cleverer than we are. 190 00:10:20,641 --> 00:10:23,322 Is he really telling the truth? Maybe his client is guilty! 191 00:10:30,561 --> 00:10:33,882 In 1950, Sayyed Qutb traveled back to Egypt from America. 192 00:10:35,802 --> 00:10:38,801 He too was determined to find some way of controlling 193 00:10:39,041 --> 00:10:41,162 the forces of selfish individualism. 194 00:10:42,402 --> 00:10:45,361 And as he traveled, he began to envisage a new type of society. 195 00:10:46,681 --> 00:10:47,882 It would have all the modern benefits 196 00:10:48,121 --> 00:10:49,961 of Western science and technology 197 00:10:50,921 --> 00:10:54,561 but a more political Islam would have a central role to play 198 00:10:55,161 --> 00:10:57,561 keeping individualism in check. 199 00:10:59,641 --> 00:11:01,201 It would provide a moral framework 200 00:11:01,641 --> 00:11:05,681 that would stop people's selfish desires from overwhelming them. 201 00:11:14,641 --> 00:11:15,481 But Qutb realized 202 00:11:15,681 --> 00:11:18,201 that American culture was already spreading to Egypt 203 00:11:18,641 --> 00:11:21,001 trapping the masses in its seductive dream. 204 00:11:23,721 --> 00:11:25,761 What was needed, he believed, was an elite 205 00:11:26,161 --> 00:11:29,562 a vanguard who could see through these illusions of freedom 206 00:11:29,881 --> 00:11:31,801 just as he had in America 207 00:11:32,081 --> 00:11:35,602 and who would then lead the masses to realize the higher truth. 208 00:11:39,241 --> 00:11:40,282 The masses need to be led. 209 00:11:40,921 --> 00:11:46,601 And it is this vanguard group that will be responsible 210 00:11:46,881 --> 00:11:49,042 for the task of leading the people out of the darkness 211 00:11:49,281 --> 00:11:51,121 and into the light of Islam. 212 00:11:51,642 --> 00:11:55,161 Because the masses had succumbed to their own selfish desires 213 00:11:55,681 --> 00:11:59,761 and he wanted the vanguard to be different, to be pure 214 00:12:00,121 --> 00:12:04,441 to be standing together outside all of this corrupt situation 215 00:12:05,841 --> 00:12:09,081 bringing people back to the truth. 216 00:12:11,561 --> 00:12:14,601 On his return, Qutb became politically active in Egypt. 217 00:12:15,681 --> 00:12:17,641 He joined a group called the Muslim Brotherhood 218 00:12:17,921 --> 00:12:19,521 who wanted Islam to play a major role 219 00:12:19,721 --> 00:12:21,161 in governing Egyptian society. 220 00:12:22,481 --> 00:12:23,882 And in 1952 221 00:12:24,081 --> 00:12:26,921 the Brotherhood supported the revolution led by General Nasser 222 00:12:27,322 --> 00:12:30,121 that overthrew the last remnants of British rule. 223 00:12:31,681 --> 00:12:33,521 But Nasser very quickly made it clear 224 00:12:33,841 --> 00:12:36,481 that the new Egypt was going to be a secular society 225 00:12:36,801 --> 00:12:38,441 that emulated Western morals. 226 00:12:39,721 --> 00:12:42,361 He quickly forged an alliance with America. 227 00:12:43,521 --> 00:12:47,202 And the CIA came to Egypt to organize security agencies 228 00:12:47,521 --> 00:12:49,001 for the new regime. 229 00:12:52,682 --> 00:12:53,681 Faced with this 230 00:12:53,881 --> 00:12:56,281 the Muslim Brotherhood began to organize against Nasser 231 00:12:57,121 --> 00:13:00,841 and in 1954 Qutb and other leading members of the Brotherhood 232 00:13:01,121 --> 00:13:03,841 were arrested by the security services. 233 00:13:05,721 --> 00:13:07,201 What then happened to Qutb 234 00:13:07,642 --> 00:13:10,401 was going to have consequences for the whole world. 235 00:13:19,521 --> 00:13:21,561 In the 1970s, this film was made 236 00:13:21,881 --> 00:13:24,041 that showed what happened in Nasser's main prison 237 00:13:24,281 --> 00:13:25,602 in the ‘50s and ‘60s. 238 00:13:27,081 --> 00:13:29,361 It was based on the testimony of survivors. 239 00:13:31,082 --> 00:13:33,241 Torturers who had been trained by the CIA 240 00:13:33,681 --> 00:13:35,401 unleashed an orgy of violence 241 00:13:35,681 --> 00:13:37,281 against Muslim Brotherhood members 242 00:13:37,641 --> 00:13:39,841 accused of plotting to overthrow Nasser. 243 00:13:40,801 --> 00:13:42,161 At one point 244 00:13:42,361 --> 00:13:44,161 Qutb was covered with animal fat 245 00:13:44,401 --> 00:13:47,401 and locked in a cell with dogs trained to attack humans. 246 00:13:50,961 --> 00:13:53,281 Inside the cell, he had a heart attack. 247 00:14:02,561 --> 00:14:07,281 Sayyed Qutb thought of himself as a superior sort of person. 248 00:14:07,361 --> 00:14:11,801 He saw himself as an important Islamist thinker 249 00:14:12,041 --> 00:14:13,081 and a strong character. 250 00:14:13,602 --> 00:14:14,601 And so on and so on. 251 00:14:14,721 --> 00:14:16,801 But at the end of the day 252 00:14:16,881 --> 00:14:19,121 when he was in the military prison 253 00:14:19,201 --> 00:14:21,881 he gave us the exact details about his secret group 254 00:14:21,961 --> 00:14:24,001 and the orders he had given. 255 00:14:25,081 --> 00:14:27,241 The most dangerous was the order 256 00:14:27,322 --> 00:14:30,601 to flood the whole of the Nile delta 257 00:14:30,681 --> 00:14:36,361 and drown this corrupt land of infidels. 258 00:14:39,001 --> 00:14:40,801 Qutb survived, but the torture 259 00:14:41,041 --> 00:14:43,881 had a powerful radicalizing effect on his ideas. 260 00:14:45,361 --> 00:14:46,321 Up to this point 261 00:14:46,681 --> 00:14:48,841 he had believed that the Western secular ideas 262 00:14:49,201 --> 00:14:52,161 simply created the selfishness and the isolation 263 00:14:52,401 --> 00:14:54,441 he had seen in the United States. 264 00:14:54,921 --> 00:14:56,561 But the torture, he believed 265 00:14:56,841 --> 00:14:58,441 showed that this culture also unleashed 266 00:14:58,681 --> 00:15:01,801 the most brutal and barbarous aspects of human beings. 267 00:15:03,401 --> 00:15:06,161 Qutb began to have an apocalyptic vision of a disease 268 00:15:06,441 --> 00:15:09,281 that was spreading from the West throughout the world. 269 00:15:10,121 --> 00:15:13,761 He called it jahilliyah - a state of barbarous ignorance. 270 00:15:15,041 --> 00:15:17,521 What made it so terrifying and insidious 271 00:15:17,801 --> 00:15:20,561 was that people didn't realize that they were infected. 272 00:15:21,481 --> 00:15:23,201 They believed that they were free 273 00:15:23,481 --> 00:15:25,561 and that their politicians were taking them forward 274 00:15:25,841 --> 00:15:27,201 to a new world. 275 00:15:27,681 --> 00:15:31,761 But in fact, they were regressing to a barbarous age. 276 00:15:32,921 --> 00:15:35,161 The sense is that jahilliyah is so dangerous now 277 00:15:35,401 --> 00:15:37,641 because not only is it advanced by Western powers 278 00:15:37,961 --> 00:15:41,761 but Muslims - this is like a charge of false consciousness - 279 00:15:42,201 --> 00:15:45,721 Muslims have become infected with this jahilliyah 280 00:15:46,001 --> 00:15:48,481 so now the threat to Islam is also from within. 281 00:15:48,761 --> 00:15:50,361 It's from without, and within. 282 00:15:50,761 --> 00:15:52,121 It's a state of emergency 283 00:15:52,401 --> 00:15:54,761 because jahilliyah is a condition 284 00:15:55,001 --> 00:15:57,001 that pervades everything and everybody. 285 00:15:57,521 --> 00:15:59,601 It's even infected our powers of imagination. 286 00:15:59,841 --> 00:16:02,001 We don't even know that we're sick! 287 00:16:02,241 --> 00:16:05,161 That we now worship materialism, and the self 288 00:16:05,441 --> 00:16:08,241 and individual truths over the real truths. 289 00:16:08,921 --> 00:16:11,961 Um, so it's an incredible sense of epic confrontation 290 00:16:12,201 --> 00:16:14,041 where Islam is being insulted on all fronts. 291 00:16:14,321 --> 00:16:15,201 From within, from without 292 00:16:15,481 --> 00:16:17,881 culturally, militarily, economically, politically. 293 00:16:18,201 --> 00:16:19,281 And under those circumstances 294 00:16:19,521 --> 00:16:21,961 any way of fighting it becomes justified and legitimate 295 00:16:22,361 --> 00:16:24,441 and in fact has a kind of existential weight 296 00:16:24,681 --> 00:16:26,681 because somehow it's doing God's will on earth. 297 00:16:28,961 --> 00:16:30,601 To Qutb, this force of jahilliyah 298 00:16:30,921 --> 00:16:33,201 had now gone so deep into the minds of Muslims 299 00:16:33,721 --> 00:16:36,281 that a dramatic way had to be found to free them. 300 00:16:38,521 --> 00:16:40,561 In a series of books he wrote secretly in prison 301 00:16:40,881 --> 00:16:42,201 which were then smuggled out 302 00:16:42,681 --> 00:16:45,840 Qutb called upon a revolutionary vanguard to rise up 303 00:16:46,121 --> 00:16:47,441 and overthrow the leaders 304 00:16:47,721 --> 00:16:50,601 who had allowed jahilliyah to infect their country. 305 00:16:52,121 --> 00:16:53,520 The implication was 306 00:16:53,761 --> 00:16:56,521 that these leaders could justifiably be killed 307 00:16:56,921 --> 00:16:58,481 because they had become so corrupted 308 00:16:58,841 --> 00:17:02,321 they were no longer Muslims, even though they said they were. 309 00:17:05,081 --> 00:17:08,961 Faced with this, Nasser decided to crush Qutb and his ideas 310 00:17:09,801 --> 00:17:13,801 and in 1966 Qutb was put on trial for treason. 311 00:17:15,721 --> 00:17:19,281 This is the only known film of Qutb as he awaits sentence. 312 00:17:21,761 --> 00:17:23,961 The verdict was a foregone conclusion 313 00:17:24,881 --> 00:17:29,561 and on August 29, 1966, Qutb was executed. 314 00:17:31,481 --> 00:17:33,281 But his ideas lived on. 315 00:17:33,721 --> 00:17:35,361 The day after his execution 316 00:17:35,641 --> 00:17:37,960 a young schoolboy set up a secret group. 317 00:17:38,801 --> 00:17:41,321 He hoped that it would one day become the vanguard 318 00:17:41,601 --> 00:17:43,161 that Qutb had hoped for. 319 00:17:43,641 --> 00:17:45,681 His name was Ayman Zawahiri 320 00:17:46,561 --> 00:17:50,681 and Zawahiri was to become the mentor to Osama Bin Laden. 321 00:17:58,521 --> 00:17:59,401 But at the very moment 322 00:17:59,601 --> 00:18:02,041 when Sayyed Qutb's ideas seemed dead and buried 323 00:18:02,601 --> 00:18:05,321 Leo Strauss' ideas about how to transform America 324 00:18:05,881 --> 00:18:08,281 were about to become powerful and influential 325 00:18:09,001 --> 00:18:10,600 because the liberal political order 326 00:18:10,880 --> 00:18:14,761 that had dominated America since the war started to collapse. 327 00:18:16,521 --> 00:18:20,241 Law and order have broken down in Detroit, Michigan. 328 00:18:21,121 --> 00:18:24,161 Pillage, looting, murder. 329 00:18:24,720 --> 00:18:25,960 Only a few years before. 330 00:18:26,281 --> 00:18:28,041 President Johnson had promised policies 331 00:18:28,321 --> 00:18:31,320 that would create a new and a better world in America. 332 00:18:31,601 --> 00:18:33,360 He had called it "the Great Society." 333 00:18:36,761 --> 00:18:40,640 The Great Society is in place 334 00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:44,521 where every child can find knowledge to enrich his mind. 335 00:18:46,601 --> 00:18:48,881 It is a place where the City of Man. 336 00:18:49,081 --> 00:18:49,960 But now 337 00:18:50,001 --> 00:18:52,560 in the wake of some of the worst riots ever seen in America 338 00:18:52,961 --> 00:18:56,241 that dream seemed to have ended in violence and hatred. 339 00:18:57,640 --> 00:18:59,921 One prominent liberal journalist called Irving Kristol 340 00:19:00,240 --> 00:19:01,441 began to question 341 00:19:01,681 --> 00:19:03,881 whether it might actually be the policies themselves 342 00:19:04,281 --> 00:19:06,041 that were causing social breakdown. 343 00:19:07,240 --> 00:19:10,000 If you had asked any liberal in 1960 344 00:19:10,241 --> 00:19:12,121 we are going to pass these laws, these laws, these laws 345 00:19:12,361 --> 00:19:14,081 and these laws, mentioning all the laws 346 00:19:14,321 --> 00:19:16,720 that in fact were passed in the 1960s and ‘70s 347 00:19:17,481 --> 00:19:20,560 would you say crime will go up, drug addiction will go up 348 00:19:20,960 --> 00:19:23,361 illegitimacy will go up, or will they get down? 349 00:19:24,041 --> 00:19:26,320 Obviously, everyone would have said, they will get down. 350 00:19:26,720 --> 00:19:28,240 And everyone would have been wrong. 351 00:19:28,881 --> 00:19:30,681 Now, that's not something 352 00:19:30,921 --> 00:19:34,201 that the liberals have been able to face up to. 353 00:19:34,680 --> 00:19:35,961 They've had their reforms 354 00:19:36,440 --> 00:19:38,441 and they have led to consequences 355 00:19:38,721 --> 00:19:41,761 that they did not expect and they don't know what to do about. 356 00:19:43,561 --> 00:19:46,241 In the early ‘70s, Irving Kristol became the focus 357 00:19:46,561 --> 00:19:49,281 of a group of disaffected intellectuals in Washington. 358 00:19:50,641 --> 00:19:52,080 They were determined to understand 359 00:19:52,481 --> 00:19:55,321 why the optimistic liberal policies had failed. 360 00:19:56,441 --> 00:19:59,760 And they found the answer in the theories of Leo Strauss. 361 00:20:00,401 --> 00:20:05,000 Strauss explained that it was the very basis of the liberal idea 362 00:20:05,361 --> 00:20:07,241 "the belief in individual freedom" 363 00:20:07,521 --> 00:20:09,321 that was causing the chaos 364 00:20:09,881 --> 00:20:12,001 because it undermined the shared moral framework 365 00:20:12,201 --> 00:20:14,121 that held society together. 366 00:20:14,801 --> 00:20:17,521 Individuals pursued their own selfish interests 367 00:20:17,921 --> 00:20:19,961 and this inevitably led to conflict. 368 00:20:22,800 --> 00:20:24,001 As the movement grew 369 00:20:24,320 --> 00:20:27,041 many young students who had studied Strauss' ideas 370 00:20:27,321 --> 00:20:29,280 came to Washington to join this group. 371 00:20:31,241 --> 00:20:32,921 Some, like Paul Wolfowitz 372 00:20:33,240 --> 00:20:36,240 had been taught Strauss' ideas at the University of Chicago 373 00:20:37,241 --> 00:20:39,361 as had Francis Fukuyama. 374 00:20:40,881 --> 00:20:43,520 And others, like Irving Kristol's son William 375 00:20:43,800 --> 00:20:46,161 had studied Strauss' theories at Harvard. 376 00:20:47,121 --> 00:20:50,761 This group became known as the neoconservatives. 377 00:20:51,521 --> 00:20:53,120 Well, many of them couldn't get academic jobs 378 00:20:53,601 --> 00:20:55,600 and the political science and philosophy faclities 379 00:20:55,880 --> 00:20:57,441 were not terribly friendly to those 380 00:20:57,841 --> 00:21:00,201 of a conservative or moderately conservative disposition. 381 00:21:00,481 --> 00:21:01,441 And the truth is that a lot of people 382 00:21:01,721 --> 00:21:03,400 who ended up in Washington started out as academics. 383 00:21:03,680 --> 00:21:05,681 I did; Paul Wolfowitz did; and decided 384 00:21:05,921 --> 00:21:08,401 they probably didn't have very good prospects in the academy. 385 00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:11,441 What we all had in common, I think 386 00:21:11,640 --> 00:21:13,000 was a certain doubt about 387 00:21:13,280 --> 00:21:15,241 what once seemed a kind of great certainty 388 00:21:15,561 --> 00:21:17,680 and confidence in liberal progress. 389 00:21:18,681 --> 00:21:22,641 The philosophic grounds for liberal democracy had been weakened. 390 00:21:24,761 --> 00:21:26,641 So I think Straussians who came to Washington 391 00:21:26,921 --> 00:21:29,001 they didn't think of themselves as Churchill or Lincoln 392 00:21:29,200 --> 00:21:31,000 let me assure you, but they did that, you know 393 00:21:31,281 --> 00:21:34,560 there's something noble about public life, and about politics 394 00:21:35,041 --> 00:21:38,161 and they tried to make a contribution in many different areas. 395 00:21:40,320 --> 00:21:43,241 The neoconservatives were idealists. 396 00:21:43,600 --> 00:21:46,600 Their aim was to try and stop the social disintegration 397 00:21:46,921 --> 00:21:49,401 they believed liberal freedoms had unleashed. 398 00:21:50,561 --> 00:21:53,360 They wanted to find a way of uniting the people 399 00:21:53,880 --> 00:21:55,361 by giving them a shared purpose. 400 00:21:56,561 --> 00:21:59,001 One of their great influences in doing this 401 00:21:59,281 --> 00:22:01,761 would be the theories of Leo Strauss. 402 00:22:02,120 --> 00:22:04,801 They would set out to recreate the myth of America 403 00:22:05,120 --> 00:22:06,601 as a unique nation 404 00:22:06,841 --> 00:22:10,281 whose destiny was to battle against evil in the world. 405 00:22:11,840 --> 00:22:13,200 And in this project 406 00:22:13,561 --> 00:22:16,321 the source of evil would be America's Cold War enemy: 407 00:22:16,681 --> 00:22:18,320 the Soviet Union. 408 00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:20,721 And by doing this, they believed 409 00:22:21,001 --> 00:22:22,881 that they would not only give new meaning 410 00:22:23,120 --> 00:22:24,760 and purpose to people's lives 411 00:22:25,361 --> 00:22:29,000 but they would spread the good of democracy around the world. 412 00:22:30,080 --> 00:22:31,841 The United States would not only 413 00:22:32,120 --> 00:22:34,121 according to these - the Straussians 414 00:22:34,401 --> 00:22:38,241 be able to bring good to the world 415 00:22:38,561 --> 00:22:40,240 but would be able to overcome 416 00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:43,240 the fundamental weaknesses of American society 417 00:22:44,001 --> 00:22:46,641 a society that has been suffering, almost rotting 418 00:22:47,001 --> 00:22:49,320 in their language, from relativism, liberalism 419 00:22:49,601 --> 00:22:53,601 lack of self-confidence, lack of belief in itself. 420 00:22:53,840 --> 00:22:56,801 And one of the main political projects of the Straussians 421 00:22:57,081 --> 00:22:58,241 during the Cold War 422 00:22:58,561 --> 00:23:01,520 was to reinforce the self-confidence of Americans 423 00:23:01,841 --> 00:23:03,680 and the belief that America 424 00:23:03,960 --> 00:23:06,801 was fundamentally the only force for good in the world 425 00:23:07,201 --> 00:23:12,001 that had to be supported, otherwise evil would prevail. 426 00:23:13,201 --> 00:23:15,801 But to do this, the neoconservatives were going to have 427 00:23:16,121 --> 00:23:18,480 to defeat one of the most powerful men in the world. 428 00:23:19,720 --> 00:23:23,320 Henry Kissinger was the Secretary of State under President Nixon 429 00:23:23,641 --> 00:23:26,361 and he didn't believe in a world of good and evil. 430 00:23:27,120 --> 00:23:29,241 What drove Kissinger was a ruthless 431 00:23:29,561 --> 00:23:31,641 pragmatic vision of power in the world. 432 00:23:32,601 --> 00:23:35,321 With America's growing political and social chaos 433 00:23:35,561 --> 00:23:39,281 Kissinger wanted the country to give up its ideological battles. 434 00:23:39,801 --> 00:23:42,400 Instead, it should come to terms with countries 435 00:23:42,640 --> 00:23:44,160 like the Soviet Union 436 00:23:44,521 --> 00:23:47,280 to create a new kind of global interdependence. 437 00:23:47,801 --> 00:23:49,881 A world in which America would be safe. 438 00:23:53,161 --> 00:23:58,280 I believe that with all the dislocations we know - now experience 439 00:23:59,000 --> 00:24:02,161 there also exists an extraordinary opportunity to form 440 00:24:02,441 --> 00:24:06,041 for the first time in history, a truly global society 441 00:24:06,441 --> 00:24:09,321 carried by the principle of interdependence. 442 00:24:09,881 --> 00:24:12,601 And if we act wisely and with vision 443 00:24:13,120 --> 00:24:16,161 I think we can look back to all this turmoil 444 00:24:16,601 --> 00:24:22,921 as the birth pangs of a more creative and better system. 445 00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:26,441 Kissinger had begun this process in 1972 446 00:24:26,721 --> 00:24:28,480 when he persuaded the Soviet Union 447 00:24:28,681 --> 00:24:31,480 to sign a treaty with America limiting nuclear arms. 448 00:24:32,120 --> 00:24:34,800 It was the start of what was called "detente." 449 00:24:35,801 --> 00:24:37,841 And President Nixon returned to Washington 450 00:24:38,241 --> 00:24:42,040 to announce triumphantly that the age of fear was over. 451 00:24:42,840 --> 00:24:44,961 Last Friday, in Moscow 452 00:24:45,401 --> 00:24:48,760 we witnessed the beginning of the end of that era 453 00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:51,401 which began in 1945. 454 00:24:51,640 --> 00:24:55,880 With this step, we have enhanced the security of both nations. 455 00:24:56,121 --> 00:24:59,361 We have begun to reduce the level of fear 456 00:24:59,760 --> 00:25:04,360 by reducing the causes of fear - for our two peoples 457 00:25:04,761 --> 00:25:06,641 and for all peoples in the world. 458 00:25:08,240 --> 00:25:10,040 But a world without fear was not 459 00:25:10,400 --> 00:25:13,361 what the neoconservatives needed to pursue their project. 460 00:25:14,440 --> 00:25:17,601 They now set out to destroy Henry Kissinger's vision. 461 00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:21,601 What gave them their opportunity 462 00:25:21,840 --> 00:25:24,440 was the growing collapse of American political power 463 00:25:24,761 --> 00:25:26,561 both abroad and at home. 464 00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:29,001 The defeat in Vietnam 465 00:25:29,240 --> 00:25:31,601 and the resignation of President Nixon over Watergate 466 00:25:31,960 --> 00:25:35,721 led to a crisis of confidence in America's political class. 467 00:25:36,561 --> 00:25:39,120 And the neoconservatives seized their moment. 468 00:25:39,640 --> 00:25:41,881 They allied themselves with two right-wingers 469 00:25:42,240 --> 00:25:44,320 in the new administration of Gerald Ford. 470 00:25:45,240 --> 00:25:48,560 One was Donald Rumsfeld, the new Secretary of Defense. 471 00:25:49,080 --> 00:25:52,721 The other was Dick Cheney, the President's Chief of Staff. 472 00:25:54,361 --> 00:25:56,281 Rumsfeld began to make speeches 473 00:25:56,561 --> 00:25:57,681 alleging that the Soviets 474 00:25:58,081 --> 00:25:59,760 were ignoring Kissinger's treaties 475 00:26:00,240 --> 00:26:02,160 and secretly building up their weapons 476 00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:05,201 with the intention of attacking America. 477 00:26:06,920 --> 00:26:08,400 The Soviet Union has been busy. 478 00:26:08,801 --> 00:26:10,400 They've been busy in terms of their level of effort; 479 00:26:10,640 --> 00:26:12,560 they've been busy in terms of the actual weapons 480 00:26:12,840 --> 00:26:13,721 they've been producing; 481 00:26:14,001 --> 00:26:16,240 they've been busy in terms of expanding production rates; 482 00:26:16,481 --> 00:26:18,600 they've been busy in terms of expanding 483 00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:20,640 their institutional capability 484 00:26:20,880 --> 00:26:24,001 to produce additional weapons at additional rates; 485 00:26:24,240 --> 00:26:26,800 they've been busy in terms of expanding their capability 486 00:26:27,000 --> 00:26:30,680 to increasingly improve the sophistication of those weapons. 487 00:26:31,001 --> 00:26:33,520 Year after year after year, they've been demonstrating 488 00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:35,880 that they have steadiness of purpose. 489 00:26:36,160 --> 00:26:38,240 They're purposeful about what they're doing. 490 00:26:38,480 --> 00:26:39,800 Now, your question is 491 00:26:40,080 --> 00:26:41,841 what ought one to be doing about that? 492 00:26:43,761 --> 00:26:45,600 The CIA, and other agencies 493 00:26:45,961 --> 00:26:47,800 who watched the Soviet Union continuously 494 00:26:48,080 --> 00:26:49,521 for any sign of threat 495 00:26:49,801 --> 00:26:51,600 said that this was a complete fiction. 496 00:26:51,880 --> 00:26:54,000 There was no truth to Rumsfeld's allegations. 497 00:26:55,640 --> 00:26:57,601 But Rumsfeld used his position 498 00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:01,480 to persuade President Ford to set up an independent inquiry. 499 00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:03,320 He said it would prove 500 00:27:03,600 --> 00:27:06,040 that there was a hidden threat to America. 501 00:27:06,720 --> 00:27:08,321 And the inquiry would be run 502 00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:10,200 by a group of neoconservatives 503 00:27:10,400 --> 00:27:12,720 one of whom was Paul Wolfowitz. 504 00:27:13,080 --> 00:27:16,920 The aim was to change the way America saw the Soviet Union. 505 00:27:17,641 --> 00:27:20,120 And Rumsfeld won that very intense 506 00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:23,480 intense political battle 507 00:27:23,720 --> 00:27:27,040 that was waged in Washington in 1975 and 1976. 508 00:27:27,280 --> 00:27:29,480 Now, as part of that battle, Rumsfeld and others 509 00:27:29,800 --> 00:27:33,320 people such as Paul Wolfowitz, wanted to get into the CIA. 510 00:27:33,681 --> 00:27:35,360 And their mission was to create 511 00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:40,080 a much more severe view of the Soviet Union, Soviet intentions 512 00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:44,360 Soviet views about fighting and winning a nuclear war. 513 00:27:46,880 --> 00:27:49,560 The neoconservatives chose, as the inquiry chairman 514 00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:51,600 a well-known critic and historian 515 00:27:51,840 --> 00:27:54,320 of the Soviet Union called Richard Pipes. 516 00:27:55,201 --> 00:27:58,000 Pipes was convinced that whatever the Soviets said publicly 517 00:27:58,521 --> 00:28:02,120 secretly they still intended to attack and conquer America. 518 00:28:02,920 --> 00:28:04,560 This was their hidden mindset. 519 00:28:05,960 --> 00:28:07,961 The inquiry was called Team B 520 00:28:08,280 --> 00:28:10,721 and the other leading member was Paul Wolfowitz. 521 00:28:11,480 --> 00:28:12,761 And the idea was then 522 00:28:13,041 --> 00:28:14,520 to appoint a group of outside experts 523 00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:18,000 who have access to the same evidence as the CIA 524 00:28:18,480 --> 00:28:21,160 used to arrive at these conclusions 525 00:28:21,440 --> 00:28:23,360 and to see if they could come up with different conclusions. 526 00:28:23,840 --> 00:28:25,560 And I was asked to chair it 527 00:28:25,840 --> 00:28:27,640 because I was not an expert on nuclear weapons. 528 00:28:27,880 --> 00:28:29,760 I was, if anything, an expert on the Soviet mindset 529 00:28:30,041 --> 00:28:32,480 but not on the weapons. But that was the real key 530 00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:35,160 was the question of the Soviet mindset 531 00:28:35,480 --> 00:28:36,921 because the CIA looked only at - 532 00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:38,520 they were known as "bean counters," 533 00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:40,040 always looking at weapons. 534 00:28:40,360 --> 00:28:41,800 But weapons can be used in various ways. 535 00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:43,081 They can be used for defensive purposes 536 00:28:43,361 --> 00:28:44,520 or offensive purposes. 537 00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:46,921 Well, all right, I collected this group of experts 538 00:28:47,201 --> 00:28:49,280 and we began to sift through the evidence. 539 00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:54,520 Team B began examining all the CIA data on the Soviet Union. 540 00:28:54,920 --> 00:28:56,560 But however closely they looked 541 00:28:56,921 --> 00:28:58,920 there was little evidence of the dangerous weapons 542 00:28:59,200 --> 00:29:02,640 or defense systems they claimed the Soviets were developing. 543 00:29:04,201 --> 00:29:05,800 Rather than accept that this meant 544 00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:07,560 that the systems didn't exist 545 00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:09,880 Team B made an assumption 546 00:29:10,200 --> 00:29:12,120 that the Soviets had developed systems 547 00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:16,120 that were so sophisticated, they were undetectible. 548 00:29:16,840 --> 00:29:19,320 For example, they could find no evidence 549 00:29:19,600 --> 00:29:21,240 that the Soviet submarine fleet 550 00:29:21,520 --> 00:29:23,360 had an acoustic defense system. 551 00:29:24,560 --> 00:29:26,281 What this meant, Team B said 552 00:29:26,600 --> 00:29:27,720 was that the Soviets 553 00:29:27,960 --> 00:29:30,801 had actually invented a new non-acoustic system 554 00:29:31,040 --> 00:29:33,160 which was impossible to detect. 555 00:29:34,040 --> 00:29:37,240 And this meant that the whole of the American submarine fleet 556 00:29:37,521 --> 00:29:40,961 was at risk from an invisible threat that was there 557 00:29:41,400 --> 00:29:44,360 even though there was no evidence for it. 558 00:29:46,520 --> 00:29:48,361 They couldn't say that the Soviets 559 00:29:48,720 --> 00:29:52,400 had acoustic means of picking up American submarines 560 00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,480 because they couldn't find it. So they said 561 00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:58,000 well maybe they have a non-acoustic means 562 00:29:58,320 --> 00:30:00,841 of making our submarine fleet vulnerable. 563 00:30:01,160 --> 00:30:05,280 But there was no evidence that they had a non-acoustic system. 564 00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:10,280 They're saying, "We can't find evidence 565 00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:11,480 that they're doing it the way 566 00:30:11,920 --> 00:30:13,000 that everyone thinks they're doing it 567 00:30:13,200 --> 00:30:14,520 so they must be doing it a different way. 568 00:30:14,760 --> 00:30:16,040 We don't know what that different way is 569 00:30:16,080 --> 00:30:17,520 but they must be doing it." 570 00:30:17,560 --> 00:30:18,720 Even though there was no evidence? 571 00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:20,680 Even though there was no evidence. 572 00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:22,241 So they're saying there 573 00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:24,161 that the fact that the weapon doesn't exist 574 00:30:24,760 --> 00:30:26,081 Doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. 575 00:30:26,120 --> 00:30:27,760 It just means that we haven't found it. 576 00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:28,880 Now, that's important, yes. 577 00:30:29,160 --> 00:30:30,960 If something is not there, that's significant. 578 00:30:32,280 --> 00:30:33,080 By its absence. 579 00:30:33,520 --> 00:30:35,080 By its absence. If you believe 580 00:30:35,320 --> 00:30:38,200 that they share your view of strategic weapons 581 00:30:38,440 --> 00:30:40,920 and they don't talk about it, then there's something missing. 582 00:30:41,080 --> 00:30:43,240 Something is wrong. And the CIA wasn't aware of that. 583 00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:47,560 What Team B accused the CIA of missing 584 00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:51,240 was a hidden and sinister reality in the Soviet Union. 585 00:30:52,520 --> 00:30:55,760 Not only were there many secret weapons the CIA hadn't found 586 00:30:56,440 --> 00:30:59,520 but they were wrong about many of those they could observe 587 00:30:59,960 --> 00:31:02,000 such as the Soviet air defenses. 588 00:31:03,240 --> 00:31:05,840 The CIA were convinced that these were in a state of collapse 589 00:31:06,160 --> 00:31:09,440 reflecting the growing economic chaos in the Soviet Union. 590 00:31:11,200 --> 00:31:13,080 Team B said that this was actually 591 00:31:13,360 --> 00:31:15,840 a cunning deception by the Soviet regime. 592 00:31:16,440 --> 00:31:18,240 The air-defense system worked perfectly. 593 00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:21,560 But the only evidence they produced to prove this 594 00:31:21,920 --> 00:31:24,080 was the official Soviet training manual 595 00:31:24,560 --> 00:31:27,080 which proudly asserted that their air-defense system 596 00:31:27,320 --> 00:31:29,880 was fully integrated and functioned flawlessly. 597 00:31:31,040 --> 00:31:34,960 The CIA accused Team B of moving into a fantasy world. 598 00:31:35,480 --> 00:31:39,320 The CIA was very loath to deal with issues 599 00:31:39,560 --> 00:31:43,880 which could not be demonstrated in a kind of mathematical form. 600 00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:47,720 I said they could consider the soft evidence. 601 00:31:50,720 --> 00:31:53,720 They deal with realities, whereas this was a fantasy. 602 00:31:53,920 --> 00:31:55,320 That's how it was perceived. 603 00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:59,200 And there were battles all the time on this subject. 604 00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:01,760 Did you think it was a fantasy? 605 00:32:02,120 --> 00:32:03,840 No! I thought it was absolute reality. 606 00:32:04,120 --> 00:32:06,360 I would say that all of it was fantasy. I mean 607 00:32:06,640 --> 00:32:11,000 they looked at radars out in Krasnoyarsk and said 608 00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:13,440 "This is a laser beam weapon," 609 00:32:13,840 --> 00:32:15,760 when in fact it was nothing of the sort. 610 00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:21,720 They even took a Russian military manual 611 00:32:22,200 --> 00:32:27,480 which the correct translation of it is "The Art of Winning." 612 00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:30,800 And when they translated it and put it into Team B 613 00:32:31,120 --> 00:32:33,120 they called it "The Art of Conquest." 614 00:32:33,480 --> 00:32:37,000 Well, there's a difference between "conquest" and "winning." 615 00:32:40,880 --> 00:32:45,320 And if you go through most of Team B's specific allegations 616 00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:49,240 about weapons systems, and you just examine them one by one 617 00:32:49,680 --> 00:32:51,360 they were all wrong. 618 00:32:51,840 --> 00:32:52,560 All of them? 619 00:32:52,880 --> 00:32:53,680 All of them. 620 00:32:55,200 --> 00:32:56,360 Nothing true? 621 00:32:56,760 --> 00:33:00,520 I don't believe anything in Team B was really true. 622 00:33:02,280 --> 00:33:04,200 The neoconservatives set up a lobby group 623 00:33:04,480 --> 00:33:06,400 to publicize the findings of Team B. 624 00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:09,559 It was called the Committee on the Present Danger 625 00:33:09,920 --> 00:33:11,720 and a growing number of politicians joined 626 00:33:12,080 --> 00:33:15,920 including a Presidential hopeful, Ronald Reagan. 627 00:33:17,280 --> 00:33:18,479 Through films and television 628 00:33:18,880 --> 00:33:20,200 the Committee portrayed a world 629 00:33:20,640 --> 00:33:23,400 in which America was under threat from hidden forces 630 00:33:23,680 --> 00:33:25,280 that could strike at any time 631 00:33:26,240 --> 00:33:29,720 forces that America must conquer to survive. 632 00:33:33,720 --> 00:33:38,560 A concentration of world evil, of hatred for humanity 633 00:33:38,880 --> 00:33:40,400 is taking place. 634 00:33:41,160 --> 00:33:44,679 And it is fully determined to destroy your society. 635 00:33:45,760 --> 00:33:47,960 Must you wait until the young men of America have to fall 636 00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:51,399 defending the borders of their continent?! 637 00:33:51,799 --> 00:33:54,279 This dramatic battle between good and evil 638 00:33:54,520 --> 00:33:57,080 was precisely the kind of myth that Leo Strauss had taught 639 00:33:57,320 --> 00:34:00,000 his students would be necessary to rescue the country 640 00:34:00,280 --> 00:34:02,320 from moral decay. 641 00:34:02,840 --> 00:34:05,280 It might not be true, but it was necessary 642 00:34:05,680 --> 00:34:09,160 to re-engage the public in a grand vision of America's destiny 643 00:34:09,600 --> 00:34:11,960 that would give meaning and purpose to their lives. 644 00:34:13,440 --> 00:34:15,760 The neoconservatives were succeeding 645 00:34:16,000 --> 00:34:17,760 in creating a simplistic fiction - 646 00:34:18,360 --> 00:34:20,160 a vision of the Soviet Union 647 00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:22,320 as the center of all evil in the world 648 00:34:22,920 --> 00:34:26,840 and America as the only country that could rescue the world. 649 00:34:27,960 --> 00:34:30,800 And this nightmarish vision was beginning to give 650 00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:34,760 the neoconservatives great power and influence. 651 00:34:35,160 --> 00:34:39,800 The Straussians started to create a worldview which is a fiction. 652 00:34:40,639 --> 00:34:45,080 The world is not divided into good and evil. 653 00:34:45,360 --> 00:34:47,680 The battle in which we are engaged is not a battle 654 00:34:47,960 --> 00:34:49,360 between good and evil. 655 00:34:49,560 --> 00:34:52,800 The United States, as anyone who observes understands 656 00:34:53,080 --> 00:34:56,640 has done some good and some bad things. 657 00:34:56,880 --> 00:34:59,480 It's like any great power. This is the way history is. 658 00:35:00,680 --> 00:35:05,720 But they wanted to create a world of moral certainties 659 00:35:06,440 --> 00:35:10,240 so therefore they invent mythologies - fairytales - 660 00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:13,200 describing any force in the world 661 00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:17,239 that obstructs the United States as somehow Satanic 662 00:35:17,720 --> 00:35:19,400 or associated with evil. 663 00:35:42,600 --> 00:35:46,599 By the late 1970s, Egypt had been transformed. 664 00:35:46,920 --> 00:35:48,720 On the surface, it had become a modern 665 00:35:49,040 --> 00:35:51,720 Westernized state with a prosperous middle class 666 00:35:52,079 --> 00:35:54,640 who were benefiting from a flood of Western capital 667 00:35:54,880 --> 00:35:56,720 that was being invested in the country. 668 00:35:58,040 --> 00:36:00,560 One member of this prosperous Egyptian elite 669 00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:03,800 was Ayman Zawahiri. He was now a young doctor 670 00:36:04,120 --> 00:36:05,760 just starting his career. 671 00:36:08,720 --> 00:36:11,559 Ayman, he was an ideal person 672 00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:17,680 who was a doctor coming from a very good family. 673 00:36:18,600 --> 00:36:21,480 His father was a professor in the university 674 00:36:21,839 --> 00:36:24,080 his grandfather was an ambassador 675 00:36:24,360 --> 00:36:27,800 his other grandfather was Sheikh of Al-Azhar; 676 00:36:28,159 --> 00:36:30,320 very well-respected family. 677 00:36:31,039 --> 00:36:32,959 He used to be the the sort of person 678 00:36:33,239 --> 00:36:36,720 that acted by the book. Not looking for prestige 679 00:36:37,120 --> 00:36:41,599 not looking for money, not looking for propaganda. 680 00:36:43,119 --> 00:36:46,399 Ayman became a leader because of his attitudes. 681 00:36:47,560 --> 00:36:48,440 In reality 682 00:36:48,680 --> 00:36:51,759 Zawahiri was the leader of an underground Islamist cell. 683 00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:54,479 The group that he had started as a schoolboy 684 00:36:54,800 --> 00:36:58,039 which he had modeled on the ideas of Sayyed Qutb, had grown. 685 00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:02,999 Sayyed Qutb's ideas were now spreading rapidly in Egypt - 686 00:37:03,240 --> 00:37:05,240 above all, among students - 687 00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:08,280 because his predictions about the corruption from the West 688 00:37:08,639 --> 00:37:10,320 seemed to have come true. 689 00:37:11,720 --> 00:37:13,320 The government of President Sadat 690 00:37:13,640 --> 00:37:16,159 was controlled by a small group of millionaires 691 00:37:16,360 --> 00:37:18,400 who were backed by Western banks. 692 00:37:19,240 --> 00:37:20,760 The banks had been let in by 693 00:37:21,000 --> 00:37:23,680 what Sadat called his open-door policy. 694 00:37:25,400 --> 00:37:28,359 To the Western media, Sadat denied any corruption. 695 00:37:29,400 --> 00:37:32,800 All Egyptians knew that this was a blatant lie. 696 00:37:34,959 --> 00:37:38,119 Who has benefited now from the open-door policy? 697 00:37:38,399 --> 00:37:40,439 Taxi drivers. The liberals. 698 00:37:40,760 --> 00:37:43,719 All of those have benefited from the open-door policy. 699 00:37:43,960 --> 00:37:45,000 It is not like they say 700 00:37:45,359 --> 00:37:48,840 that there are millionaires here and so. 701 00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:52,840 No, not at all. This is pure, um 702 00:37:53,079 --> 00:37:59,200 pure black propaganda from the side of the Soviet Union 703 00:37:59,480 --> 00:38:01,320 and agents here in the country. 704 00:38:03,079 --> 00:38:04,920 Zawahiri was convinced that the time 705 00:38:05,200 --> 00:38:07,760 was now approaching to fulfill Qutb's vision. 706 00:38:08,320 --> 00:38:11,839 The vanguard should rise up and overthrow this corrupt regime. 707 00:38:15,200 --> 00:38:17,960 And the man who would give the Islamists that opportunity 708 00:38:18,360 --> 00:38:20,479 would be Henry Kissinger. 709 00:38:21,080 --> 00:38:24,160 As part of his attempt to create a stable and balanced world 710 00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:26,600 Kissinger had persuaded President Sadat 711 00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:29,959 to begin peace negotiations with the Israelis. 712 00:38:30,840 --> 00:38:33,239 To Kissinger, the ruthless pragmatist 713 00:38:33,720 --> 00:38:36,559 religious divisions and hatreds were irrelevant. 714 00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:40,720 The most important thing was to create a safer world. 715 00:38:42,039 --> 00:38:45,520 And in 1977, Sadat had flown to Jerusalem 716 00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:47,639 to start the peace process. 717 00:38:48,240 --> 00:38:51,840 To the West, it was a heroic act. But to the Islamists 718 00:38:52,200 --> 00:38:54,000 it was a complete betrayal. 719 00:38:54,320 --> 00:38:58,160 It showed that Sadat's mind had become so corrupted by the West 720 00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:01,680 that he was now completely under their control. 721 00:39:01,960 --> 00:39:03,800 And under the theories of Sayyed Qutb 722 00:39:04,119 --> 00:39:06,520 this meant that he was no longer a Muslim 723 00:39:06,959 --> 00:39:10,520 and so could justifiably be killed. 724 00:39:15,359 --> 00:39:19,759 And then, in 1979, the Ayatollah Khomeini showed Zawahiri 725 00:39:20,080 --> 00:39:23,480 that his dream of creating an Islamist state was possible. 726 00:39:23,480 --> 00:39:24,440 God is Great! that his dream of creating an Islamist state was possible. 727 00:39:24,440 --> 00:39:25,680 God is Great! 728 00:39:25,680 --> 00:39:26,199 God is Great! Khomeini had inspired an uprising against the Shah of Iran. 729 00:39:26,199 --> 00:39:29,000 Khomeini had inspired an uprising against the Shah of Iran. 730 00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:30,959 The Shah was another leader 731 00:39:31,200 --> 00:39:33,120 who had allowed Western banks to corrupt his country. 732 00:39:33,120 --> 00:39:33,999 Armed struggle is the read to freedom! who had allowed Western banks to corrupt his country. 733 00:39:33,999 --> 00:39:34,679 Armed struggle is the read to freedom! 734 00:39:34,679 --> 00:39:36,240 Armed struggle is the read to freedom! Khomeini had put forth the idea of an Islamist state 735 00:39:36,240 --> 00:39:37,360 Khomeini had put forth the idea of an Islamist state 736 00:39:37,360 --> 00:39:39,120 Death to the Shah's mercenary army! Khomeini had put forth the idea of an Islamist state 737 00:39:38,399 --> 00:39:40,480 Death to the Shah's mercenary army! that was remarkably similar to Qutb's ideas. 738 00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:41,360 Death to the Shah's mercenary army! 739 00:39:41,920 --> 00:39:43,999 He acknowledged this by placing Qutb's face 740 00:39:44,360 --> 00:39:48,399 on one of the postage stamps of the new Islamic republic. 741 00:39:49,680 --> 00:39:52,840 In his first sermon, Khomeini addressed the West. 742 00:39:53,999 --> 00:39:57,240 "Yes," he told them, "we are reactionaries 743 00:39:57,520 --> 00:39:59,639 and you are enlightened intellectuals. 744 00:40:00,439 --> 00:40:03,239 You who want freedom for everything 745 00:40:03,599 --> 00:40:07,680 the freedom that will corrupt our country, corrupt our youth 746 00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:11,360 and freedom that will pave the way for the oppressor 747 00:40:11,960 --> 00:40:15,600 freedom that would drag our country to the bottom." 748 00:40:17,440 --> 00:40:19,160 You sound very dissatisfied 749 00:40:19,200 --> 00:40:20,840 with what's happening in Iran now. 750 00:40:20,879 --> 00:40:27,280 Not MORE than dissatisfied, this is disgraceful! Really! 751 00:40:28,039 --> 00:40:29,159 I was myself 752 00:40:29,360 --> 00:40:32,920 I was the Secretary-General of the Muslim Congress at one time. 753 00:40:33,799 --> 00:40:39,399 This, putting the name "Islamic revolution," is a crime. 754 00:40:39,959 --> 00:40:43,799 A crime against Islam in the first hand. 755 00:40:44,160 --> 00:40:45,280 President Sadat, do you expect 756 00:40:45,559 --> 00:40:47,320 that the Shah will accept the invitation? 757 00:40:47,519 --> 00:40:49,279 It seems like a good solution right now. 758 00:40:49,999 --> 00:40:55,840 Quote me: My aeroplane is ready to bring him here. Any moment. 759 00:40:56,640 --> 00:40:58,840 At the end of 1980, Ayman Zawahiri 760 00:40:59,240 --> 00:41:01,759 with a number of other followers of Qutb who had formed cells 761 00:41:02,159 --> 00:41:05,519 came together. They created an organization 762 00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:07,959 they called Islamic Jihad. 763 00:41:08,519 --> 00:41:11,359 Its leader was a man called Abdel Salam Faraj. 764 00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:14,839 And Faraj argued that they should kill Sadat 765 00:41:15,119 --> 00:41:18,239 in a spectacular way that would shock the masses. 766 00:41:18,720 --> 00:41:19,680 It would make them see 767 00:41:19,919 --> 00:41:22,359 the true reality of the corruption surrounding them 768 00:41:22,759 --> 00:41:25,679 and they would rise up and overthrow the regime. 769 00:41:31,159 --> 00:41:37,879 The jihadi movement – some of the leaders are still alive – I was one and so was Ayman Zawahiri. 770 00:41:39,759 --> 00:41:45,320 We spearheaded the jihadi state of mind rather than the earlier more moderate ideas.. 771 00:41:45,399 --> 00:41:51,999 in the liberal era that simply accepted reality. 772 00:41:52,200 --> 00:41:57,560 Psychologically we thought we were superior to reality. 773 00:41:57,800 --> 00:42:04,640 We despised the everyday vision of the world. And we wanted to transform or change this reality. 774 00:42:08,360 --> 00:42:12,640 Therefore our dream was to get rid of Sadat. 775 00:42:46,439 --> 00:42:48,280 Those who carried out the assassination 776 00:42:48,560 --> 00:42:51,280 were a group of Army officers who were a part of Islamic Jihad. 777 00:42:52,839 --> 00:42:54,359 They were immediately arrested 778 00:42:54,639 --> 00:42:56,999 and the regime launched a massive manhunt for those 779 00:42:57,320 --> 00:42:59,319 behind the plot. 780 00:43:00,719 --> 00:43:03,520 But the effect of the assassination on the Egyptian people 781 00:43:03,800 --> 00:43:06,359 was not what Zawahiri had hoped for. 782 00:43:07,319 --> 00:43:12,560 That night, Cairo remained calm. The masses failed to rise up. 783 00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:16,079 And in the following weeks, Zawahiri 784 00:43:16,359 --> 00:43:19,079 and many other conspirators were arrested. 785 00:43:20,640 --> 00:43:23,439 The assassins were tried immediately and executed. 786 00:43:23,999 --> 00:43:28,320 But then, nearly 300 Islamists, including Zawahiri 787 00:43:28,600 --> 00:43:30,319 were put on trial in a pavilion 788 00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:32,959 in Cairo's industrial exhibition park. 789 00:43:33,719 --> 00:43:37,079 It was agreed that Zawahiri would be their spokesman. 790 00:43:38,880 --> 00:43:46,119 for (unintelligible), for the whole world, this is our world Doctor Ayman Zawahiri! 791 00:43:46,440 --> 00:43:51,599 Now, we want to speak to the whole world! Who are we? 792 00:43:51,920 --> 00:43:58,319 Who are we? Why did they bring us here? And what we want to say? 793 00:43:58,679 --> 00:44:02,200 About the first question: we are Muslims! 794 00:44:02,480 --> 00:44:06,040 We are Muslims who believed in their religion 795 00:44:06,399 --> 00:44:10,639 in their broad feelings, as both an ideology and practice. 796 00:44:11,079 --> 00:44:15,279 We believed in our religion, both as an ideology and practice. 797 00:44:15,679 --> 00:44:17,679 And hence, we tried our best 798 00:44:18,079 --> 00:44:22,080 to establish Islamic state and Islamic society! 799 00:44:22,360 --> 00:44:23,679 La illah la-illallah! 800 00:44:23,959 --> 00:44:28,000 La illah la-illallah! 801 00:44:28,519 --> 00:44:30,919 Zawahiri, the man is an aristocrat. 802 00:44:31,239 --> 00:44:34,319 He comes from a major Egyptian -Saudi family. 803 00:44:34,720 --> 00:44:40,480 And he thinks that, you know, he is a visionary 804 00:44:41,079 --> 00:44:44,359 and the means do not matter, just as in Lenin - 805 00:44:44,679 --> 00:44:47,519 I mean, revolution in one country or revolution worldwide. 806 00:44:47,799 --> 00:44:52,359 He was convinced that this was a means to mobilize the masses 807 00:44:52,719 --> 00:44:55,479 that they had tried something, that it had not worked 808 00:44:58,039 --> 00:44:59,520 then he failed that - you know 809 00:44:59,919 --> 00:45:03,039 the masses that were still under the spell of ideology 810 00:45:03,319 --> 00:45:07,319 the ideology of America. And he is looking for a new strategy. 811 00:45:09,479 --> 00:45:12,879 At the trial, Zawahiri was sentenced to three years in prison 812 00:45:13,159 --> 00:45:15,720 along with many others of Islamic Jihad. 813 00:45:16,719 --> 00:45:19,999 He was taken to cells behind the Police National Museum 814 00:45:20,199 --> 00:45:23,159 where, like Sayyed Qutb, he was tortured. 815 00:45:23,839 --> 00:45:25,720 And under this torture, he began 816 00:45:26,119 --> 00:45:29,879 to interpret Qutb's theories in a far more radical way. 817 00:45:31,119 --> 00:45:34,039 The mystery, for Zawahiri, was why the Egyptian people 818 00:45:34,360 --> 00:45:37,240 had failed to see the truth and rise up. 819 00:45:37,879 --> 00:45:41,199 It must be because the infection of selfish individualism 820 00:45:41,559 --> 00:45:44,199 had gone so deep into people's minds 821 00:45:44,479 --> 00:45:47,799 that they were now as corrupted as their leaders. 822 00:45:49,079 --> 00:45:53,440 Zawahiri now seized on a terrible ambiguity in Qutb's argument. 823 00:45:54,359 --> 00:45:56,279 It wasn't just leaders like Sadat 824 00:45:56,600 --> 00:46:00,439 who were no longer real Muslims, it was the people themselves. 825 00:46:01,279 --> 00:46:03,759 And Zawahiri believed that this meant 826 00:46:04,000 --> 00:46:09,200 that they too could legitimately be killed. But such killing 827 00:46:09,519 --> 00:46:12,360 Zawahiri believed, would have a noble purpose 828 00:46:12,599 --> 00:46:14,560 because of the fear and the terror 829 00:46:14,759 --> 00:46:17,799 that it would create in the minds of ordinary Muslims. 830 00:46:18,159 --> 00:46:21,960 It would shock them into seeing reality in a different way. 831 00:46:22,799 --> 00:46:24,999 They would then see the truth. 832 00:46:26,159 --> 00:46:28,359 Ayman Zawahiri came to the conclusion 833 00:46:28,719 --> 00:46:33,239 that because you have what you believe to be a sublime objective 834 00:46:33,839 --> 00:46:39,679 then the means can be as ugly as they can get. 835 00:46:39,999 --> 00:46:42,159 You can kill as many people as you wish 836 00:46:42,519 --> 00:46:47,039 because the end means is noble. 837 00:46:47,319 --> 00:46:49,719 The logic is that "we are the vanguards 838 00:46:50,119 --> 00:46:54,039 we are the correct Muslims, everybody else is wrong. 839 00:46:54,439 --> 00:46:57,359 Not only wrong, but everybody else is not a Muslim 840 00:46:57,999 --> 00:47:02,759 and the only means available to us today 841 00:47:03,079 --> 00:47:07,519 is just to kill our way to perfection." 842 00:47:21,279 --> 00:47:22,919 And at this very same moment 843 00:47:23,079 --> 00:47:26,039 religion was being mobilized politically in America 844 00:47:26,319 --> 00:47:28,399 but for a very different purpose. 845 00:47:28,639 --> 00:47:31,599 And those encouraging this were the neoconservatives. 846 00:47:35,519 --> 00:47:37,799 Many neoconservatives had become advisers 847 00:47:38,080 --> 00:47:41,039 to the Presidential campaign of Ronald Reagan. 848 00:47:41,399 --> 00:47:44,079 And as they became more involved with the Republican Party 849 00:47:44,559 --> 00:47:46,199 they had forged an alliance 850 00:47:46,399 --> 00:47:48,439 with the religious wing of the party 851 00:47:48,999 --> 00:47:53,959 because it shared their aim of the moral regeneration of America. 852 00:47:56,279 --> 00:47:58,679 The notion that a purely secular society 853 00:47:58,919 --> 00:48:01,959 can cope with all of the terrible pathologies 854 00:48:02,199 --> 00:48:04,959 that now affect our society 855 00:48:05,199 --> 00:48:06,799 I think has turned out to be false. 856 00:48:07,039 --> 00:48:09,039 And that has made me culturally conservative. 857 00:48:09,359 --> 00:48:11,639 I mean, I really think religion has a role now 858 00:48:11,919 --> 00:48:15,519 to play in redeeming the country. 859 00:48:15,999 --> 00:48:19,079 And liberalism is not prepared to give religion a role. 860 00:48:19,399 --> 00:48:22,519 Conservatism is, but it doesn't know how to do it. 861 00:48:23,199 --> 00:48:24,319 By the late ‘70s 862 00:48:24,599 --> 00:48:27,119 there were millions of fundamentalist Christians in America. 863 00:48:27,839 --> 00:48:30,839 But their preachers had always told them not to vote. 864 00:48:31,119 --> 00:48:34,759 It would mean compromising with a doomed and immoral society. 865 00:48:35,599 --> 00:48:38,519 But the neoconservatives and their new Republican allies 866 00:48:38,919 --> 00:48:41,879 made an alliance with a number of powerful preachers 867 00:48:42,399 --> 00:48:45,519 who told their followers to become involved with politics 868 00:48:45,879 --> 00:48:47,879 for the first time. 869 00:48:48,359 --> 00:48:52,119 I'm sick and tired of hearing about all of the radicals 870 00:48:52,759 --> 00:48:56,959 and the perverts, and the liberals, and the leftists 871 00:48:57,199 --> 00:48:59,439 and the Communists coming out of the closet! 872 00:48:59,719 --> 00:49:02,719 It's time for God's people to come out of the closet 873 00:49:03,039 --> 00:49:07,159 out of the churches, and change America! We must do it! 874 00:49:07,599 --> 00:49:09,679 The conservative movement, up to that point 875 00:49:10,079 --> 00:49:12,719 was essentially an intellectual movement. 876 00:49:13,199 --> 00:49:15,559 It had some very powerful thinkers 877 00:49:15,999 --> 00:49:21,959 but it didn't have many troops. And as Stalin said of the Pope 878 00:49:22,319 --> 00:49:23,839 "Where are his divisions?" 879 00:49:24,279 --> 00:49:26,879 Well, we didn't have many divisions. 880 00:49:27,399 --> 00:49:30,799 When these folks became active 881 00:49:31,039 --> 00:49:35,279 all of a sudden the conservative movement had lots of divisions. 882 00:49:35,759 --> 00:49:39,559 We were able to move literally millions of people. 883 00:49:39,879 --> 00:49:40,919 And this is something that 884 00:49:41,039 --> 00:49:44,799 we had no ability to do prior to that time. 885 00:49:44,999 --> 00:49:45,759 Literally millions? 886 00:49:45,879 --> 00:49:46,679 Literally millions. 887 00:49:48,879 --> 00:49:50,839 And at the beginning of 1981 888 00:49:51,079 --> 00:49:52,999 Ronald Reagan took power in America. 889 00:49:54,319 --> 00:49:56,479 The religious vote was crucial in his election 890 00:49:57,039 --> 00:49:58,759 because many millions of fundamentalists 891 00:49:58,999 --> 00:50:03,239 voted for the first time. And as they had hoped 892 00:50:03,559 --> 00:50:05,518 many neoconservatives were given power 893 00:50:05,759 --> 00:50:08,919 in the new administration. Paul Wolfowitz became 894 00:50:09,199 --> 00:50:10,998 head of the State Department policy staff 895 00:50:11,559 --> 00:50:14,079 while his close friend Richard Perle 896 00:50:14,399 --> 00:50:16,519 became the Assistant Secretary of Defense. 897 00:50:17,079 --> 00:50:19,399 And the head of Team B, Richard Pipes 898 00:50:19,759 --> 00:50:22,519 became one of Reagan's chief advisers. 899 00:50:24,399 --> 00:50:25,879 The neoconservatives believed 900 00:50:26,159 --> 00:50:28,959 that they now had the chance to implement their vision 901 00:50:29,319 --> 00:50:31,319 of America's revolutionary destiny - 902 00:50:32,159 --> 00:50:34,359 to use the country's power aggressively 903 00:50:34,598 --> 00:50:36,399 as a force for good in the world 904 00:50:36,879 --> 00:50:39,959 in an epic battle to defeat the Soviet Union. 905 00:50:40,679 --> 00:50:42,319 It was a vision that they shared 906 00:50:42,639 --> 00:50:44,799 with millions of their new religious allies. 907 00:50:46,439 --> 00:50:49,799 I take a personal and public stand as a minister 908 00:50:50,319 --> 00:50:53,439 a stand against Communism. To destroy it 909 00:50:53,719 --> 00:50:55,079 to wipe it from the face of the Earth 910 00:50:55,319 --> 00:50:57,759 because believe you me, these people are dedicated 911 00:50:58,239 --> 00:51:00,719 to the destruction of the United States of America 912 00:51:00,959 --> 00:51:02,599 and freedom as we know it. 913 00:51:02,919 --> 00:51:05,399 But the neoconservatives faced immense opposition 914 00:51:05,639 --> 00:51:06,919 to this new policy. 915 00:51:07,199 --> 00:51:09,479 It came not just from the bureaucracies and Congress 916 00:51:09,919 --> 00:51:11,919 but from the President himself. 917 00:51:12,759 --> 00:51:15,999 Reagan was convinced that the Soviet Union was an evil force 918 00:51:16,399 --> 00:51:18,719 but he still believed that he could negotiate with them 919 00:51:19,038 --> 00:51:21,039 to end the Cold War. 920 00:51:22,318 --> 00:51:25,279 Reagan at first didn't quite understand 921 00:51:25,639 --> 00:51:27,999 that their aggressiveness is rooted in the system. 922 00:51:29,719 --> 00:51:32,759 He had a rather benign view of human beings. 923 00:51:32,999 --> 00:51:34,039 He was a very kindly man 924 00:51:34,279 --> 00:51:36,038 and he attributed kind motives to others. 925 00:51:36,279 --> 00:51:37,719 There was another form of mirror imaging. 926 00:51:38,199 --> 00:51:39,679 And he would say on more than one occasion 927 00:51:40,119 --> 00:51:41,439 something like this: 928 00:51:41,679 --> 00:51:42,999 "If I could just sit down with the Soviet leaders 929 00:51:43,199 --> 00:51:46,079 and explain to them that they're following a wrong ideology 930 00:51:46,479 --> 00:51:48,518 and if they adopt the right ideologies 931 00:51:48,559 --> 00:51:49,919 they could make their people happy and prosperous." 932 00:51:50,319 --> 00:51:51,639 So we says "Mr. President.. 933 00:51:51,678 --> 00:51:52,638 ..That is not going to do it! 934 00:51:52,918 --> 00:51:54,039 You have to go after the system. 935 00:51:54,519 --> 00:51:56,359 Force them to reform the system." 936 00:51:57,119 --> 00:51:59,638 It took him a very long time to assimilate this view. 937 00:52:01,239 --> 00:52:02,559 To persuade the President 938 00:52:02,799 --> 00:52:04,879 the neoconservatives set out to prove 939 00:52:05,159 --> 00:52:07,559 that the Soviet threat was far greater than anyone 940 00:52:07,879 --> 00:52:09,999 even Team B, had previously shown. 941 00:52:13,519 --> 00:52:15,919 They would demonstrate that the majority of terrorism 942 00:52:16,358 --> 00:52:18,439 and revolutionary movements around the world 943 00:52:18,879 --> 00:52:22,439 were actually part of a secret network, coordinated by Moscow 944 00:52:22,839 --> 00:52:24,679 to take over the world. 945 00:52:25,919 --> 00:52:29,118 The main proponent of this theory was a leading neoconservative 946 00:52:29,439 --> 00:52:32,319 who was the special adviser to the Secretary of State. 947 00:52:33,279 --> 00:52:34,959 His name was Michael Ledeen 948 00:52:35,359 --> 00:52:37,559 and he had been influenced by a best-selling book 949 00:52:37,999 --> 00:52:39,439 called The Terror Network. 950 00:52:40,479 --> 00:52:44,439 It alleged that terrorism was not the fragmented phenomenon 951 00:52:44,679 --> 00:52:45,998 that it appeared to be. 952 00:52:46,678 --> 00:52:48,919 In reality, all terrorist groups 953 00:52:49,439 --> 00:52:52,838 from the PLO to the Baader-Meinhof group in Germany 954 00:52:53,159 --> 00:52:55,318 and the Provisional IRA 955 00:52:55,799 --> 00:52:59,639 all of them were a part of a coordinated strategy of terror 956 00:52:59,919 --> 00:53:04,839 run by the Soviet Union. But the CIA completely disagreed. 957 00:53:05,318 --> 00:53:09,199 They said this was just another neoconservative fantasy. 958 00:53:09,959 --> 00:53:12,318 The CIA denied it. They tried to convince people 959 00:53:12,679 --> 00:53:15,198 that we were really crazy. I mean, they never believed 960 00:53:15,639 --> 00:53:19,079 that the Soviet Union was a driving force 961 00:53:19,399 --> 00:53:21,079 in the international terror network. 962 00:53:21,319 --> 00:53:22,679 They always wanted to believe 963 00:53:23,119 --> 00:53:27,439 that terrorist organizations were just what they said they were: 964 00:53:27,879 --> 00:53:35,399 Local groups trying to avenge terrible evils done to them 965 00:53:35,719 --> 00:53:39,399 or trying to rectify terrible social conditions 966 00:53:39,719 --> 00:53:40,639 and things like that. 967 00:53:40,679 --> 00:53:42,799 And the CIA really did buy into the rhetoric. 968 00:53:42,879 --> 00:53:44,879 I don't know what their motive was. I mean 969 00:53:45,118 --> 00:53:48,199 I don't know what people's motives are, hardly ever. 970 00:53:48,839 --> 00:53:50,759 And I don't much worry about motives. 971 00:53:52,159 --> 00:53:54,438 But the neoconservatives had a powerful ally. 972 00:53:54,958 --> 00:53:58,239 He was William Casey, and he was the new head of the CIA. 973 00:53:59,599 --> 00:54:02,599 Casey was sympathetic to the neoconservative view. 974 00:54:02,999 --> 00:54:06,478 And when he read the Terror Network book, he was convinced. 975 00:54:07,239 --> 00:54:09,918 He called a meeting of the CIA's Soviet analysts 976 00:54:10,159 --> 00:54:12,079 at their headquarters, and told them 977 00:54:12,398 --> 00:54:14,399 to produce a report for the President 978 00:54:14,639 --> 00:54:17,598 that proved this hidden network existed. 979 00:54:18,199 --> 00:54:20,959 But the analysts told him that this would be impossible 980 00:54:21,399 --> 00:54:23,918 because much of the information in the book 981 00:54:24,239 --> 00:54:28,079 came from black propaganda the CIA themselves had invented 982 00:54:28,438 --> 00:54:30,638 to smear the Soviet Union. 983 00:54:31,598 --> 00:54:34,358 They knew that the terror network didn't exist 984 00:54:34,799 --> 00:54:37,638 because they themselves had made it up. 985 00:54:39,439 --> 00:54:42,639 And when we looked through the book, we found very clear episodes 986 00:54:42,958 --> 00:54:48,198 where CIA black propaganda - clandestine information 987 00:54:48,478 --> 00:54:50,359 that was designed under a covert action plan 988 00:54:50,678 --> 00:54:52,879 to be planted in European newspapers - 989 00:54:53,238 --> 00:54:54,839 were picked up and put in this book. 990 00:54:55,198 --> 00:54:58,038 A lot of it was made up. It was made up out of whole cloth. 991 00:54:58,719 --> 00:54:59,599 You told him this? 992 00:54:59,838 --> 00:55:00,879 We told him that, point blank. 993 00:55:01,119 --> 00:55:03,838 And we even had the operations people to tell Bill Casey this. 994 00:55:03,999 --> 00:55:05,478 I thought maybe this might have an impact 995 00:55:05,719 --> 00:55:08,358 but all of us were dismissed. Casey had made up his mind. 996 00:55:08,799 --> 00:55:10,759 He knew the Soviets were involved in terrorism 997 00:55:11,039 --> 00:55:13,919 so there was nothing we could tell him to disabuse him. 998 00:55:14,159 --> 00:55:15,598 Lies became reality. 999 00:55:16,119 --> 00:55:18,599 In the end, Casey found a university professor 1000 00:55:18,959 --> 00:55:21,199 who described himself as a terror expert 1001 00:55:21,759 --> 00:55:24,039 and he produced a dossier that confirmed 1002 00:55:24,319 --> 00:55:27,678 that the hidden terror network did, in fact, exist. 1003 00:55:29,519 --> 00:55:31,039 Under such intense lobbying 1004 00:55:31,238 --> 00:55:34,158 Reagan agreed to give the neoconservatives what they wanted 1005 00:55:34,879 --> 00:55:37,718 and in 1983 he signed a secret document 1006 00:55:38,118 --> 00:55:41,359 that fundamentally changed American foreign policy. 1007 00:55:41,719 --> 00:55:44,038 The country would now fund covert wars 1008 00:55:44,359 --> 00:55:48,118 to push back the hidden Soviet threat around the world. 1009 00:55:48,439 --> 00:55:51,079 The specter of Marxist-Leninist controlled governments 1010 00:55:51,359 --> 00:55:54,438 with ideological and political loytities to the Soviet Union 1011 00:55:54,799 --> 00:55:58,079 proves that there's a direct challenge to which we must respond. 1012 00:55:58,639 --> 00:56:01,599 They are the focus of evil in the modern world. 1013 00:56:03,999 --> 00:56:06,399 It was a triumph for the neoconservatives. 1014 00:56:06,798 --> 00:56:08,838 America was now setting out to do battle 1015 00:56:09,118 --> 00:56:10,719 against the forces of evil in the world. 1016 00:56:13,599 --> 00:56:15,838 But what had started out as the kind of myth 1017 00:56:16,078 --> 00:56:17,159 that Leo Strauss had said 1018 00:56:17,519 --> 00:56:19,479 was necessary for the American people 1019 00:56:19,719 --> 00:56:22,438 increasingly came to be seen as the truth 1020 00:56:22,678 --> 00:56:24,758 by the neoconservatives. 1021 00:56:25,438 --> 00:56:27,758 They began to believe their own fiction. 1022 00:56:28,838 --> 00:56:31,878 They had become what they called "democratic revolutionaries," 1023 00:56:32,479 --> 00:56:35,598 who were going to use force to change the world. 1024 00:56:38,198 --> 00:56:41,598 We were aiming for an expansion of the zone of freedom 1025 00:56:41,878 --> 00:56:45,959 in the world. And in part that had to do with fighting Communism 1026 00:56:46,199 --> 00:56:49,119 and in part that had to do with fighting other kinds of tyrannies. 1027 00:56:49,359 --> 00:56:51,598 But that's what we were about, and that's what we're still about. 1028 00:56:51,999 --> 00:56:53,319 When you say you were democratic revolutionaries 1029 00:56:53,558 --> 00:56:54,439 what do you mean? 1030 00:56:54,638 --> 00:56:57,719 It meant that we wanted to support the people 1031 00:56:57,999 --> 00:57:00,838 who wanted to carry out revolutions against tyrannical regimes 1032 00:57:01,118 --> 00:57:02,158 in the name of democracy 1033 00:57:02,718 --> 00:57:05,279 in order to install a democratic system. 1034 00:57:05,998 --> 00:57:06,919 As simple as that. 1035 00:57:07,158 --> 00:57:10,079 Yeah. It's not nuclear physics, you know. 1036 00:57:10,359 --> 00:57:13,239 I mean, freedom is a fairly simple thing to get. 1037 00:57:15,358 --> 00:57:18,719 It's a chancy job - makes a man watchful and a little lonely. 1038 00:57:19,318 --> 00:57:21,958 But somebody has to do it. 1039 00:57:27,678 --> 00:57:31,118 The neoconservatives now set out to transform the world. 1040 00:57:33,158 --> 00:57:36,478 In next week's episode, they find themselves joining forces 1041 00:57:36,718 --> 00:57:38,638 with the Islamists in Afghanistan 1042 00:57:39,198 --> 00:57:43,038 and together they fight an epic battle against the Soviet Union. 1043 00:57:44,878 --> 00:57:49,118 And both come to believe that they had defeated the Evil Empire. 1044 00:57:51,239 --> 00:57:54,278 But this imagined victory would leave them without an enemy. 1045 00:57:55,199 --> 00:57:58,518 And in a world disillusioned with grand political ideas 1046 00:57:59,078 --> 00:58:02,838 they would need to invent new fantasies and new nightmares 1047 00:58:03,319 --> 00:58:07,878 in order to maintain their power.