Hijacking Catastrophe (2004)

Synopsis: Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire examines how a radical fringe of the Republican Party has used the trauma of the 9/11 terror attacks to advance a pre-existing agenda to radically transform American foreign policy while rolling back civil liberties and... Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire examines how a radical fringe of the Republican Party has used the trauma of the 9/11 terror attacks to advance a pre-existing agenda to radically transform American foreign policy while rolling back civil liberties and social programs at home. The documentary places the Bush Administration’s false justifications for war in Iraq within the larger context of a two-decade struggle by neoconservatives to dramatically increase military spending in the wake of the Cold War, and to expand American power globally by means of military force. At the same time, the documentary argues that the Bush Administration has sold this radical and controversial plan for aggressive American military intervention by deliberately manipulating intelligence, political imagery, and the fears of the American people after 9/11. Narrated by Julian Bond, Hijacking Catastrophe features interviews with more than twenty prominent political observers, including Pentagon whistleblower Lt. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, who witnessed first-hand how the Bush Administration set up a sophisticated propaganda operation to link the anxieties generated by 9/11 to a pre-existing foreign policy agenda that included a preemptive war on Iraq. At its core, the film places the deceptions of the Bush Administration within the larger frame of questions seldom posed in the mainstream: What, exactly, is the agenda that drove the administration's pre-war deceptions? How is 9/11 being used to sell this agenda? And what are the stakes for America, Americans, and the world if this agenda succeeds in being fully implemented during a second Bush term? FEATURING INTERVIEWS WITH: Tariq Ali | Benjamin Barber | Medea Benjamin | Noam Chomsky | Kevin Danaher Mark Danner | Shadia Drury | Michael Dyson | Daniel Ellsberg | Michael Franti Stan Goff | William Hartung | Robert Jensen | Chalmers Johnson | Jackson Katz Michael T. Klare | Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski (Ret.) | Norman Mailer | Zia Mian Mark Crispin Miller | Scott Ritter | Vandana Shiva | Norman Solomon | Greg Speeter Fernando Suarez del Solar | Immanuel Wallerstein | Jody Williams | Max Wolff -- © Media Education Foundation [More]