State of Fear
The State of Fear: The Truth About Terrorism
directed by Pamela Yates
This documentary focuses on the brutal and repressive twenty year period in Peruvian history, from 1980 until 2000.
It began with the cult of charismatic, Maoist leader Abimael Guzman and his Shining Path guerillas and ends in the collapse of dictator Albert K fujimori.
The movie is based on the testimony of 16,000 people to the Peruvian truth and reconciliation Commission. Part of the movie is based on personal interviews- from the rich, white woman, who is plagued with guilt, about not being aware of the plight of her country people, to the student who was abducted and raped as she was about to start her first day at college, to the 11 year old who was kidnaped and became addicted to violence and killing.
The indigenous population in Ayuchocho, were the first people exposed to the Shining Path indoctrination. They were also the poorest in all of Peru and the government in Lima did nothing to help them. They were willing to carry arms and fight the government, but soon the Shining Path started torturing people, that did not agree with their methods. But only when the Shining Path started targeting citizens in Lima, did the issue became real for the government, and they sent troops to the countryside to subdue the revolt. This lead to indiscriminate killing of 70,000 children, women and men.
Albert Fujimori won elections by creating a sense of fear, us against the terrorists. Even after Guzman and all his comrades had been captured or killed, Fujimori kept up the repression in the name of security. He dissolved the Congress, gave himself absolute power. He controlled the media, by bribing the media moghuls, and contained dissent by murdering opponents.
At the end of the movie, a short film was shown the Montesinos Media Buy-This was surveillance video, shot by Fujimori’s disgraced chief of intelligence Vladimoro Montesinos. It was a record of the how Fujimori and Montesinos bribed the head of different media channels in Peru to show him in a positive and popular light. It showed Montesino take out money from suitcases and lay the bundels on the table, count it, and then hand it to the heads of media. Apparently when Fujimori fled, he left with 10 suitcases filled with tapes.
The State of Fear, is very relevant now, as the U.S. government expands it’s global war on terror, by increasing repression at home and abroad. The truth commission found that Fujimori’s response increased the nations crisis by exacerbating the cycle of violence, and that terrorism is best fought with more democracy not less.
directed by Pamela Yates
This documentary focuses on the brutal and repressive twenty year period in Peruvian history, from 1980 until 2000.
It began with the cult of charismatic, Maoist leader Abimael Guzman and his Shining Path guerillas and ends in the collapse of dictator Albert K fujimori.
The movie is based on the testimony of 16,000 people to the Peruvian truth and reconciliation Commission. Part of the movie is based on personal interviews- from the rich, white woman, who is plagued with guilt, about not being aware of the plight of her country people, to the student who was abducted and raped as she was about to start her first day at college, to the 11 year old who was kidnaped and became addicted to violence and killing.
The indigenous population in Ayuchocho, were the first people exposed to the Shining Path indoctrination. They were also the poorest in all of Peru and the government in Lima did nothing to help them. They were willing to carry arms and fight the government, but soon the Shining Path started torturing people, that did not agree with their methods. But only when the Shining Path started targeting citizens in Lima, did the issue became real for the government, and they sent troops to the countryside to subdue the revolt. This lead to indiscriminate killing of 70,000 children, women and men.
Albert Fujimori won elections by creating a sense of fear, us against the terrorists. Even after Guzman and all his comrades had been captured or killed, Fujimori kept up the repression in the name of security. He dissolved the Congress, gave himself absolute power. He controlled the media, by bribing the media moghuls, and contained dissent by murdering opponents.
At the end of the movie, a short film was shown the Montesinos Media Buy-This was surveillance video, shot by Fujimori’s disgraced chief of intelligence Vladimoro Montesinos. It was a record of the how Fujimori and Montesinos bribed the head of different media channels in Peru to show him in a positive and popular light. It showed Montesino take out money from suitcases and lay the bundels on the table, count it, and then hand it to the heads of media. Apparently when Fujimori fled, he left with 10 suitcases filled with tapes.
The State of Fear, is very relevant now, as the U.S. government expands it’s global war on terror, by increasing repression at home and abroad. The truth commission found that Fujimori’s response increased the nations crisis by exacerbating the cycle of violence, and that terrorism is best fought with more democracy not less.
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