Peter Taylor - the new Chris Morris?
Every so often I feel moved to send in comments on BBC programmes; sadly I have yet to have one selected for their site, and my comment on Monday’s The New Al-Qaeda was no exception (Update: my comment subsequently appeared on the site). The first part of Peter Taylor’s series was BBC documentary at its worst: shallow, sensationalist and deeply flawed. For the programme to have been any more tabloid, it would have had to have been presented by a Page 3 Stunna, offering the chance to win £10,000 in a bingo game at the end.
As the majority of comments chosen by the BBC could have come straight from the Daily Mail’s letters page, I might as well post the one I submitted (perhaps not the greatest critique ever written, but what the heck!):
Whereas The Power of Nightmares provided an informative, intelligent analysis of the current Islamist threat and its origins, this was nothing more than dumbed-down terror-porn masquerading as insightful documentary. No amount of “edgy” camera angles could disguise the fact that the majority of the programme was taken up with tabloid-style stating of the obvious (wow, who’d have thought that bad people sometimes use the internet too?). Taylor’s unquestioning interviews with US military officials and self-proclaimed security experts never challenged any of their assertions. A year to research? I could have come up with a more informative documentary in a week.
Elsewhere, John Lettice provides a pretty thorough (and amusing) debunking of much of the programme in his review for the Register, and Spy Blog discusses some of the serious legal implications of the documentary.
Incidentally, I recently started reading Al-Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam by Jason Burke, and highly recommend it to anyone looking for intelligent analysis of the subject.
Is Peter Taylor not also a spook - he’s got a lot of high level contacts for a reptile. Mind you rather that than Pilger or M. Moore…
Given his work in N Ireland I suspect he has pretty good ‘contacts’ in the security services. You’re not a fan of Pilger then?
I’ve seen his 3 series on NI where again he has a lot of high level access. Some people in the media get good access and a double salary for presenting an official argument - as the program was biased bilge I thought he ma be one. And no, I do not like Pilger - he is a crude propogandist. I doubt the veracity of anything he produces, even if I have sympathy with the “cause”. Ditto M. Moore.
Your comment did get posted, and I wholeheartedly agree with you.
Thanks for pointing that out - either I’m going blind or they added more comments (looks like my no-particularly-secret true identity’s out of the bag too). Good to see a few other critical comments there now. BTW, you’re not M as in James Bond’s boss are you? ;-)
The 3rd and final episode of this series, which supposedly took over a year to research and make was somewhat odd since one of the programs main contributions was from the head of the ISID. Taylor states that it took months to negotitate access to interview him and one night he was taken to a secret location in Pakistan.
The interview referenced Shahzahd Tanweer the man accused of being the Aldgate bomber who was named on the 13th July.
President Musharraf is also interviewd in connection with Tanweer in the program.
Taylor also visits the village in Pakistan where Tanweer was supposed to have visited before the 7th July, a local villager is interviewed about Tanweer.
It seems very strange to me that a major series that took so long to research and make, suddenly in the matter of the last three weeks has a large parts of it devoted to the 7th July bombings.
It means that the long negotiated meeting with the head of the ISID that took months to arrange must have occured in the last 3 weeks and the program rapidly reedited. Taylor must also have flown to Pakistan for this interview and also to visit the village. He was obviously also fortunate to get another interview with President Musharraf at such short notice.
The fliming of these parts of the program also follow the same distinctive style of photography so I guess he was also lucky to have the same crew with him at such short notice.
Am I getting too suspicious here?
I wonder if his next project will expose the judiciary in their efforts to prevent the UK turning into the control state which our government desires. Put Pilger in Gitmo I say!
I recorded this program here in Ireland on Sat night.
What about the FAKE footage of the airplane hitting the South Tower WTC? Did nobody spot this?
This is also the same footage which was shown by the TV stations on the day.
Now you know how it was done.