John Pilger‘s documentary The War on Democracy is a fascinating film that looks at U.S. foreign policy in Latin America. This is important to keep in mind when it comes to the U.S. bringing democracy to Iraq.

John Pilger‘s The War On Democracy examines:

• Torture techniques used in Latin American Coups taught at the School of the Americas.
• 2002 coup against Hugo Chavez backed by rich and powerful interests under U.S. support, but Chavez was brought back to power by hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan people marching in their streets demanding his return.
• The 1973 coup that took out democratically elected Salvador Allende and put Augusto Pinochet into power. Milton Friedman’s economic techniques were used to establish an economy with a great disparity between the rich and the poor. This can be verified by viewing a chart of the Gini Coefficient (a.k.a Gini Index).
• Victor Jara was murdered by the Pinochet coup.
• Former CIA agent and Watergate scandal conspirator Howard Hunt, and Duane Clarridge, former head of CIA operations in South America.
• Dianna Ortiz is a U.SRoman Catholic nun of the Ursuline order. She is a native of the state of New Mexico in the United States. While serving as a missionary in Guatemala in 1989, she was abducted by right-wing forces and brutally tortured. Among other torments she was gang-raped and suffered over 100 cigarette burns
• The 1954 coup in Guatemala to over throw Jacobo Arbenz Guzman. Arbenz nationalized the land in the country and gave it to the poor. Much of the land was held by the United Fruit Company (now known as Chiquita Brands.
• On the brighter side — over the last five years Bolivia has been able to refuse multinational companies access their country’s natural reserves of gas, and water rights. Prior to Bolivia’s activist movement their natural resources where asset stripped by multinational interests

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You can order a copy of The War on Democracy from Bullfrog Films for $39, specifically for the purpose of doing public screenings.

Related Video:

Bill Moyers PBS documentary Secret Government: Constitution in Crisis

For more information on Bolivia’s Water War watch the below clip from The Corporation
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The Secret Government: Constitution in Crisis (1987) is a PBS documentary that covers the Iran Contra Scandal of 1987. The Iran-Contra Affair was a political scandal occurring in 1987 as a result of earlier events during the Reagan administration in which members of the executive branch sold weapons to Iran, and illegally used the proceeds to continue funding anti-Sandinista rebels, the Contras, in Nicaragua. One of the business men who helped fund the scandal was Joseph Coors from the Coors Beer fortune.

Other shady operations covered in this video:

• The US enlisted Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie “The Butcher of Lyon” and then helped him flee to Bolivia.
• The US backed coup take over in Iran of 1953 that took elected official Mohamed Mossadeq out of power and installed the Shaw in Iran. Mossadeq had planned to kick out British Petroleum and nationalize the countries oil fields.
• The 1954 coup in Guatemala to over throw Jacobo Arbenz Guzman. Arbenz nationalized the land in the country and gave it to the poor. Much of the land was held by the United Fruit Company.
• Cuba 1961 Bay of Pigs US Invasion, an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro.
• The Vietnam War of 1968 originally started as US covert operation and support for a puppet leader Ngo Dinh Diem. The Gulf of Tonkin Incident was provoked as an excuse to go into battle. Ralph MacGehee was there for the CIA and helped setup the South Vietnam Secret Police.
• Oliver North was involved with CIA drug smuggling to fund The Iran-Contra Affair.

More from PBS on the secrecy of the US Government pbs.org/now I am not associated with PBS, but personally I believe the work Bill Moyers does is essential to US Democracy. Please consider making a donation as I have so Bill Moyers can keep up the good work http://www.pbs.org/now/pledge.html This would be a great video to request for at public libraries, give as a gift to state delegates for you local precinct, and to show to friends and family, but I have not been able to find it on DVD. Perhaps if there is enough public support PBS will consider making the DVD available to the public again.