Era in Review Documentary: The Latter Half of the Twentieth Century
Part I.
(BEGINNING TITLE SLIDE: THE LATTER TWENTIETH CENTURY)
INTRODUCTION
NARRATOR:
Modern history has been marked by the unending strife of human conflict. We as a species have witnessed awesome battles on the landscapes of philosophy, politics, and morality. Many millions have perished along the way at the heights of these deadly dialogues that seem to hold so much sway over humanity. We may pause to ask ourselves every now and then: Is there something dark at work in the human heart and soul? Something that we have not yet come to understand, as a race? Is it in our nature to destroy ourselves? In light of the mass suffering and destruction seen in the twentieth century alone, it is easy to assume how the verdict reads. And yet, we still continue in our ways, often to the thunder of our own applause.
The latter half of the twentieth century witnessed the continuation and conclusion of a conflict that began many years earlier in the troubled psyche of mankind. It was a time of universal enthusiasm, as the Spirit of Progress and Triumph was narrated by the leaders of the Western world, culminating in a glorious end of history.
TITLE SLIDE: COLD WAR
NARRATOR:
The Cold War was the ongoing tension between the United States of America and the Soviet Union. Although referred to as the “Cold War”, it was more of a competition of military, technology, and economic status. Although the United States and the USSR were allies in World War II, the two countries disagreed about capitalism and communism and also the post-war plans for Europe, and tension began brewing. The countries battled by aiding easily influenced developing countries in hopes of gaining allegiance and preventing the spread of either communism or capitalism.
TITLE SLIDE: SPACE RACE
NARRATOR:
One notable competition in the Cold War was the “Space Race”. This was a race to see which country could gain more experience, knowledge, and prestige in space. Although the Space Race caused extreme excess of spending, it emphasized and increased the importance of education and technology.
Part II.
TITLE SLIDE: COLD BLOODED KILLING
NARRATOR:
The year 1989 has been described by the British historian Timothy Garton Ash as “the biggest year in world history since 1945” (Ash). It “changed everything” (Ash). Twenty years earlier, the broad consensus for such praise was affirmed in the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe. Only a week after the fall of the Berlin wall, six Latin American Jesuit priests were assassinated in cold blood, along with their housekeeper and her daughter, in El Salvador. The assassins were agents of the right-wing military government, trained and equipped by the United States. The deaths of the El Salvadoran Jesuits occurred only a week after the fall of the Berlin Wall had captivated the Western world. There were praises on an unprecedented scale, all in honor of the collapse of a relentless tyranny, all in celebration of the liberation of Eastern Europe. The threat of force had been overcome by the unstoppable spirit of human liberation.
No such praises were concurrent with the developments in Central America.
(Screen Goes Black, Gun Shots)
NARRATOR:
The 1989 assassinations of the Jesuit priests could not demonstrate this more fully. In their efforts to call attention to the institutional roots of their people’s abject suffering, they were silenced forever, their deaths now only a shamefully faint memory. Among the murdered priests was Ignacio Ellacuria, a prominent Latin American intellectual and dissident, as well as the rector of the Jesuit University. At the heart of his core convictions there was a courageous will to express the deepest truth, uninhibited by the threat of unyielding terror. As Ellacuria saw it, “Latin America’s actual situation points out prophetically the capitalist system’s intrinsic malice and the ideological falsehood of the semblance of democracy that accompanies, legitimates, and cloaks it.”(Chomsky 152) Whereas his various counterparts in Eastern Europe such as Vaclav Havel were received with euphorically by Western observers, Ellacuria’s mission to defy the structures of domination that still grip the overwhelming mass of humanity today were ignored, and then finally met with murderous onslaught.
Days before his fateful rendezvous death, Ellacuria had lent his voice to the people of Europe, addressing the West in its entirety. You “have organized your lives around inhuman values,” he said. They “are inhuman because they cannot be universalized. The system rests on a few using the majority of the resources, while the majority can’t even cover their basic necessities. It is crucial to define a system of values and a norm of living that takes into account every human being.”(Chomsky 248) The priest’s aforementioned murderers were soldiers of the elite Atlacatl Battalion. America’s Watch noted that it was “created, trained, and equipped by the United States,” whose soldiers “professionally obeyed orders from their officers to kill the Jesuits in cold blood.” (Chomsky 388) Nine years earlier, the same fate had been visited upon Archbishop Oscar Romero, silenced “for being the voice of those without a voice,” in the words of Romero’s successor, Archbishop Arturo Rivera y Damas. (Chomsky 363)
NARRATOR:
As Americas Watch observed, the decade of the 1980s leading up to the liberation of Eastern Europe was circumscribed symbolically in Central America by “these two events – the murder of Archbishop Romero in 1980 and the slaying of the Jesuits in 1989;” mere footnotes in a horrific legacy of mass murder and ruthless suppression, spanning the accumulation of hundreds of thousands of corpses along the way. (Chomsky 363)
(Music leads out, goes to black)
Part III.
TITLE SLIDE: PRESIDENT BUSH
NARRATOR:
On January 20, 1980, George H. W. Bush became the 41st president of the United States of America. By most, his presidency is characterized by a change in foreign affairs.
Early in his term, President Bush was received with high approval ratings after ordering military operations in Panama and the Persian Gulf. Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega was once an American ally, but it became clear that he had turned. This invasion violated former treaties, but the country agreed that it was necessary for security reasons; Americans feared being spied on by Fidel Castro and Panama was being used to traffic drugs into the United States. “Operation Just Cause” was successful in removing Manuel Noriega from power and allowing the leader who had been elected Democratically, Guillermo Endara, to assume the role as president. The Bush administration was able facilitate charging the former leader, Noreiga, with drug trafficking and imprisoned him.
TITLE SLIDE: BERLIN WALL
NARRATOR:
The fall of the Berlin Wall took place in 1989. After weeks of chaos leading up to November 9, 1989, the Eastern German government finally allowed all citizens to visit West Germany. Mobs of people from both sides swarmed the wall, climbing on it and celebrating. Over several weeks, enthusiastic citizens did what they could to destroy the wall on their own. After all settled down, the government removed the rest with proper machinery. Germany was finally reunited and the world let out a small sigh of relief.
(GREEN SCREEN WITH FOOTAGE/PICTURES OF WALL IN BACKGROUND)
NARRRATOR:
Next came the fall of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, also known as the USSR or the Soviet Union. After facing difficult economic times and civil and political unrest, the Soviet Union and its satellites lost collapsed in December of 1991. This signified the official end of the unofficial Cold War.
TITLE SLIDE: NAFTA
NARRATOR:
Another part of foreign policy that president Bush had a big part in was the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA. NAFTA is an agreement between the leaders of Canada, Mexico, and the United States that lifted barriers among the countries that signed it. Even before NAFTA, the three countries traded with each other, but were subject to tariffs. Since labor in Mexico was very cheap, people in the United States with jobs in manufacturing feared that they would lose their jobs to outsourcing. Americans faced uncertainty about the agreement and were scared about its possible effects on the labor force in the United States.
(USE PHOTOS OF NAFTA LOGO DURING NARRATION)
TITLE SLIDE: PRESIDENT CLINTON
NARRATOR:
On Wednesday, January 21, 1993, William Jefferson Clinton was inaugurated forty-second president of the United States of America. More commonly known as Bill Clinton, the 46-year-old made a short inaugural address that focused on “an end to the era of deadlock and drift and a new season of American renewal.”
NARRATOR:
The latter 20th century was a time of perceived progress. Foreign policy was the stand-out issue that the United States faced during that time. Whether Vietnam, the USSR, Panama, or any other country, the United States made many controversial decisions that took a lot of heat from the general public.
(ROLL CREDITS)
Works Cited
Ash, Timothy Garton. "1989 Changed the World." Guardian (2009): n. pag. Web
. 6 Sep 2010. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/04/1989 changed-the-world-europe>.
Chomsky, Noam. Year 501. South End Press. 1993. pg 152. Print.
Chomsky, Noam. Deterring Democracy. New York: Hill and Wang, 1992. pg. 248. Print.
Ibid. pg. 388. Print.
Ibid. pg. 363. Print.
Ibid. pg. 363. Print.
Gutiérrez, Raúl. "Spanish Judge to Investigate Murders of Jesuit Priests." IPS (2009): n. pag. Web. 7 Oct 2010. <http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45399>.
www.history.com/videos/space-race-cold-war-front#space-race-cold-war-front
(BEGINNING TITLE SLIDE: THE LATTER TWENTIETH CENTURY)
INTRODUCTION
NARRATOR:
Modern history has been marked by the unending strife of human conflict. We as a species have witnessed awesome battles on the landscapes of philosophy, politics, and morality. Many millions have perished along the way at the heights of these deadly dialogues that seem to hold so much sway over humanity. We may pause to ask ourselves every now and then: Is there something dark at work in the human heart and soul? Something that we have not yet come to understand, as a race? Is it in our nature to destroy ourselves? In light of the mass suffering and destruction seen in the twentieth century alone, it is easy to assume how the verdict reads. And yet, we still continue in our ways, often to the thunder of our own applause.
The latter half of the twentieth century witnessed the continuation and conclusion of a conflict that began many years earlier in the troubled psyche of mankind. It was a time of universal enthusiasm, as the Spirit of Progress and Triumph was narrated by the leaders of the Western world, culminating in a glorious end of history.
TITLE SLIDE: COLD WAR
NARRATOR:
The Cold War was the ongoing tension between the United States of America and the Soviet Union. Although referred to as the “Cold War”, it was more of a competition of military, technology, and economic status. Although the United States and the USSR were allies in World War II, the two countries disagreed about capitalism and communism and also the post-war plans for Europe, and tension began brewing. The countries battled by aiding easily influenced developing countries in hopes of gaining allegiance and preventing the spread of either communism or capitalism.
TITLE SLIDE: SPACE RACE
NARRATOR:
One notable competition in the Cold War was the “Space Race”. This was a race to see which country could gain more experience, knowledge, and prestige in space. Although the Space Race caused extreme excess of spending, it emphasized and increased the importance of education and technology.
Part II.
TITLE SLIDE: COLD BLOODED KILLING
NARRATOR:
The year 1989 has been described by the British historian Timothy Garton Ash as “the biggest year in world history since 1945” (Ash). It “changed everything” (Ash). Twenty years earlier, the broad consensus for such praise was affirmed in the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe. Only a week after the fall of the Berlin wall, six Latin American Jesuit priests were assassinated in cold blood, along with their housekeeper and her daughter, in El Salvador. The assassins were agents of the right-wing military government, trained and equipped by the United States. The deaths of the El Salvadoran Jesuits occurred only a week after the fall of the Berlin Wall had captivated the Western world. There were praises on an unprecedented scale, all in honor of the collapse of a relentless tyranny, all in celebration of the liberation of Eastern Europe. The threat of force had been overcome by the unstoppable spirit of human liberation.
No such praises were concurrent with the developments in Central America.
(Screen Goes Black, Gun Shots)
NARRATOR:
The 1989 assassinations of the Jesuit priests could not demonstrate this more fully. In their efforts to call attention to the institutional roots of their people’s abject suffering, they were silenced forever, their deaths now only a shamefully faint memory. Among the murdered priests was Ignacio Ellacuria, a prominent Latin American intellectual and dissident, as well as the rector of the Jesuit University. At the heart of his core convictions there was a courageous will to express the deepest truth, uninhibited by the threat of unyielding terror. As Ellacuria saw it, “Latin America’s actual situation points out prophetically the capitalist system’s intrinsic malice and the ideological falsehood of the semblance of democracy that accompanies, legitimates, and cloaks it.”(Chomsky 152) Whereas his various counterparts in Eastern Europe such as Vaclav Havel were received with euphorically by Western observers, Ellacuria’s mission to defy the structures of domination that still grip the overwhelming mass of humanity today were ignored, and then finally met with murderous onslaught.
Days before his fateful rendezvous death, Ellacuria had lent his voice to the people of Europe, addressing the West in its entirety. You “have organized your lives around inhuman values,” he said. They “are inhuman because they cannot be universalized. The system rests on a few using the majority of the resources, while the majority can’t even cover their basic necessities. It is crucial to define a system of values and a norm of living that takes into account every human being.”(Chomsky 248) The priest’s aforementioned murderers were soldiers of the elite Atlacatl Battalion. America’s Watch noted that it was “created, trained, and equipped by the United States,” whose soldiers “professionally obeyed orders from their officers to kill the Jesuits in cold blood.” (Chomsky 388) Nine years earlier, the same fate had been visited upon Archbishop Oscar Romero, silenced “for being the voice of those without a voice,” in the words of Romero’s successor, Archbishop Arturo Rivera y Damas. (Chomsky 363)
NARRATOR:
As Americas Watch observed, the decade of the 1980s leading up to the liberation of Eastern Europe was circumscribed symbolically in Central America by “these two events – the murder of Archbishop Romero in 1980 and the slaying of the Jesuits in 1989;” mere footnotes in a horrific legacy of mass murder and ruthless suppression, spanning the accumulation of hundreds of thousands of corpses along the way. (Chomsky 363)
(Music leads out, goes to black)
Part III.
TITLE SLIDE: PRESIDENT BUSH
NARRATOR:
On January 20, 1980, George H. W. Bush became the 41st president of the United States of America. By most, his presidency is characterized by a change in foreign affairs.
Early in his term, President Bush was received with high approval ratings after ordering military operations in Panama and the Persian Gulf. Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega was once an American ally, but it became clear that he had turned. This invasion violated former treaties, but the country agreed that it was necessary for security reasons; Americans feared being spied on by Fidel Castro and Panama was being used to traffic drugs into the United States. “Operation Just Cause” was successful in removing Manuel Noriega from power and allowing the leader who had been elected Democratically, Guillermo Endara, to assume the role as president. The Bush administration was able facilitate charging the former leader, Noreiga, with drug trafficking and imprisoned him.
TITLE SLIDE: BERLIN WALL
NARRATOR:
The fall of the Berlin Wall took place in 1989. After weeks of chaos leading up to November 9, 1989, the Eastern German government finally allowed all citizens to visit West Germany. Mobs of people from both sides swarmed the wall, climbing on it and celebrating. Over several weeks, enthusiastic citizens did what they could to destroy the wall on their own. After all settled down, the government removed the rest with proper machinery. Germany was finally reunited and the world let out a small sigh of relief.
(GREEN SCREEN WITH FOOTAGE/PICTURES OF WALL IN BACKGROUND)
NARRRATOR:
Next came the fall of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, also known as the USSR or the Soviet Union. After facing difficult economic times and civil and political unrest, the Soviet Union and its satellites lost collapsed in December of 1991. This signified the official end of the unofficial Cold War.
TITLE SLIDE: NAFTA
NARRATOR:
Another part of foreign policy that president Bush had a big part in was the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA. NAFTA is an agreement between the leaders of Canada, Mexico, and the United States that lifted barriers among the countries that signed it. Even before NAFTA, the three countries traded with each other, but were subject to tariffs. Since labor in Mexico was very cheap, people in the United States with jobs in manufacturing feared that they would lose their jobs to outsourcing. Americans faced uncertainty about the agreement and were scared about its possible effects on the labor force in the United States.
(USE PHOTOS OF NAFTA LOGO DURING NARRATION)
TITLE SLIDE: PRESIDENT CLINTON
NARRATOR:
On Wednesday, January 21, 1993, William Jefferson Clinton was inaugurated forty-second president of the United States of America. More commonly known as Bill Clinton, the 46-year-old made a short inaugural address that focused on “an end to the era of deadlock and drift and a new season of American renewal.”
NARRATOR:
The latter 20th century was a time of perceived progress. Foreign policy was the stand-out issue that the United States faced during that time. Whether Vietnam, the USSR, Panama, or any other country, the United States made many controversial decisions that took a lot of heat from the general public.
(ROLL CREDITS)
Works Cited
Ash, Timothy Garton. "1989 Changed the World." Guardian (2009): n. pag. Web
. 6 Sep 2010. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/04/1989 changed-the-world-europe>.
Chomsky, Noam. Year 501. South End Press. 1993. pg 152. Print.
Chomsky, Noam. Deterring Democracy. New York: Hill and Wang, 1992. pg. 248. Print.
Ibid. pg. 388. Print.
Ibid. pg. 363. Print.
Ibid. pg. 363. Print.
Gutiérrez, Raúl. "Spanish Judge to Investigate Murders of Jesuit Priests." IPS (2009): n. pag. Web. 7 Oct 2010. <http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45399>.
www.history.com/videos/space-race-cold-war-front#space-race-cold-war-front
