Film Analysis: A Legacy Of Violence

After viewing the interesting film A Legacy of Violence: 100 Years of Terror (Setton, Mudd, & Carroll, 2000), I found many aspects of the video that I was unfamiliar with. In particular, the Tricontinental Conference of 1966 struck me with great curiosity. To illustrate, The Tricontinental Conference of 1966 was orchestrated by Fidel Castro, the Prime Minister and President of Cuba, and it involved the gathering of over 500 revolutionary activists (terrorists), from around the world, to meet in Cuba for discussions. The Tricontinental Conference allowed the attending terrorist groups to step out from the shadows and contact one another to discuss future cooperation. After the conference, Fidel Castro opened 14 training camps in Havana,

It can be seen in the film (Setton et al., 2000), that once the demands, brought by terrorists, are met, than it opens the doors for a rise in future behaviors that were successful in the past. If we comply with the demands of terrorists, then we can be certain that future attacks, of the same nature, are inevitable. This sort of thought could be seen as common sense. If one learns that they can get what they want through a specific action, then that person will use that exact action again because it resulted in success. Also, terrorist organizations learn and adopt actions that other terrorist groups employ. With that being said, hijacking commercial airliners can now be seen as a successful tool to utilize if terrorists want demands to be met (Setton et al.,

I believe all forms of terrorism are unacceptable because they usually target innocent people. However, I do recognize why people partake in guerrilla warfare. When a supreme nation places its beliefs on a lesser powerful nation, or a powerful nation controls another nation, one could visualize why the controlled people would want to unleash terror against the supreme nation. Rebel activists usually don’t have the man power, or the weaponry, a supreme nation has in its arsenal, so terrorists must adopt guerrilla style tactics to subdue its adversary. I cannot place blame on all terrorists activities because they were forced into the position they are in. If we think about it, America was found on forms of terrorism. Can we call the colonist of the American Revolution, or the founding fathers of America, terrorists? We ought to view our founding fathers as a terrorist organization because they were guerrilla fighters fighting for political change (Setton et al.,