Veteran documentary-maker Mayank Jain’s Crimson Crescent — The Last Quarter is a riveting documentary; it explores an ideological war whose frontlines run globally — through neighbourhoods and newsfeeds as much as across borders.
Wars are not fought with traditional military weapons alone. Influence operations and narrative wars are decisively waged in coffee houses and pubs, in ‘radicalisation hubs’ and religious schools, and in the media and social media — shaping how a generation will think and act. Today’s battlefield is the mind of the populace; lose here... and the war could end before it begins.
A Beginning in Brutality
The film opens not with spectacle, but with Juliana Taimoorazy’s voice. She is an Assyrian Christian activist who has worked with survivors of ISIS atrocities. She recalls:
“I’ve seen hearts being carved out of bodies. I’ve seen men’s eyes being duct-taped, then they are made to stand on mass graves and are shot. …I studied the Holocaust; I read about it in history. We saw ISIS’s genocide in Iraq. But this is on a different scale.”
It is this stripping away of human dignity-systemic, systematic, rehearsed, and framed as holy duty — that the film places at the root of extremist violence. Whether in the deserts of Iraq or in narrow lanes closer to home, the logic is the same: First dehumanise, then destroy.
Brutality Begins with Belief
Humanity’s worst atrocities rarely begin with bullets. They begin with an idea — that one truth is the only truth, and thus all others must be erased. The Jewish Holocaust, the communist purges of the 20th century, and what historian Will Durant called “the bloodiest story in history” — the medieval Muslim conquests in India — all began as visions of purity that demanded the annihilation of the impure. The belief that the unbeliever is expendable.
The Fault Lines
For over four decades, elements in Saudi Arabia allegedly channelled more than $100 billion into exporting Wahhabi ideology, funding mosques and madrasas globally. This was not charity; it was the seeding of a worldview: Exclusive, supremacist, and resistant to pluralism. They financed a narrative where coexistence was replaced by conquest. The consequences transcend borders.
Transnational Trendlines
In the UK’s Rotherham scandal, between 2003 and 2008, grooming gangs exploited over 1,400 young girls. In Sweden’s Östersund, women were warned not to walk alone after a surge in migrant-linked assaults. Teachers in Stockholm’s Järva no-go zones attend parent-teacher meetings in bulletproof vests. The geography changes. The ideological core does not. These are not isolated failures of policing; they are socio-political fractures that occur when an ideology of exclusive supremacy is allowed to nest within a host society.
The Indoctrination Pipeline
The film’s lens turns to Sunder Nagri, on Delhi’s edge, where demographic change has hardened socio-religious lines. Mayank Jain, the film’s director, had sought to interview a madrasa teacher and students. Instead, he was met with heckling and a swelling crowd whose frayed tempers quickly turned the scene hostile. Voices were raised, threats implied. It was clear that the aim was to intimidate. In the end, Jain walked away physically unharmed from what was clearly a volatile situation.
The film carries multiple on-camera interviews with madrasa students from Delhi, Bengal, the Assam border, and Mewat. In these exchanges — sometimes guarded, sometimes startlingly candid — both students and teachers articulate a clear theological position and a sequential plan of action. The film explores this ideological transition, from classroom to conflict. This is where Neeraj Atri, an IT engineer turned education reformer, podcaster, and activist, offers a chilling diagnosis: when a young mind is shut inside the four walls of a religious school, its free-flowing curiosity is replaced with a rigid, narrow view of the world and of divinity. It instils in the young mind a sense of “duty”. The young man begins to see violence not as a crime, but as a sacred obligation. Increasingly blatant attacks during Hindu festivals reveal the growing malaise. There is a normalisation of violent mindsets and of violence itself. Public awareness and political will to meaningfully address the (well-known) core issues are only fitfully awakening.
Erase History, for Subjugation and for Future Denial of its Existence
The film draws a historical parallel with the destruction of Nalanda University. Monasteries burned, monks killed, a civilisation’s intellectual capital reduced to ash. This was not random vandalism but deliberate erasure of heritage and history; for humiliation, subjugation, and future denial of this history. It recalls the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan.
The MBS Initiative
Can Islam’s ideological framework be reinterpreted? The film turns to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), whose ambitious $1.5 trillion NEOM project aims to redefine Saudi Arabia as a global hub for AI, innovation, and cultural openness. Since 2017, MBS has driven reforms, including lifting the ban on women driving and reopening cinemas, while publicly vowing to combat Islamic extremism and promote coexistence with other religions.
A Parallel from History
After the Renaissance, Christian Europe dismantled the machinery of the Inquisition, witch-burnings, and wars of faith. In time, Christianity was partially declawed as a political weapon. By touching theological red lines, MBS may be attempting the same for Islam. We wish him well. The gamble is immense. NEOM is consuming resources at a scale that could leave little for funding radicalisation. But reform without root cause removal is risky. Can the youth, with economic diversification and brighter future prospects, overcome the traditional clerics’ resistance to change? We hope so.
The Price of Complacency
Ignoring this ideological war carries a price tag. In Europe, demographic shifts have given rise to ‘no-go’ zones and grooming gangs. Elon Musk remarks in the film: “Some complained online about migrant rape gangs in England — and were jailed for it.” These are not just crimes; they are indicators of a civilisational struggle over the terms of coexistence. Violence is justified as obedience to God. The victims are prosecuted further; the perpetrators dominate.
Hope in the Information Age
And yet, the film is not a counsel of despair. Activist Maryam Namazie offers the most hopeful parallel: “The internet is doing to Islam what the printing press did to Christianity.” Remember, Christianity was partially declawed as a political weapon. Today, the smartphone is a Trojan horse of ideas, letting young minds compare radical ideology with competing interpretations and brighter alternatives.
Concluding Thoughts
The battle has metamorphosed. Crimson Crescent — The Last Quarter highlights this. Its arsenal is data, testimony, and historical memory. It recognises that defeating a radical, extremist ideology requires far more than military muscle. A structured plan of action, empathy, time, patience, and money are required. The battlefield has enlarged. Contemporary wars are not fought by the military alone; nor only by the government standing with the military, but require a whole-of-country approach. This film reminds us that today’s battlefield is the mind of the next generation. Lose in that arena, and the war ends before it begins. A must-see film.
(The writer is Former Security Advisor (LWE), Ministry of Home Affairs, GoI)