Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil (Paperback)

by Michael C. Ruppert (Author), Catherine Austin Fitts (Foreword)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Ruppert's hefty book is meant to make us think and inspire us all to be courageous against the forces that want us to live in fear" - Nexus, December 2004.

Product Description
The attacks of September 11, 2001 were accomplished through an amazing orchestration of logistics and personnel. Crossing the Rubicon discovers and identifies key suspects - finding some of them in the highest echelons of American government - by showing how they acted in concert to guarantee that the attacks produced the desired result.

Crossing the Rubicon is unique not only for its case-breaking examination of 9/11, but for the breadth and depth of its world picture - an interdisciplinary analysis of petroleum, geopolitics, narco-traffic, intelligence and militarism - without which 9/11 cannot be understood.

The US manufacturing sector has been mostly replaced by speculation on financial data whose underlying economic reality is a dark secret. Hundreds of billions of dollars in laundered drug money flow through Wall Street each year from opium and coca fields maintained by CIA-sponsored warlords and US-backed covert paramilitary violence. America's global dominance depends on a continually turning mill of guns, drugs, oil and money. Oil and natural gas - the fuels that make economic growth possible - are subsidized by American military force and foreign lending.

In reality, 9/11 and the resulting "War on Terror" are parts of a massive authoritarian response to an emerging economic crisis of unprecedented scale. Peak Oil - the beginning of the end for our industrial civilization - is driving the elites of American power to implement unthinkably draconian measures of repression, warfare and population control. Crossing the Rubicon is more than a story. It is a map of the perilous terrain through which, together and alone, we are all now making our way.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 696 pages
• Publisher: New Society Publishers (October 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0865715408
• ISBN-13: 978-0865715400
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (188 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #58,116 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

88 of 91 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars HAVE INTERVIEWED RUPPERT TWICE ON-AIR and READ BOOK TWICE, March 11, 2005

By	M.T. Karthik "MTK" - See all my reviews

This book is important.

[it's NOT by Catherine Austin Fitts as first-credited above (she writes the introduction). The author is Michael Ruppert]

Crossing the Rubicon is comprehensive in scope and Ruppert uses well-honed investigative procedures to reveal key missing pieces in the investigation of 9/11/01. He also uses his vast knowledge of U.S. military procedure, protocol and policy to expose the inner workings of CIA, FBI, NSA, JCS, NORAD and FAA in detail that far exceeds that of the 9/11 Commission.

Ruppert composes circumstantial evidence, eyewitness accounts, and actual testimony of participating agents and agencies from mainstream news sources, from Richard Clarke's Against All Enemies, from the 9/11 Commission's activities and Report and from on-the-record interviews of instrumental figures who reveal facts not published anywhere else.

He takes focus on the "wargames" issue and exposes the FACT of numerous exercises conducted on 9/11 that included the use of false radar blips that clearly confused FAA, NORAD and JCS personnel, that resulted in the wildly distant assignment of aircraft, and that was the result of a very specific re-organizing and restructuring of air defense long before 9/11 and he thus comes to the conclusion of complicity and awareness by high-ranking members of the Bush Administration fairly.

Ruppert conjectures from his research as to how the events could have been orchestrated but does so by composing a specific narrative of FACTS, reproducing work he conducted on his website [including revealing immense increases in "put" options that evidence foreknowledge by monied interests] and conducting original research and interviews.

Ruppert identifies players who were involved, would have had to be involved and may have been involved and clearly points out amazing ommissions by the 9/11 Commission and 9/11 Truth researchers including the FACT that the deputy director of the National Military Command Center [a position required to coordinate NORAD,FAA and JCS in both wargames and real-world events] actually asked on September 10, 2001, to be absent from duty on September 11 between 8:30 and 10:30 a.m. [the exact time of the attacks], that this did occur despite the fact the the hijackings and attacks were already taking place and that no one has ever received an explanation why. [further Ruppert reveals that the Officer who replaced this important defense coordinating position was a long-time Bush Administration friend recently qualified to hold the position as the result of Bush appointment who filed the shortest testimonial in all of the 9/11 Commission's requested written depositions]

Ruppert explores some fringe pursuits like the revelations of Vreeland, but far-more of the book is about the back-story, about the relevance of Peak Oil, about intelligence factors and about the workings of the U.S. military under conditions such as those on 9/11.

Having interviewed Ruppert twice for Pacifica Radio, I can say he is clear and direct on 9/11. He is not erratic or imprudent.

I, like many, have long suffered his overwriting, his penchant for vernacular and sometimes excessive language and pop metaphor, but his research and investigation is far too good to allow such failings to be relevant.

This book is too important to miss; understanding its contents is integral to understanding the U.S.A. under Bush and the New World Order. It also confirms lingering doubts and hundreds of unanswered questions as a result of the Bush Government narrative of what happened on September 11, 2001.

490 of 537 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A word from the book's editor, Jamey Hecht, November 10, 2004

By	Jamey Hecht "www.jameyhecht.com" (Brooklyn, NY, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I'd like to extend my thanks to everyone who has reviewed Crossing The Rubicon, and to everyone who has read the book. And a special thanks to those who have done both.

Let me reply to a recent review by a Mr. Watson. "Already some of his witnesses are unravelling as in the case of Mike Vreeland." The sentence starts with the plural, but it really refers only to Vreeland -- whom the book describes as utterly unreliable EXCEPT in the special case of his 911 warning. Why? Because the warning was a physical document whose authenticity and pre-9/11 provenance have been attested by Vreeland's lawyers, court records submitted under oath, interviews with the attorneys, former Canadian federal prosecutors, and news media. At no point does Ruppert's use of Vreeland depend on the latter's personal credibility.

Then Watson refers to the exchange between a "Victor Thorn" of "Wing TV" and Mr. Ruppert. For a complete and accurate account of the matter, including Wing TV's questions and Mike Ruppert's answers, see Ruppert's website, page:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/10questions.shtml

Watson continues: "The improbability of such an event [9/11] being pulled off under the noses of every uninvolved government/military official is not discussed." It is discussed at length -- see pp. 2-4; 12-18; 103; 203-224; 291-306, et al.

"Ruppert asks us to believe that Bush/Cheney could pull 9/11 off with such precision and them fumble so publically with WMDs in trying to connect 9/11 with Saddam - which he states was their main reason for 9/11 - an excuse to grab the oil." Ruppert does not say any such thing. Nobody who had read this book could possibly come away with the view that the Iraq war was the "main reason" for 9/11.

"Plenty of dots, but not many connections. Indeed, given enough dots, one can connect any kind of picture one wants." Yes, and this applies to the official story (the conspiracy of 19 highjackers and the man in the Afghan cave), and to the 26-volume "Warren Report," and to every other text. The job of an investigator, like that of a lawyer or an historian, is to configure an accurrate interpretation whose logic is more compelling than the others. This is achieved through a combination of sound evidence gathering and valid argumentation. Mr. Ruppert has produced both in abundance.

91 of 96 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Message from the Author -- The Mike Ruppert, November 8, 2004

By	Michael C. Ruppert - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Regarding the review from the_mirror.

I have never considered either Timothy McVeigh or Terry Nichols to be American heroes. Pawns, patsies and not very bright, yes; Heroes, never. Further, like many who are moderately familiar with the OKC bombing, I have serious doubts as to the government's version of events there and I also seriously doubt that a truck bomb caused all that damage based upon hard science.

Neither do I advocate or even remotely endorse any form of violence against the government, especially a cowardly attack against innocent women and children. I never have.

These convenient attempts to discredit me and Rubicon with associations we have never been a part of are transparent efforts that have been easily recognized by Amazon reviewers thus far.

I am, however, humbled and personally gratified by the reviews I have seen. They prove that people are getting it!

Michael C. Ruppert
Author
"Crossing the Rubicon"