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Summary: The Saudi¿s lies, in great detail.
Review: This book is awesome; it details the Saudi's lies, in great detail.Most of the highjackers on 9/11 were from Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia gives billions upon billions to terrorists. They are not a democracy. This book is so eye-opening it is unbelievable. Everyone should read this book. It will make you angry the Saudi Arabian is still in existence, as they are liars and cheats.
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Summary: A wake-up call you haven't heard yet
Review: As a follow-up to Baer's great "See No Evil", this book is sensational! Like his first, it is written in a wry, self-deprecating style and is very casual about real and dangerous escapades that would scare the hell out of the average macho Bond wanabe. (like sneaking across closed Syrian borders to meet with international arms dealers just to pick up a little intel for the book). This guy is either more imaginative than Clancy, or one of the coolest, toughest good guys in the world....I've chosen to believe the latter, and all I can say is, now that he's retired, I hope there are a few more just like him still working as spooks to protect us. Clearly the Clinton administration did their damnest to get rid of these guys and it all came home to roost with Sept 11, the greatest White House intelligence screw-up in this country's history. The official report on 9-11 has neatly excused all politicians and appointees from blame and pointed the finger at the CIA and it's bumbling half brother, the FBI. Baer provides a bit more insight than that. Two chapters in this book stand out from the rest. In a departure from the spy stuff, Baer gives the reader one of the most cogent historical summaries I've ever heard of the ongoing courtship of Saudi Arabia by the US since the days of Roosevelt, the politics of the Middle East, and the corruption of Islamic teachings by the Muslim Brotherhood and its Al Qaeda-like siblings. The ultimate irony of the US basically creating and supporting the environment that spawned the mujihadeen as a side product of the Cold War is chilling. The fact that the Clinton administration didn't want to understand what was going on or have the guts to do something about it was downright criminal. However, the greatest thing about this book is that it is NOT about bashing Clinton (although Baer certainly had the material to go there, he criticized both Bushes and a whole slew of others as well). It is a wake-up call to American readers to understand that we really are at war on a battlefield that we cannot easily see and against an enemy that we little understand. He brings a message of hope based upon all the good, innocent people he also encountered in the Middle East who don't want war either. But he clearly paints a picture of the desperation, the obscene disparity of income and resultant lack of value of human life throughout the Middle East. He also clearly targets the bad guys and suggests we are going to have to be tougher than we've been in order to preserve our way of life. Most sickening of all is the consistent picture of the parade of smug, "see no evil" politicians who populate our elected offices, abuse our trust and do nothing but pad their own retirement plans while the radical fundamentalists seethe and devise new ways to attack our way of life again. This book will frighten you, perhaps depress you, but it WILL educate you to the world outside our naïve media view, and unfortunately, what we may expect in the future. Read it!
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting , But Flawed
Review: First off, Robert Baer is the sort of CIA officer that CIA needed more of in the 1990s: someone who spoke Arabic and Farsi who had a real interest in the religion and cultural of the Islamic world and who was willing to take risks in an effort to run agents inside terrorist groups. The scandal is that CIA had very few people like that in the past. Let's hope that's changing. The vignettes in the books that describe his actual intelligence operations are very interesting, giving you a sense of what it must be like to be a CIA officer on station in Central Asia. Unfortunately, the analytical portions of the book are quite disappointing. Baer isn't really a deep thinker, and he doesn't appear to know as much about the subjects as he should. Most bothersome to me is that Baer's view of Islamism (or Islamic fundamentalism), while radical in the 1980s when everyone was focused on the Soviet menace in Afghanistan, is really just the conventional wisdom in Washington today. Every talking head on TV or policy wonk will tell you how dangerous the forces of Islamism are, whether in the guise of Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood (Baer's preferred term), Islamic Jihad, Wahabbism, or whatever. What you don't hear a lot about is the connection between these movements and the nation states in which they operate. Baer talks about Saudi Arabia and their support for Islamic radicalism in general. He repeats allegations made in the press (for example, about connections between Princess Haifa and 9/11), but doesn't present a detailed case that any particular terrorist operation received Saudi support. He does not discuss the role of other states, and worse yet, holds up Syria (of all places) as a model of a successful approach to cracking down on Islamist terror. Has Baer heard of Syria's support for Hizb'allah in Lebanon? Does he know that Hamas and PIJ operate openly in Damascus? How about Syrian Islamist volunteers in Iraq? No, the problem isn't Islamist terror, per se. The problem is that almost all of the states in the modern Middle East (save Israel and Turkey) have a history of using Islamist terror groups as proxies in battles between each other and with the West, Russia and India. This is true whether or not the state in question is itself fundamentalist (Iran, Sudan) or secular (Iraq, Syria, Libya, Pakistan). Baer's instance that the "real problem" is Islamist militancy, and not the combination of both Islamist terror with state policy, that continues to obscure the problem we face. After reading this book, I'm not convinced that Saudi Arabia is more dangerous than any of the others. It at least is not openly hostile to the U.S. There appear to be some elements in the government that would like to be openly hostile to the U.S. But they aren't calling the shots yet. Until they are, calling for things like seizing the oil fields is premature. To paraphrase Don Rumsfeld, like Osama bin Laden, Saudi Arabia is a problem, it is not the problem.
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Summary: Very Important Book
Review: This is better than his first book, and it was great. Baer cuts through the expletive deleted of all the geo-politically correct mumbo-jumbo that's been foisted on us from both political parties about the role of the Saudi's in Middle East turmoil and hatred for the West - especially the US. Baer is smart, brave, a fine writer. What he writes is alarming. And it rings true. If you think the Saudi's are our allies, read this book. Then abandon that idea, or redefine the word. It's too bad that multiple copies of Baer's breed were not in charge of the "intelligence community" before 9-11. Lives might have been saved.
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Summary: Revealing Dirty Secrets of Our Elected leaders!
Review: Even though I am only half-way through the book I am spellbound by the information in it. My God! If only half of these facts are correct, then we as a nation must look at our elected officials with a clear vision and not Rose-Colored Glasses! If these connections are right, as I fear they are, then every elected official who accepted donations from the Saudis', back to FDR, who wanted a retirement account for life allowed Saudi Arabia to become what it is to day. Not your typical, on the street people, but the elite ruling class of the Royal Family of Al Saud. Living like Sadaam and his family, but to a much greater extent. The US keeps turning a blind eye to these attrocities that occur with the beheadings in the square of the capital. We first wanted them as friends but now they control the USA in a very large way. But, as my old granddaddy used to say , "Money Talks...........you know what Walks." Anyway I just wish people will read this book, like Pres. Bush said, "Either you're with us or against us. Wake up people and demand that at the very least the government keep us safe from foreign enemy invaders. PS My son is in Afghanistan. I pray for PEACE!!!!!!!!! sincerly, mds
Rating: 
Summary: Hate Book
Review: It is a book of Hate, written by anti Arab, anti Muslim person.
Rating:
Summary: Important contribution to our understanding of Saudi Arabia
Review: This is an important book. Boy! Is it an important book! Mr. Baer reveals the bloody-mindedness, deadly indifference and ignorance that has ruled our government's policies with the Saudi royal family in its determination to maintain its access to cheap oil. No one comes out of this expose as clean, including virtually the whole current Bush administration and pretty much every administration going back to WW2. I wish that something could be done politically about this poisonous relationship we have fostered with the Saudi Royal family, but with G.W. Bush and his oil company minions in office I expect everything will continue in the manner in which Mr. Baer depicts it in his excellent book. Tell everyone you know about it. Give copies of this book out as gifts. Reference it when you write to Congress. I certainly intend to.
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Summary: Built on shaky facts
Review: I haven't finished the book, and I am not sure I will. Since my own background is energy I have some knowledge of the topics being discussed, although I would hasten to add that the Middle East is not my area of interest. What worries me is that where he states a fact on a subject in which I have knowledge, the book either presents a simplistic, and sometimes misleading, version of the fact. Or, in some cases, the book is just plain wrong. This worries me for two reasons: it undermines the credibility of the rest of the book, and it makes me wonder what is the level of professionalism in general in the CIA. I also find these blacked-out lines in the book to be ludicrous. I can find no explanation for them in the book (it may be there, I just have not found it) and they are silly in any case. The implication, of course, is that someone (CIA?) censored the information and the author is making a silent protest. But why? He does say the book went through a CIA review process to protect national security, so we know the book is sanitized. Why belate the point? I find that the writing style is mostly a rant. The author's personal agenda seems to be anger at those who have made money in the Middle East. Fair enough, but I think we all know that life is unfair. He seems to have a particular grudge against former president George Bush, possibly stemming from Bush's term as Director of CIA. But the attacks are tedious. Since my confidence in his fact base has been shaken, my belief in his rants is suffering. The fact that Saudi Arabia is a backward, tyrannical, repressive place is not news. The fact that certain Saudis have a lot of money is not news. The fact that we rely excessively on them for an essential commodity for our national well-being is not news. What could be news is the changing dynamic in the country. Analysis of that in the book is useful. If I were more comfortable with the author's objectivity and facts, I would have a higher regard for the book.
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Summary: Where is he coming from?
Review: I have a hard time believing that a CIA guy could write this book unless it was officially sanctioned to a large extent. That said, his opinion is that the Saudis own Washington, that all high-ranking Washingtonians are ..., and that we are being done in by our thirst for cheap oil. Also that most of the Arab dictatorships are a long way from democracy, and further still from the rule of law, and that the idea of democratizing them in the short term is a fantasy. His remedy is not totally consistent with his opinions however: He concludes with the idea that we should simply take over the Saudi oil fields. (As we have done with Iraq.) But given his total lack of faith in the morality of the people that would be directing the takeover, why would he expect that to solve matters? That's why the question of official sponsorship for this book (however indirect) is of interest. Is this guy a tolerated loose cannon that the CIA is politely distancing itself from, because they think that's the easiest and safest way to deal with him, or is he really speaking for heart and soul the bureaucracy? The reason this question is hard to answer is that 99.99% of the bureaucracy consists of working stiffs who will identify with Robert Baer. The other 0.01% are the upper class thieves he describes. But who really runs the Government, the upper class thieves or the working stiffs? I wish I knew, but this book doesn't really make it clear. Mr. Baer still comes off as an insider, despite his denials of continuing membership in the club, and his own business activities that he alludes to occasionally put him both in the club and in the 0.01% level of people who have figured out how to really make a buck out of their Government career, post-retirement. In summary: A pretty good window into Saudi Arabia, 85%. And 13% hall of mirrors. And 2% blustering hawk. But enjoyable, I finished it off cover to cover in a long reading session this weekend.
Rating: 
Summary: must read for foreigh affairs buffs
Review: I gave this book 4 stars only because it could've been better organized overall and the first half seemed overlong generally. Nevertheless, anyone interested in this topic should read this. Much of the information has been noted elsewhere but the last 50-60% of the book is a good summary of the current mess in the Arab world, America's tar baby. Though I've followed foreign affairs since the '50s and read a lot, like many I was still caught short by 9/11 and the puzzling possible role of the Saudis. Baer's review of this topic, especially his description of the Saudi financial situation and royal family are worth the book price by themselves. His various anecdotes add to it all (especially the one about having to call a Kuwaiti border guard--priceless!). Like his earlier book, See No Evil, Baer's anger and disillusionment come through, hurting his effectiveness at times but giving the book an undeniable force. ...
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