"No border," write Gould and Fitzgerald, "has been more contentious than the one today separating Pakistan from Afghanistan, known as the Durand line but referred to by the military and intelligence community as Zero line."
The war in Afghanistan has become the most complex foreign policy problem the United States has ever faced, spreading into Pakistan and involving the conflicting interests of Russia, India, China and Iran. Crossing Zero focuses on the nuances of the Obama administration's evolving military and political strategy, those who have been chosen to implement it, and the long-term consequences for the U.S. and the region. A clear, well-researched and easy-to-read analysis of the spiraling U.S. war in Afghanistan/Pakistan.
Praise for Crossing Zero:
"A ferocious, iron-clad argument about the institutional failure of American foreign policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan." -- Daniel Ellsberg
"Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould have seen the importance of the 'Great Game' in Afghanistan since the early 1980s. They have been most courageous in their commitment to telling the truth -- and have paid a steep price for it. Their views have never been acceptable to mainstream media in our country, but they deserve accolades. If only our establishment had listened to them." -- Oliver Stone
"Fitzgerald and Gould have consistently raised the difficult questions and inconvenient truths about western engagement in Afghanistan. While many analysts and observers have attempted to wish a reality on a grim and tragic situation in Afghanistan, Fitzgerald and Gould have systematically dug through the archives and historical record with integrity and foresight to reveal a series of misguided strategies and approaches that have contributed to what has become a tragic quagmire in Afghanistan. I suspect that many of their assessments while presently viewed as controversial and contentious, will eventually be considered conventional wisdom."
—Thomas Johnson, Department of National Security Affairs and Director, Program for Culture and Conflict Studies, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey California
"Americans are now beginning to grasp the scope of the mess their leaders made while pursuing misguided military adventures into regions of Central Asia we once called 'remote.' How this happened—and what the US can do to extricate itself from its entanglements in Pakistan and Afghanistan—is the story of Crossing Zero. Based on decades of study and research, this book draws lines and connects dots in ways few others do. It is clear, sober and methodical—an ideal handbook for anyone seeking to understand how the US became the latest imperial power to blunder into this turbulent and fascinating region."
—Stephen Kinzer, author of All the Shah's Men and Reset: Iran, Turkey and America's Future
"I loved it. An extraordinary contribution to understanding war and geo-politics in Afghanistan that will shock most Americans by its revelations of official American government complicity in using, shielding, sponsoring and supporting terrorism. A devastating indictment on the behind-the-scenes shenanigans by some of America's most respected statesmen." —Daniel Estulin investigative journalist and author of The True Story of the Bilderberg Club, The Secrets of Club Bilderberg, and Shadow Masters: An International Network of Governments and Secret-Service Agencies Working Together with Drugs Dealers and Terrorists for Mutual Benefit and Profit
"Gould and Fitzgerald have identified the triumphalist strain that has marked American foreign policy over the past 100 years and documented President Obama's failure to introduce change to American national security policy. The war in Afghanistan is consistent with previous failures in U.S. policymaking over the past 50 years as well as with the misuse of military force. This book should be required reading at the National Security Council and the Pentagon." — Melvin A. Goodman; CIA Senior Soviet Analyst, 1966-1990; Professor of International Security at the National War College,1986-2004; Senior Fellow, Center for International Policy, Washington, DC.
"After several decades of facile and destructive answers from Washington policymakers, the authors deploy a phalanx of incisive questions about U.S. policies in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The result is a book that shatters the key myths promoted by American news media and the last six presidents. Crossing Zero is a searing expose of distortions that have fundamentally warped U.S. perceptions and actions in the 'AfPak' region. Fitzgerald and Gould provide crucial antidotes to poisonous assumptions and bromides of conventional wisdom that continue to delude the USA into further lethal follies. This book deconstructs and dismantles a deadly formula of ignorance and deceit." -- Norman Solomon, author of War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death
"In Crossing Zero, Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould provide a much needed antidote to mainstream accounts of the AfPak war by documenting in detail the disastrous consequences of United States and NATO military intervention in the region. Drawing from a wide range of sources, and written in crisp, clear prose, the book will be useful to students, researchers, policy makers, and anyone interested in knowing the truth." --Julien Mercille, lecturer in US foreign policy at University College Dublin
"Crossing Zero is much more than a devastating indictment of the folly of U.S. military intervention in Afghanistan. Paul Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Gould demonstrate that the U.S. debacle in Afghanistan is the predictable climax of U.S. imperial overreach on a global scale. Like their earlier work documenting the origins of U.S. involvement in Afghanistan during the Cold War, Crossing Zero deserves the attention of all serious students of U.S. foreign policy." --Selig S. Harrison, Co-author with Diego Cordovez of Out of Afghanistan: The Inside Story of the Soviet Withdrawal
Praise for Invisible History:
"Journalists Fitzgerald and Gould do yeoman's labor in clearing the fog and laying bare American failures in Afghanistan in this deeply researched, cogently argued and enormously important book. The authors demonstrate how closely American actions are tied to past miscalculations—and how U.S. policy has placed Afghans and Americans in grave danger."
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A probing history of the country and a critical evaluation of American involvement in recent decades . . . A fresh perspective on a little-understood nation."
—Kirkus