Mike Ruppert's Response to a Thread on Cryptogon

The comment below was written by Mike Ruppert and initially sent to Matt Savinar for submission to Cryptogon. However, since Matt's away, I submitted it instead as Mike’s proxy, in order to protect the privacy of his email address. I can verify having seen the letter Mike refers to in which he resigned from PQI. That letter’s not being included now only because Mike’s comment is already so long.

Jenna Orkin
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This is Mike Ruppert. Matt can verfiy that this message came directlyfrom me. I am sticking my periscope up this once to put a few folks onnotice that I am still very much alive and in full possession of myfaculties. Unlike the previous nine years, however, I will notre-engage in any dialogue after offering these comments and responses.After 28 years of dedicated activism I am retired from that field ofbattle. The price was too great; the returns too little. However, I am not through making contributions on the two real and dangerous issues that confront all of us: Peak Oil and Global Warming.

I will soon be starting another book.

Let me address the points of this thread as I saw them in order.

ARMORWARE — The open/closed source debate is a Red Herring. Apples and Oranges are mixed here. Spyware was my first initial concern, (i.e. the vulnerability of files stored on my personal hard drive to compromise via back doors in any number of programs or operating systems. When I met the folks from Armorware (at a PQI event — seebelow) I took a lot of time to see what was an utterly elegant solution to the problem of preventing spyware or malware from entering my hard drive. It required no technical expertise.

Armorware, designed by a Russian emigre computer scientist living inToronto whom I have met, operated, SOLELY from a CD-ROM which “onboot” became the ONLY operating system the Internet ever saw or interfaced with. The hard drive was never accessed or even turned onin the sense that we think of. All web surfing and emailing (including 1024 bit encryption) was done from the CD ROM drive so it was NOT possible for anything to access or compromise the hard drive from THE OUTSIDE. No technical knowledge of any kind is required to understand the significance of this.

No one could track my web surfing either.

Sure, the creators of Armorware understood that they were a third-party intermediary with their servers. That’s why they offer such amazing guarantees. I knew them personally and in 2004 I travelled to Toronto to meet with all the significant members of the company and test drive the product. They were and remain my trusted friends. My input was asked (non-technical of course) about funtionality and uses and I offered my suggestions, some of which were incorporated. All of the Armor Technlogy family were kindred spirits, concerned about civil liberties and privacy protection in age of massive government spying and data theft..
The most intelligent comment in this thread was from the person who said that the only perfect solution for internet security was to lock your computer up in a safe and never go on line at all.
But what I saw remains, a quantum leap in protecting one’s personal computer from unwanted surreptitious intrusions. But Armoware offered other distinct advantages. One could pack up the CD and go anywhere in the world to almost any cyber cafe and reboot in a secure mode without disclosing one’s location. A USB stick compatible with the OS provided tons of space to store encrypted documents and passwords so that one could literally go almost anywhere and have much better odds of privacy. This is, in the end, all about odds and probabilities.
Although I have been out of touch with them for a while I understand that the whole package is now contained in one USB stick (OperatingSystem and files) that makes it even easier to use. ArmorTechnologies, http://www.armorware.com/, is in negotiations with some large corporations for large contracts to safely transmit secure data so obviously someone thinks it has value.

Now I realize that the last statement will be used against me. If large corporatins like it then it must be proof that it’s comrpomised or the enemy. No, they want to use it in-house. They want to protect their data.

As to allegations that I did all that for money I remind everyone that in its eight years FTW never accepted any paid advertising of any kind. I wouldn’t ever let us be compromised editorially. Armorware is the only product I ever endorsed, excluding gold. I became an Armoware affiliate (as described on their web page) and enjoyed the benefits of that. There ain’t nothing wrong with folks. It’s called paying the rent and good business.

PQI — I severed all contact with PQI in November of 2005 because it had deteriorated rapidly from the stimulating and cutting-edge educational program it was when I first started working with them. I have attached a copy of my November, 2005 email with this message toMatt Savinar and he may post it or not as he sees fit. But he will be able to confirm that he has seen it. Armoware severed all relations with PQI about ten months later.

ME SUING PEOPLE — Only once have I ever sued anyone. It was a former employee who I had connected to a government operation to sabotage my company from within (an operation which continued after we moved to Ashland). I won that suit in court after proving the sabotage. I have threatened to sue people who have employed libelous and dishonest smear tactics. That’s why we have laws to prevent such things and why such conduct is illegal. But to argue that I defend my work by relying on threats of a lawsuit is ridiculous. All of my work and FTW’s work has always been fully documented. That’s why I wrote a six-hundred page book with a thousand footnotes which is now in the Harvard Business School library.

GARY WEBB — Well, here’s where the flames come out. (Everone wanted a little fireworks right?) Gary left a long trail indicating his intention to commit suicide starting about ten days before his death.(Actually, even longer.) Let’s deal with the two shots first since that’s the place where amateuers and dilettantes get so hooked and become such unjustified and unqualified experts. There’s a couple of pieces of real bad disinformation in this thread. Gary was not shot“in the face”. After his death I went to Sacramento and interviewed his entire family except for his mother. This included his brother,his ex-wife and his three children. They were all open and frank withme, knowing that I had been close to him.

His brother, ex-wife and eldest son all told me they when they saw his body in the morgue, pre-autopsy, they observed two entry wounds near the right temple (NOT THE FACE). I originally reported that the first wound had blown out Gary’s lower left jaw. His ex wife, Susan, later corrected me that the bullet had not exited the jaw but it was clear that the jaw had been shattered and pushed outwards. There was a massive edema, confirming that it was a pre-mortem wound.

Now, draw a human head from the front. Put ears on so you know where the temples are. Draw a line from the right temple to the lower left jaw and tell me if any vital organs have been hit or if any arteries have been severed? No, they have not.

The second wound was in a straight line from temple to temple acrossthe midbrain and was the fatal shot.

The autopsy report did not say that the shots were fired from three feet away, it stated that the shots were fired from WITHIN three feet away. That is a standard statement when gunpowder residue is found on the skin. I was told there was also stippling (Look it up). That indicates a much closer range (i.e. within inches). All of this was also reported in several newspapers. It is not the ME’s role to decide the distance of the shot from gunpowder residure but rather an explosives expert who can analyaze the powder and compare it to the barrel length of the gun and make of the ammunition used. (I was anLAPD detective, remember?) That had not been done when I was up there.

The weapon used was Gary’s own.38 revolver and he was probably using weak target ammunition.

Next go to the web and look up “hesitation wounds”. The occur with guns just as they do with suicide slashes. I have seen them when I was with LAPD. Gary screwed up the first shot and finished it with the second. This is what every member of his family who saw the body told me. The first shot was clearly NOT a fatal wound. While Alex Jones was publishing stories about Ninja-clad warriors sliding down drain pipes to Gary’s upper-floor balcony, I was in Sacramento photographing Gary’s single family, one-story home which had no balcony which is where he killed himself.

(I get slammed for promoting one prouduct. How many paid advertisers are there on Alex Jones’ sites?)

Now add to that the fact that in the ten days prior to his death Gary had:
– changed the beneficiaries and upped the payouts on his insurance policies;– written individual letters to each of his children, his ex-wife, his mother and his brother telling them goodbye, They all confirmed receiving such letters to me personally and in front of other journalists at the memorial service;– moved all of his most valued personal belongings to his mother’sgarage and said goodbye.– sent an email to Al Giordano of Narconews saying that he was contemplating suicide. (I believe Al told me that he even called Gary on the phone and tried to disuade him)
Gary was telegraphing his suicide to everybody. Even I had sensed it coming in my last communications with him. He couldn’t get hired anywhere and he had burned many bridges behind him. He was behind on his house payments.

So anyone who believes that Gary was murdered, based on the evidence, gets an honorary tin foil hat — with a propeller and a satellite dish(Oh, geez, there I go showing my bad people skills again). The thing that makes me so f—–g agry is the pain this has caused Gary’s family every time it gets brought up again.

IRAN — The US is not ging to attack Iran. Stan Goff and I have been right for three years on this and we are still going to be right three years from now. The US wants and needs rapprochement with Iran for several reasons:

1. To be able to plug Caspian heavy-sour crude into the existing Iran pipeline system and bypass Russian strategic threats along the northern Caspian littorals and into the US-controlled Gulf.

2. Both the US and Iran are more concerned about Russian threats. Russia sees the US weakening and is becoming bolder. That puts Iran in a squeeze too. In order for Russia to get to the Gulf it has to gothrough Iran. Right now the “sideshow hostility” between the US and Iran is good politically for both Bush’s and Ahmadinejad’s poll ratings, such as they are..

3. Militatrily (especially logistically) the US cannot possibly takeon major attacks against Iran.

4. Iran and Venezuela are in a mutual defense pact wherein Venezuela will shut off oil deliveries to the US if Iran is attacked.

5. China, Japan, Europe and Southeast Asia cannot survive without Iranian oil and Iran will close the Straits of Hormuz. These countries will go crazy if the US attacks.

MY HEALTH AND THE BREAKDOWN — As some of you should observe by now my brain is working just fine, thank you. What happened to me was just asmuch a medical/physical illness as a stress-induced depression. I makeno apologies or excuses for it. None are necesary. I returned to the US to save my life. I was going to die in Venezuela. I needed English speaking friends and culture around me as much as I needed air. I also needed medical treatment badly. Venezuela was a horrible experience but I will deal with that publicly on another occasion.
I love all the speculation about the what’s whys and wherefores. It’sbetter than the gossip mags.
You can expect to hear from me again sometime in the Fall when Donald Rumsfeld hopefully gets indicted over FTW’s Pat Tillman series. Everything that has broken came from our investigation of the Army records and Stan Goff’s brilliant work. Every handout that was given to Congress came from our series. We were publishing that series when our computers were smashed in Oregon and we had just proved that Rumsfeld was guilty of multiple felonies when the burglary occurred.

Remember Watergate and “The Plumbers”.

What I am going to continue to do now is to take care of myself,something which I neglected to do for two decades.

So y’all can go back to speculating now. Matt, my good friend, as theysay, “non carborundum illegitimati”.

Mike Ruppert