Emergency: This Book Will Save Your Life - Neil Strauss (2009)

Part III. ESCAPE

Lesson 18

Back in Los Angeles, I bought the book I’d seen at Spencer’s house, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers by Paul Kennedy, which, from the first page, was eerily prophetic.

Written in 1987, the book meticulously traces the histories and economies of world superpowers of the last five hundred years. Its thesis, born of an endless array of historical examples, is that the collapse of every superpower in modern history has been due not just to lengthy fighting by its armed forces, but to its interests expanding internationally while its economy weakens domestically. In other words, empires collapse when they stretch themselves too thin.

Furthermore, Kennedy explains, “Great Powers in relative decline instinctively respond by spending more on ‘security,’ and thereby divert potential resources from ‘investment’ and compound their long-term dilemma.”

Though he doesn’t discuss America for most of the book, every word and every example has parallels in the United States today. For example, he writes of the declining Spanish empire in the sixteenth century, “Spain resembled a large bear in the pit: more powerful than any of the dogs attacking it, but never able to deal with all of its opponents and growing gradually exhausted in the process.”

Similarly, two hundred years later, the British, “like all other civilizations at the top of the wheel of fortune … could believe that their position was both ‘natural’ and destined to continue. And just like all those other civilizations, they were in for a rude shock.”

As each successive empire fell on the same economic sword, Hegel’s words kept echoing in my head: “What experience and history teach is this—that peoples and governments have never learned anything from history.”

By the time I finished the book, it seemed clear that whether or not there was another devastating terrorist attack in America, the end of the empire as we know it was approaching. The only remaining questions were: Would it simply become a smaller player, like Spain and Britain after their zenith, or disappear altogether, like Rome, Austria-Hungary, and the Soviet Union? And what world power would eventually take its place: China, the European Union, maybe India?

Either way, I was now convinced that, as surely as one tucks money into a retirement plan, I needed to build a backup life offshore immediately—and maybe even take Spencer’s advice and look into other ways to protect myself. In a time when nuclear, chemical, and biological weapon technology is for sale to the highest bidder, especially since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fall of a great empire today could be a lot messier than in the past.

After returning home from the Hamptons, I’d also called the lawyer Spencer had recommended, Holland Wright.

“Your clients Spencer Booth and Adam McCormick recommended I speak to you,” I told him, my voice slightly nervous, as it was every time I knew I’d have to say the next sentence aloud. “I’m looking for a second citizenship and wanted to see if I could work with you.”

“That’s not something I do,” he replied brusquely.

“It’s okay.” I assumed he was just trying to protect his clients’ confidentiality. “I was with them in the Hamptons this weekend. They told me to call you.”

“No, that’s not something I do,” he repeated. Maybe I wasn’t B enough for him.

“But—”

“Is there anything else I can help you with?”

I hate lawyers.

“Thanks for your time.” I hung up dejectedly.

I needed to find someone who understood the advantages and disadvantages of each country, the benefits and restrictions of each passport, the various legal shortcuts to obtaining quick citizenships. If necessary, I was even willing to consider getting married.

But no lawyer would help me.

Before leaving for the Sovereign Society conference, I researched one other option: a tombstone ID. Spencer had told me he’d considered getting one but changed his mind because it was too shady.

To obtain a tombstone ID from a foreign country, I’d need to fly there and go to a local cemetery. Then I’d have to find the grave of a boy who’d died between the ages of three and ten, write down his name and birth date, and take out a mailbox in his name.

After researching information about his parents on a genealogy website, I’d have to apply to the government for a birth certificate. With that certificate, I could get the country’s equivalent of a social security number and card. And with both those documents—and perhaps, for extra security, a utility bill in that person’s name or a fake student ID—I could get a driver’s license.

Finally, with all those documents (and, in some countries, a local friend to vouch that I was a citizen), I could get a brand-new passport.

But in addition to being risky—especially since more municipalities were starting to store birth and death certificates in the same database—there was also something degenerate about having my face on a passport above the name of a dead child.

As I boarded a plane to Mexico, I hoped someone at the Sovereign Society conference would have the answers I was looking for. I was running out of legal options.