On May 2, 2011, at 1:03 a.m. in Pakistan, a satellite uplink was sent from the town of Abbottabad crackling into the situation room of the White House in Washington, D.C.: 'Geronimo, Echo, KIA'. These words, spoken by a Navy SEAL, put paid to Osama bin Laden's three-decade-long career of terror. This is the story of Bin Laden's relentless hunters and how they took down the terrorist mastermind, told by Chuck Pfarrer, a former assault element commander of SEAL Team Six. After talking to members of the SEAL team involved in the raid, Pfarrer shares never-before-revealed details of the historic raid and the men who planned and conducted it in an exclusive boots-on-the-ground account of what happened during each minute of the mission - both inside the building and outside. Pfarrer takes readers inside the operation as the SEALs flew over the wall of Bin Laden's shabby compound and then penetrated deeper and deeper into the terrorist's lair, telling us just what it looked, sounded, and smelled like in that sweltering Pakistani suburb. He takes us to the exact spot where the al-Qaeda leader was cowering when the bullet entered his head. SEAL Target Geronimo is an explosive story of unparalleled valour, clockwork military precision, and deadly accuracy carried out by one of the most elite fighting forces in the world - the U.S. Navy's SEAL Team Six.

On November 16, 1989, on the campus of El Salvador's University of Central America, six Jesuits and two women were murdered by members of the Salvadoran army, an army funded and trained by the United States. One of the murdered Jesuits was Ignacio Ellacuria, the university's Rector and a key, although controversial, figure in Salvadoran public life. From an opening account of this terrible crime, Paying the Price asks, Why were they killed and what have their deaths meant? Answers come through Teresa Whitfield's detailed examination of Ellacuria's life and work. His story is told in juxtaposition with the crucial role played by the unraveling investigation of the Jesuits' murders within El Salvador's peace process. A complex and nuanced book, Paying the Price offers a history of the Church in El Salvador in recent decades, an analysis of Ellacuria's philosophy and theology, an introduction to liberation theology, and an account of the critical importance of the University of Central America. In the end, Whitfield's comprehensive picture of conditions in El Salvador suggest that the Jesuits' murders were almost inevitable. A crime that proved a turning point in El Salvador's civil war, the murders expressed the deep tragedy of the Salvadoran people beyond suffering the heartless cruelty, violence, and deceitfulness of a corrupt military and their patrons in the U.S. government. Whitfield draws on her extensive research of Jesuit archives and private papers, Ellacuria's diaries, documents declassified by the U.S. government, and 200 interviews conducted with sources ranging from Jesuits to Salvadoran military officers, U.S. officials and congressmen to human rights campaigners.

Yugoslavia and Political Assassinations is the first book in English to analyse how and why the Yugoslav State Security Service carried out multiple targeted assassinations, over the country's forty-six years of existence, under the pretext of protecting the Yugoslav communist party-state. Offering a detailed history of the programme, from the inception of the State Security Service to the recent trials of individuals involved, it draws on Christian Axboe Nielsen's unique wealth of experience and research as an academic and as an expert witness in numerous criminal trials. The result is a ground-breaking contribution to the history of targeted assassinations, communist history, state security services and related criminal trials.

On March 18, 1975, Herbert Chitepo, an African nationalist in exile and chairman of the war council that struggled to liberate Zimbabwe from white-ruled Rhodesia, was killed by a car bomb. Since then, there have been four confessions and at least as many accusations about who was responsible. In The Assassination of Herbert Chitepo, Luise White does not set out to resolve questions about who was accountable for this horrible murder. Instead, in a style that is as much murder mystery as it is history writing, she uncovers what is at stake in the various confessions and why Chitepo s assassination continues to incite conflict and controversy in Zimbabwe s national politics. White casts doubt on official accounts of the murder and addresses how and for whom history is written and how myths and ideas about civic culture were founded in war-torn Zimbabwe. Although the truth about the assassination of Herbert Chitepo may never be known, readers will discover how one man s murder continues to unsettle Zimbabwe."

Lebanon, together with the province of Hatay in Turkey (containing Antakya) and the Golan Heights were all part of French mandate Syria, but are now all outside the boundaries of the modern Syrian state. The policies and reactions of Syria both to the loss of these territories and to the states that have either absorbed, annexed or emerged from them (Lebanon, Turkey and Israel) are the focus of Emma Jorum's book. Jorum uses the differences in policy and discourse when it comes to each of these three cases to highlight the nature of territorial dispute in the region, and the processes of state-building and nationalism more generally. Through the examination of Syria's policies concerning these lost territories, Jorum plots and analyses Syrian-Turkish, Syrian-Lebanese and Syrian-Israeli relations, explaining why some losses have been pushed to one side and others remain at the forefront in Syria's international relations and diplomacy efforts.

Among the probes was an extensive 1990 inquiry organized by a New Scotland Yard team invited to Kenya by the government, as well as an open public commission of inquiry appointed by President Daniel arap Moi. The commission ran for seventeen months in 1990-91 before the president shut it down. International and Kenyan unrest over Ouko's brutal death brought increasing attention to corruption and violence associated with the Moi government, leading in late 1991 to multiparty politics and in December 2002 to the elections that ended the Moi era. This powerfully argued book raises important issues about the production of knowledge and the politics of memory that will interest a large interdisciplinary audience. An inquiry into how facts are created and knowledge produced, The Risks of Knowledge pursues a ghastly murder into the normally unseen worlds of international business wheeling and dealing, into the rural "squireocracy" of western Kenya, and into the bureaucratic routines of Kenya's government. In this, their third coauthored study of Kenya, the authors show how these unfinished investigations are about much more than the solution to the murder of a distinguished Kenyan statesman and world citizen.

Working with thousands of previously unreleased documents and drawing on more than one thousand interviews, with many witnesses speaking out for the first time, Joan Mellen revisits the investigation of New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison, the only public official to have indicted, in 1969, a suspect in President John F. Kennedy's murder.Garrison began by exposing the contradictions in the Warren Report, which concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald was an unstable pro-Castro Marxist who acted alone in killing Kennedy. "A Farewell to Justice" reveals that Oswald, no Marxist, was in fact working with both the FBI and the CIA, as well as with U.S. Customs, and that the attempts to sabotage Garrison's investigation reached the highest levels of the U.S. government. Garrison interviewed various individuals involved in the assassination, ranging from Clay Shaw and CIA contract employee David Ferrie to a Marine cohort of Oswald named Kerry Thornley, who at the very least was a Defense Intelligence Agency asset. Garrison's suspects included CIA-sponsored soldiers of fortune enlisted in assassination attempts against Fidel Castro, an anti-Castro Cuban asset, and a young runner for the conspirators, interviewed here for the first time by the author.Building upon Garrison's effort, Mellen uncovers decisive new evidence and clearly establishes the intelligence agencies' roles in both a president's assassination and its cover-up, set in motion well before the actual events of November 22, 1963.

"While waves of laughter echoed through the theater, James Ferguson kept his eyes focused on Abraham Lincoln. Although the president joined the crowd with a hearty laugh, his interest seemingly lay more with someone below. With his right elbow resting on the arm of his chair and his chin lying carelessly on his hand, Lincoln parted one of the flags nearby that he might see better.

"As the laughter subsided, Harry Hawk stood on the stage alone with his back to the presidential box. Before he could utter another word, a sharp crack sounded. As the noise echoed throughout the otherwise silent theater, many thought that it was part of the play. But just as quickly, most knew it was not." from Chapter Twelve

"Among the hundreds of books published about the assassination of our 16th president, this is an exceptional volume.... It captures] a you-are-there feeling...." Frank J. Williams, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, founding Chair of The Lincoln Forum, and member of the U.S. Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission

It was one of the most tragic events in American history: The famous president, beloved by many, reviled by some, murdered while viewing a play at Ford s Theater in Washington. The frantic search for the perpetrators. The nation in mourning. The solemn funeral train. The conspirators brought to justice. Coming just days after the surrender of the Confederate Army at Appomattox, the assassination of Abraham Lincoln has become etched in the national consciousness like few other events. The president who had steered the nation through its bloodiest crisis was cut down before the end, just as it appeared that the bloodshed was over. The story has been told many times, but rarely with the immediacy of The Darkest Dawn. Thomas Goodrich brings to his narrative the care of the historian and the flair of the fiction writer. The result is a gripping account, filled with detail and as fresh as today s news."

On Valentine's Day 2005, former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri, nicknamed 'Mr Lebanon' for his local power and patronage, was killed by a massive explosion as he drove along the Beirut seafront. Ten weeks later, Syrian troops had withdrawn from Lebanon after an occupation of nearly thirty years. In this compelling book, Nicholas Blanford looks at how the murder of a businessman provoked such a seismic shift in Middle Eastern politics. He examines Hariri's past, inextricably linked with that of Lebanon, and uncovers a murky world of shifting alliances between businesses, security services, politicians and diplomats. Based on exclusive interviews with the key players in the Syrian, Lebanese and international arenas, Blanford traces the last weeks of Hariri's life, and reveals who and what stood to gain from his death. Gaining access to material never before made public, Blanford shows how right up until the morning of his assassination, Hariri was building up a unique political movement which would have upset the balance of power in Middle Eastern politics. Larger than life figures emerge in this Shakespearean political drama: the wily Druze leader, Walid Jumblatt, the much-feared head of Syrian military intelligence in Lebanon, Rustom Ghazaleh and the young Syrian leader eager to stamp his authority, Bashar al-Assad. With Lebanon reeling from the explosion of regional tensions in the summer of 2006, Blanford traces the impact of the Hariri assassination on Hizbullah, Syria and Israel. Full of intrigue, shady characters and suspense, "Killing Mr Lebanon" is the definitive account of how Beirut became once again the flashpoint of the Middle East.

Working with thousands of previously unreleased documents and drawing on more than one thousand interviews, with many witnesses speaking out for the first time, Joan Mellen revisits the investigation of New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison, the only public official to have indicted, in 1969, a suspect in President John F. Kennedy's murder.Garrison began by exposing the contradictions in the Warren Report, which concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald was an unstable pro-Castro Marxist who acted alone in killing Kennedy. "A Farewell to Justice" reveals that Oswald, no Marxist, was in fact working with both the FBI and the CIA, as well as with U.S. Customs, and that the attempts to sabotage Garrison's investigation reached the highest levels of the U.S. government. Garrison interviewed various individuals involved in the assassination, ranging from Clay Shaw and CIA contract employee David Ferrie to a Marine cohort of Oswald named Kerry Thornley, who at the very least was a Defense Intelligence Agency asset. Garrison's suspects included CIA-sponsored soldiers of fortune enlisted in assassination attempts against Fidel Castro, an anti-Castro Cuban asset, and a young runner for the conspirators, interviewed here for the first time by the author.Building upon Garrison's effort, Mellen uncovers decisive new evidence and clearly establishes the intelligence agencies' roles in both a president's assassination and its cover-up, set in motion well before the actual events of November 22, 1963.

A story of the attempt on Dwight 'Ike' Eisenhower's life. It is an aspect of World War II and the true story of what happened to Heydrich and Leslie Howard. This World War II story, which details the start of a new kind of state terrorism that has instigated two wars in Iraq, caused major crises in both the UK and the USA.

"Blood Road" is a complex mix of social history, literary analysis, political biography, and murder mystery. It explores and analyzes the social and cultural dynamics of the Chinese revolution of the 1920s by focusing on the mysterious 1928 assassination of Shen Dingyi--revolutionary, landlord, politician, poet, journalist, educator, feminist, and early member of both the Communist and Nationalist parties.
The search for Shen's killer details the contours of revolutionary change in different spatial contexts--metropolitan Shanghai, the provincial capital Hangzhou, and Shen's home village of Yaqian. Several interrelated themes emerge in this dramatic story of revolution: the nature of social identity, the role of social networks, the political import of place, and the centrality of process in historical explanation. It contributes significantly to a new understanding of Chinese revolutionary culture and the 1920s revolution in particular. But "Blood Road" remains at base a story of people linked in various relationships who were thrust, often without choice, into treacherous revolutionary currents that shaped, twisted, and destroyed their lives.

In 1888 a group of armed and masked Democrats stole a ballot box from a small town in Conway County, Arkansas. The box contained most of the county's black Republican votes, thereby assuring defeat for candidate John Clayton in a close race for the U.S. Congress. Days after he announced he would contest the election, a volley of buckshot ripped through Clayton's hotel window, killing him instantly. Thus began a yet-to-be-solved, century-old mystery. More than a description of this particular event, however, Who Killed John Clayton? traces patterns of political violence in this section of the South over a three-decade period. Using vivid courtroom-type detail, Barnes describes how violence was used to define and control the political system in the post-Reconstruction South and how this system in turn produced Jim Crow. Although white Unionists and freed blacks had joined under the banner of the Republican Party and gained the upper hand during Reconstruction, during these last decades of the nineteenth century conservative elites, first organized as the Ku Klux Klan and then as the revived Democratic Party, regained power-via such tactics as murdering political opponents, lynching blacks, and defrauding elections. This important recounting of the struggle over political power will engage those interested in Southern and American history.

Aldo Moro's kidnapping and violent death in 1978 shocked Italy as no other event has during the entire history of the Republic. It had much the same effect in Italy as the assassination of President John F. Kennedy had in the United States, with both cases giving rise to endless conspiracy theories. The dominant Christian Democratic leader for twenty years, Moro had embodied the country's peculiar religious politics, its values as well as its practices. He was perceived as the most exemplary representative of the Catholic political tradition in Italy. The Red Brigades who killed him thought that in striking Moro they would cause the collapse of the capitalist establishment and clear the way for a Marxist-Leninist revolution. In his thorough account of the long and anguished quest for justice in the Moro murder case, Richard Drake provides a detailed portrait of the tragedy and its aftermath as complex symbols of a turbulent age in Italian history. Since Moro's murder, documents from two parliamentary inquiries and four sets of trials explain the historical and political process and illuminate two enduring themes in Italian history. First, the records contain a wealth of examples bearing on the nation's longstanding culture of ideological extremism and violence. Second, Moro's story reveals much about the inner workings of democracy Italian style, including the roles of the United States and the Mafia. These insights are especially valuable today in understanding why the Italian establishment is in a state of collapse. The Moro case also explores the worldwide problem of terrorism. In great detail, the case reveals the mentality, the tactics, and the strategy of the Red Brigades and related groups. Moro's fate has a universal poignancy, with aspects of a classical Greek tragedy. Drake provides a full historical account of how the Italian people have come to terms with this tragedy.

'A compelling history of the dark arts of statecraft... Fascinating' Jonathan Rugman 'Rich in anecdote and detail.' The Times Today's world is in flux. Competition between the great powers is back on the agenda and governments around the world are turning to secret statecraft and the hidden hand to navigate these uncertain waters. From poisonings to electoral interference, subversion to cyber sabotage, states increasingly operate in the shadows, while social media has created new avenues for disinformation on a mass scale. This is covert action: perhaps the most sensitive - and controversial - of all state activity. However, for all its supposed secrecy, it has become surprisingly prominent - and it is something that has the power to affect all of us. In an enthralling and urgent narrative packed with real-world examples, Rory Cormac reveals how such activity is shaping the world and argues that understanding why and how states wield these dark arts has never been more important.

This is a gripping account of the famous operation in Entebbe, Uganda on 4 July 1976. While the nation of Israel, and Jews throughout the world, struggle with the painful realities of the current Intifada, Yoni's Last Battle by Iddo Netanyahu returns to an earlier chapter of the Arab-Israeli struggle -- to a time when the battles were more clear-cut, and genuine heroes led the charge. The date was 4 July 1976. While millions of Americans celebrated the 200th anniversary of their independence, thirty of Israel's elite commandos flew 2,000 miles to Entebbe, Uganda, under the cover of darkness, in a desperate attempt to rescue 105 Jewish and Israeli passengers hijacked by terrorists on an Air France flight. Lieutenant Colonel Yonatan Netanyahu, a courageous and celebrated soldier, led the daring operation. Virtually the entire group of hostages was liberated and returned safely to Israel, but Yoni was killed in the operation that was described by the New York Times as having "no precedent in military history". In extraordinary detail, Dr Iddo Netanyahu -- Yoni's youngest brother, and also brother to former Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin (Bibi) Netanyahu -- reconstructs events to portray a minute-to-minute chronicle of one of the earliest and most spectacular victories in the modern war against terrorism. Based on interviews with almost every member of the operation, Yoni's Last Battle is a fascinating and first-hand account of the intense 48-hour period of planning and preparation of the mission, and its near-perfect execution in extremely difficult circumstances. This is also an intriguing portrayal of Yoni himself, who at the age of 30, was the brilliant and heroic commander of a courageous and daring mission.

'A compelling history of the dark arts of statecraft... Fascinating' Jonathan Rugman 'Rich in anecdote and detail.' The Times Today's world is in flux. Competition between the great powers is back on the agenda and governments around the world are turning to secret statecraft and the hidden hand to navigate these uncertain waters. From poisonings to electoral interference, subversion to cyber sabotage, states increasingly operate in the shadows, while social media has created new avenues for disinformation on a mass scale. This is covert action: perhaps the most sensitive - and controversial - of all state activity. However, for all its supposed secrecy, it has become surprisingly prominent - and it is something that has the power to affect all of us. In an enthralling and urgent narrative packed with real-world examples, Rory Cormac reveals how such activity is shaping the world and argues that understanding why and how states wield these dark arts has never been more important.

FULLY REVISED NEW EDITION 'A classic crime star in the making' Daily Mail France, 1963. A farmer reports a truck ramming into a car near Amiens, Picardie, followed by gunfire. A group of Englishmen are brought in after a bar fight. A homeless man's body is discovered in a burnt-out truck. All this occurs after multiple attempts on the President's life. Inspector Lucas Rocco knows there's a connection somewhere. Yet despite all clues pointing to the Pont Noir for the next attack on the President, his superiors reject his suspicions. Finding himself suspended, the victim of a set-up, with no badge and no authority, and facing the lethal response of English gangsters, Rocco has to go it alone... A French historical crime thriller full of suspense and intrigue, perfect for fans of Maigret, Martin Walker and Jean-Luc Bannalec.

Assassins have been killing the powerful and famous for at least three thousand years. Personal ambition, revenge, and anger have encouraged many to violent deeds, like the Turkish sultan who had nineteen of his brothers strangled or the bodyguards who murdered a dozen Roman emperors. More recently have come new motives like religious and political fanaticism, revolution and liberation, with governments also getting in on the act, while many victims seem to have been surprisingly careless: Abraham Lincoln was killed after letting his bodyguard go for a drink. So, do assassinations work? Drawing on anecdote, historical evidence, and statistical analysis, Assassins' Deeds delves into some of history's most notorious acts, unveiling an intriguing cast of characters, ingenious methods of killing, and many unintended consequences.

“Our most provocative scholar of American power� reveals the forces behind the assassination of JFK—and their continuing influence over our world (David Talbot, Salon).   On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was gunned down in Dallas by Lee Harvey Oswald. Shortly after, Oswald himself was killed. These events led many to believe there was a far greater plan at work, with a secret cabal of powerful men manipulating the public and shaping US policies both at home and abroad for their own interests.   But no one could imagine how right they were.   Beneath the orderly façade of the American government, there lies a complex network, only partly structural, linking Wall Street influence, corrupt bureaucracy, and the military-industrial complex. Here lies the true power of the American empire. This behind-the-scenes web is unelected, unaccountable, and immune to popular resistance. Peter Dale Scott calls this entity the deep state, and he has made it his life’s work to write the history of those who manipulate our government from the shadows. Since the aftermath of World War II, the deep state’s power has grown unchecked, and nowhere has it been more apparent than that day at Dealey Plaza.   In this landmark volume, Scott traces how culpable elements in the CIA and FBI helped prepare for the assassination, and how the deep state continues to influence our politics today.   As timely and important as ever in the current chaotic political climate, Dallas ’63 is a reality-shattering, frightening exposé not of those who govern us—but of those who govern those who govern us.  

Fifty years ago, the assassination of John F. Kennedy shocked the world and focused attention to the 8mm footage shot by Abraham Zapruder. The event fuelled conspiracy theories and repeated viewings of Zapruder's film as seemingly everyone in the world searched for motive and conclusive proof of a single gunman. In his new Preface to this reissued edition of Dangerous Knowledge, Art Simon discusses public fascination with celebrity deaths and recent assassination-related media - from documentaries to scholarly books to the scandalous video game JFK Reloaded - to show that the assassination continues to inspire writers, artists, and filmmakers. Dangerous Knowledge examines the seminal works of art associated with the assassination, including Andy Warhol's silk screens, the underground films of Bruce Conner, and provocative Hollywood films like The Parallax View and JFK. Simon's investigation places assassination art and images within a historical context - one that helps us understand what the assassination has meant to American culture.

On March 30, 1981, President Ronald Reagan was just seventy days into his first term of office when John W. Hinckley, Jr., opened fire outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, wounding the president, press secretary James Brady, a Secret Service agent, and a D.C. police officer. For years, few people knew the truth about how close the president came to dying. Drawing on new interviews and material, Del Quentin Wilber tells the full electrifying story of a pivotal historical moment when the nation faced a terrifying crisis.

Among the probes was an extensive 1990 inquiry organized by a New Scotland Yard team invited to Kenya by the government, as well as an open public commission of inquiry appointed by President Daniel arap Moi. The commission ran for seventeen months in 1990-91 before the president shut it down. International and Kenyan unrest over Ouko's brutal death brought increasing attention to corruption and violence associated with the Moi government, leading in late 1991 to multiparty politics and in December 2002 to the elections that ended the Moi era. This powerfully argued book raises important issues about the production of knowledge and the politics of memory that will interest a large interdisciplinary audience. An inquiry into how facts are created and knowledge produced, The Risks of Knowledge pursues a ghastly murder into the normally unseen worlds of international business wheeling and dealing, into the rural "squireocracy" of western Kenya, and into the bureaucratic routines of Kenya's government. In this, their third coauthored study of Kenya, the authors show how these unfinished investigations are about much more than the solution to the murder of a distinguished Kenyan statesman and world citizen.

Did the federal government mete out justice or revenge in response to Lincoln's assassination?

On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln was murdered by John Wilkes Booth, and Secretary of State William H. Seward was brutally stabbed. Clearly a conspiracy was afoot. Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt was put in charge of the investigation and trial. He first set out to punish all of Booth's accomplices and then wanted to go after Jefferson Davis, whom he felt had instigated the assassination—despite stern opposition, not least of all from Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson.

Elizabeth D. Leonard tells for the first time the full story of the two assassination trials. She explores the questions that made these trials pivotal in American history: Were they to be used to make the South pay for secession? Were they to be fair trials based on the evidence? Or were they to be points of reconciliation, with the South forgiven at all costs to create a solid union? 12 illustrations.