Wolves, Jackals, and Foxes: The Assassins Who Changed History

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Macmillan, Aug 5, 2008 - History - 448 pages

"A history of the twentieth century punctuated by gunshots. . . . An exciting account." --Sunday Telegraph (UK)

Exploding telephones, pipe-guns, bullets made of teeth, aspirin explosives, cobra-venom darts, a rifle that shoots around corners, exploding clams, samurai swords, karate chops, poisoned umbrellas, and a fuel-laden light aircraft. Sometimes even a regular gun. These are just some of the methods that have been used over the last ?fty years to speed four thousand VIPs to a premature end.

Wolves, Jackals, and Foxes is not an encyclopedia of assassination but rather a gripping history that charts the development of the modern world through the eyes of the assassins that tried to alter it. An experienced investigative reporter, Kris Hollington exposes shocking unknown stories of assassination. Surprising conspiracies and remarkable connections are uncovered throughout.

Hollington relates the story of the man who shot Uday Hussein seventeen times, the remarkable career of the CIA's "black sorcerer," reveals how an East German Stasi agent, an American B-movie actress, and a Saudi prince conspired to commit one of the most important assassinations of the twentieth century, uncovers the terrible history of South Africa's brutal assassination squad and exposes for the ?rst time the secret society that ensured racist assassins in the South never paid for their crimes. It also features previously classi?ed information from the Secret Service, including the story of how President Jimmy Carter was saved from a sniper's bullet by a rabid swamp rabbit.

This book is the first to study in detail not only the causes and surprising consequences of assassination, but also the crucial seconds of the act itself and the psychology of the killer in an effort to understand why some assassinations succeed where others fail---and what might be done to prevent them. It is also the ?rst book to examine the fascinating facts and ?gures of assassination, revealing everything from the success rate by type of weapon and the escape and survival rates of assassins to the most popular time of year and location for an attack.

The definitive book on assassination, Wolves, Jackals, and Foxes shows that sometimes, one murder can change the world.

 

Contents

Stalins Last Supper
12
The Black Sorcerer
34
Hearts of Darkness
50
The Mississippi Conspiracy
65
JFK Reloaded
80
By Any Means Necessary
108
Murder in Memphis
121
The Route of Most Danger
139
You Talkin to Me?
226
The Pope Must Die
245
Death at the Dorchester
267
The Stockholm Takedown
281
Dr Strangeloves Supergun
303
Lady Macdeath
322
The Enemy Within
343
Three in the Head
357

Something Bold and Dramatic
155
Spains First Astronaut
170
Terror in Rome
192
The Serial Assassin
210
The Statistics
377
References
396
Index
417
Copyright

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About the author (2008)

Kris Hollington is a journalist living and working in London. He has written a number of investigative pieces on subjects as diverse as African drug smugglers, diamond mining, art theft, murder, armed robbery, and police corruption for The Sunday Times, The Guardian, The Mail on Sunday, and The Evening Standard.

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