A spellbinding work of
history that reads like a Cold War spy thriller—about the
U.S.-sanctioned plot to assassinate the democratically elected leader
of the newly independent Congo
“
This
is one of the best books I have read in years . . . gripping, full of
colorful characters, and strange plot twists.” —Fareed Zakaria,
CNN host
It
was supposed to be a moment of great optimism, a cause for
jubilation. The Congo was at last being set free from Belgium—one
of seventeen countries to gain independence in 1960 from ruling
European powers. At the helm as prime minister was charismatic
nationalist Patrice Lumumba. Just days after the handover, however,
the Congo’s new army mutinied, Belgian forces intervened, and
Lumumba turned to the United Nations for help in saving his newborn
nation from what the press was already calling “the Congo crisis.”
Dag Hammarskjöld, the tidy Swede serving as UN secretary-general,
quickly arranged the organization’s biggest peacekeeping mission in
history. But chaos was still spreading. Frustrated with the
fecklessness of the UN and spurned by the United States, Lumumba then
approached the Soviets for help—an appeal that set off alarm bells
at the CIA. To forestall the spread of Communism in Africa, the CIA
sent word to its station chief in the Congo, Larry Devlin: Lumumba
had to go.
Within
a year, everything would unravel. The CIA plot to murder Lumumba
would fizzle out, but he would be deposed in a CIA-backed coup,
transferred to enemy territory in a CIA-approved operation, and shot
dead by Congolese assassins. Hammarskjöld, too, would die, in a
mysterious plane crash en route to negotiate a cease-fire with the
Congo’s rebellious southeast. And a young, ambitious military
officer named Joseph Mobutu, who had once sworn fealty to Lumumba,
would seize power with U.S. help and misrule the country for more
than three decades. For the Congolese people, the events of 1960–61
represented the opening chapter of a long horror story. For the U.S.
government, however, they provided a playbook for future
interventions.