The Lumumba Plot Audiobook Libro.fm

The New York Times Book Review Editors ChoiceA spellbinding work of history that reads like a Cold War spy thrillerabout the USsanctioned plot to assassinate the democratically elected leader of the newly independent Congo

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR The New Yorker The Economist Financial Times

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 Belgiumone 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 Congos 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 Hammarskjld the tidy Swede serving as UN secretarygeneral quickly arranged the organizations 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 helpan 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 zzle out but he would be deposed in a CIAbacked coup transferred to enemy territory in a CIAapproved operation and shot dead by Congolese assassins Hammarskjld too would die in a mysterious plane crash en route to negotiate a ceasere with the Congos rebellious southeast And a young ambitious military officer named Joseph Mobutu who had once sworn fealty to Lumumba would seize power with US help and misrule the country for more than three decades For the Congolese people the events of 196061 represented the opening chapter of a long horror story For the US government however they provided a playbook for future interventions