Here is the inside story of the brutal rise and fall of Colombian cocaine cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar, whose criminal empire held a nation of thirty million hostage -- a reign of terror that would only end with Escobar's death. In an intense, up-close account, award-winning journalist Mark Bowden exposes the never-before-revealed details of how U.S. operatives covertly led the sixteen-month manhunt. Drawing on unprecedented access to the soldiers, field agents, and key Colombian and U.S. officials involved in the chase, as well as top-secret documents and transcripts of Escobar's intercepted phone conversations, Bowden creates a gripping narrative that is epic in scope, a tour de force of investigative journalism, and a stark portrayal of rough justice in the real world.
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When Columbian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar escaped into the jungle he set off an unprecedented manhunt, that featured state-of-the-art weaponry and surveillance equipment and a unique partnership between the U.S. and Columbian governments. Tracking down Pablo was their paramount goal, but was there a secondary one? Could it be that imprisoning the drug lord wasn't as important as eliminating him? Mark Bowden, who penned the bestselling Black Hawk Down, draws on exclusive access to the soldiers and officials involved in the manhunt to bring us a true story that reads like an amazing thriller.
Bowden's book recounts the bloody rise and fall of Pablo Escobar, the godfather of the Medellin cocaine cartel who was assassinated by Colombian police in December 1993. A ruthless terrorist who kidnapped, tortured and murdered, this self-styled Pancho Villa was also an adored hero for Colombia's poora generous builder of schools and soccer fields, not to mention a concerned family man. For nearly two decades, even while he was confined in prison, Escobar's death squads ensured that nothing interfered with his empire. This only changed after his escape in 1992, when the Colombian police, embarrassed and fired by a new resolve, upped the ante. Aided by covert American intelligence, they secretly formed a death squad of their own to destroy Escobar's organization and terrorize his family. After fifteen months, they finally flushed the fugitive out of hiding. The author's book, about a vicious drug war and America's involvement in a high-tech, no-holds-barred manhunt, raises important questions about whether the end should justify the means.
Eric Wargo
(Excerpted Review)
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
The author of the bestseller Black Hawk Down, which depicted the U.S. military's involvement in Somalia, Bowden hits another home run with his chronicle of the manhunt for Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. He traces the prevalence of violence in Colombian history as background, then launches into the tale of the dramatic rise and fall of "Don Pablo," as he was known. Packed with detail, the book shows how Escobar, a pudgy, uneducated man who smoked marijuana daily, ruthlessly built the infamous Medellin cartel, a drug machine that eventually controlled much of Colombian life. As Bowden shows, the impotence of the Colombian government left a void readily filled by Escobar's mafia. While not ignoring the larger picture e.g., the terrible drug-related murders that wracked the South American country in the late 1980s and early 1990s Bowden never loses sight of the human story behind the search for Escobar, who was finally assassinated in 1993, and the terrible toll the hunt took on many of its main players.. There's a smoking gun here: Bowden charges that U.S. special forces were likely involved in helping some of Colombia's other drug lords assassinate perhaps more than a hundred people linked to Escobar. There's no doubt, according to Bowden, that the U.S. government was involved in the search for Escobar after a 1989 airplane bombing that killed 100 and made him, in Bowden's words, "Public Enemy Number One in the world." This revelation highlights one of Bowden's many journalistic accomplishments here: he shows how the search for Escobar became an end in itself. (May 8) Forecast: Bowden will go on a monster tour (about two dozen cities) to promote this BOMC selection, which also has its own Web site (www.killingpablo.com). Expect healthy sales. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Library Journal
Who is Pablo Escobar? Is he the loving family man who cares about his wife and children, the man who wants to help raise the standard of living for people in his community and loves nothing more than to play soccer with the kids in the neighborhood? Or is he the heartless kingpin who helped bring drugs into the United States, waged war with the Medellin Drug Cartel, and played cat and mouse with the police and the U.S. military who tried to capture him? The program, read by the author (Black Hawk Down), includes film of the final hunt for Escobar and of the aftermath. (The CDs are enhanced for computers with the appropriate plug-ins.) It is fascinating to hear about the ways that the police worked to locate Escobar using a variety of tracking devices, but the descriptions of the concomitant drug murders can be a bit graphic. Libraries with true crime collections will want to add this. Danna Bell-Russel, Library of Congress Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
In this riveting work of reportage, award-winning journalist Bowden (Black Hawk Down, 1999) details American involvement in the assassination of Pablo Escobar, the Colombian billionaire godfather of international cocaine trafficking. Drawing on restricted documents, transcripts of Escobar's bugged phone conversations, and interviews with soldiers and government officials involved in the mission, Bowden composes a fast-paced chronicle of the notorious Narco's rise and downfall. He sketches out Escobar's early days in 1960s Medellín, showing how the young crime boss launched a career of car-theft and extortion before making his millions in the cocaine business. Starting in 1984, Escobar and his guerillaswho hoped to coerce the Colombian government to ban extradition of drug traffickers to the USbegan assassinating judges, police officers, journalists, and politicians. But what made him an American military target was his 1989 bombing of an Avianca airliner, a botched attempt to murder a Colombian presidential candidate that killed over 100 people, including two Americans. Escobar surrendered to the Colombian government under the condition that he could live in La Catedral, his luxury "prison," where, protected by his henchmen, he entertained visitors with private bars, soccer games, and teenaged prostitutes. When the Colombian government attempted to relocate Escobar to a real penitentiary, he escaped by bribing Colombian officials and remained on the run for over a year. Bowden shocks with the horrific progression of Escobar's Medellín cartel in the first part of this account, offers insightful perspectives of frustrated military men who hunt the drug lord inthe second, and renders some nice portraits of interesting characters throughout. He does his best to get the facts straight by citing both Colombians' and Americans' recollections of significant events. Yet, with so much political corruption on both sides of the fence, he allows the reader to make the final judgments. Essential reading for any aficionado of espionage scandals and Mafioso folklore. First printing of 150,000; $150,000 ad/promo; Book-of-the-Month Club selection; first serial to Men's Journal; author tour
From the Publisher
"A master of narrative journalism, [Bowden] employs the same techniques of reconstructing scenes and dialogue that made his Black Hawk Down gripping reading." The New York Times Book Review "The story of how the U.S. Army Intelligence and Delta Force commandos helped Colombian police track down and kill Pablo Escobar is a compelling, almost Shakespearean tale." —Los Angeles Times
"Absolutely riveting. . . . Bowden has a way of making modern nonfiction read like the best of novels." —The Denver Post
"Compellingly detailed.... Reads like a Clancyesque thriller; it's fast-paced, full of page-turning intrigue, corruption, and thwarted pursuit." San Francisco Chronicle
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