E268 - A Modern History of Assassination w/ Simon Ball
Summary
Simon Ball, author of *Death to Order*, discusses the modern history of assassination, tracing its evolution from a tool of statecraft in World War I to a central feature of Cold War geopolitics. The episode explores how democratic states, particularly the US and UK, adopted covert assassination programs to counter totalitarian threats, leading to the CIA’s controversial operations in Latin America and the Middle East. Ball also analyzes the 1976 executive order banning US state-sponsored assassination, arguing it was a political gesture rather than a true end to the practice.
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