Killing Pablo: The Hunt for the World's Greatest Outlaw

FROM OUR EDITORS

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.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

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.

SYNOPSIS

Killing Pablo is the inside story of the brutal rise and violent fall of Colombian cocaine cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar, whose criminal empire held a nation of thirty million hostage--a reign of terror that would end only with his death. In an intense, up-close account, best-selling author and 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 officials involved in the chase, as well as hundreds of pages of top-secret documents and transcripts of Escobar's intercepted phone conversations, Bowden creates a gripping narrative that reads as if it were torn from the pages of a military technothriller. At every phase, he brings to life the men who brought the drug lord down. There is the Colombian president, Cesar Gaviria, afraid for his life and the future of his nation, who is forced to do the unthinkable: allow a foreign military to operate within his country's borders. There is the U.S. ambassador, Morris D. Busby, who brings in the most sophisticated surveillance team in the world, code-named Centra Spike, and the best team of manhunters, the mysterious Delta Force. And there is the leader of the Colombian forces, Colonel Hugo Martinez, an incorruptible man who lives under constant threat during the drug lord's reign-and whose own son plays a critical role on the fateful day when Pablo is finally found.

FROM THE CRITICS

Book Magazine

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 poor—a 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

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

This "nonfiction technothriller" by the author of Black Hawk Down recounts the manhunt for Colombian cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar. With a 150,000-copy first printing and a 23-city author tour. Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews