So about a month ago I was looking for a few more book recommendations and the first one I was able to obtain was “Killing Pablo” by Mark Bowden.

The book is about the hunt to bring down the world’s most notorius criminal. It describes the rise and fall of Pablo Escobar, a notorious Colombian drug lord who became one of the narcotic trade’s first billionaires. Pablo–Bowden refers to him by his first name throughout the book–started out as a petty thief and wound up running a massive smuggling empire. At his height in the 1980s, he owned fleets of boats and planes, plus 19 separate residences in Medellin, each with its own helipad. Violence marked everything he did: “He wasn’t an entrepreneur, and he wasn’t even an especially talented businessman. He was just ruthless.” He bought off police, politicians, and judges throughout his country, and killed many others who wouldn’t cooperate. The Colombian government tried to capture him, but without much luck; he evaded them time after time. “Now and then the police achieved enough surprise to catch him, literally, with his pants down. In [1988], about one thousand national police raided one of his mansions,” writes Bowden. “Pablo fled in his underwear, avoiding the police cordon on foot.” He got away, again, but his days were numbered. He was making powerful enemies in both Colombia and the United States.

It is hard to believe that such corruption and idiocy can overcome a government and an entire country where one man was able to control an entire country and its people. The whole time I was reading this book I kept thinking that the US should be able to find this guy with all of our superior intelligence and take him out with relative ease.

This book is a look into the mind of an amazing personality who truly believed he was a man of the people and he was doing no harm to his country, even with 200 pounds of dynamite packed into the back of a car and drove into a crowded mall.

If you are interested in this type of modern history, I highly recommend this book.
Up Next: I need to finish “Honeymoon with my Brother”

PS- I’ve never been good at book reports and I’m still looking for recommendations.

Currently Listening to Johnny Cash - 05.Cocaine Blues by from the album Live at Folsom Prison

tags: Pablo Escobar, Drugs, Colombia, Cocaine, Foreign Affairs