Forty-eight assassinations that changed the world.

We live in an age of asymmetric warfare. Huge armies no longer face each other on the battlefield. Instead heads of major powers and lone assassins (or martyrs) target each other to pursue their agendas. President Donald Trump felt it necessary to use drones to blow away the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's Qasem Soleimani – a mastermind of terrorism in the Middle East who threatened the lives of US troops - and President Barack Obama felt fully justified in sending in US Navy SEALs to take out Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. This is the nature of modern warfare. And it is only going to get worse.

​In a world globalized by social media, more lone-wolf assassins seek their fifteen minutes of fame by taking out a famous figure, while leaders of world powers have everything to gain by decapitating terrorist organizations, employing the latest surveillance technology to obliterate their leaders.

There are forty-eight assassinations that changed the world in this book. Rest assured that in the coming years we will see many more.

NIGEL CAWTHORNE is the author of some eighty books - and a major contributor to at least twenty more. He lives in Bloomsbury, London's literary area, and writes in the great British Library, which is supposed to be one of the best pick-up joints in London. However, his reputation is such that people will tell you he is more often seen drinking in Soho's famous bohemian watering hole, the French pub.