The World’s Most Dangerous Places
by Robert Young Pelton and Coskun Aral
Fielding Worldwide
Bored with Ft. Lauderdale for spring break? Try the beaches of North Korea. Like meeting new people? Try hanging out in Afghanistan with the Hezbollah. Of course, they most likely will kill you, but think of the nifty photos your next of kin will get!
If a walk on the wild side is your speed, then this is your book. Written by a pair of war corespondents, this exhaustive tome gives you the low down (and you’ll squirm at how low it can go) on getting in, getting around, and getting out of the underbelly of the world. From former Soviet republics, full of civil war and general bad management, to the gangsters of the South American drug business, everywhere no one in their right mind would want to venture is documented.
More than a travel guide, this book gives a well researched (usually first hand) look at the state of the world – who’s killing who, where the money goes, where it comes from (oil, arms, drugs, and the CIA) and which countries might implode soon. (Cambodia is a good bet). Much space is devoted to terrorist groups, including those we grow in-house, such as the yahoos who blew up the Federal building in Oklahoma. The book is sobering, in that when all is said and done, a lot of places on the planet are pretty wretched hovels, and we here in the good old U.S.A have it pretty damn good.
So, road trip to Zaire, anyone?