Jan Stocklassa

This is a very interesting book for several reasons.

First - it is about an unsolved murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme in 1986. It is weird that after almost 40 years there is no official resolution of this assassination. What this indicates is that Sweden was neutral mostly on paper but within all political and military structures it was very clear where they stand. Unfortunately this "silent approach" to investigations of high exposure events is also visible in our times, during the investigation of another incident - this time very near their territorial waters for which they did the investigation but do not want to publish the results. Friendly fire again? There is nothing worse than meddling of politics in the criminal activities and especially this type of high level events. And accusing everything on a single crazy person (and waiting until given person is dead [this time of old age] before providing the statement) is now so much a cliche that I do not know who would chose that instead of just saying - no comment.
Second - author used materiel investigated and provided by famous journalist and later crime novel writer Stieg Larsson. Struck with Palme's assassination, Larsson started investigating possible leads and it is very interesting to follow his findings (around 40% of the book). Unfortunately after a while even Larsson lost interest in the case and moved from links with right extremist organizations toward the lone amateur assassin case.
Third - author's own investigation using the Larsson's materials and further pushing and talking to still alive persons of interests in second decade of 2000's. What he found is not conclusive (after all he is journalist not law enforcer) but he paints a very plausible timeline of events and reveals the details of the possible culprits. Unfortunately culprits that played the role of proxy executioners for Western alliance during the Cold War (same as Eastern block used Bulgarians for example) so they are not to be named publicly. His investigation, from direct contacts with persons of interest to assistance by the mysterious Czech national (part about possible data extraction in Israel was .... oh, boy) and various shady and deadly characters like Craig Williamson truly show how perilous is path towards truth and how easy is to slip and commit crimes while fighting for it.
Fourth - it was interesting to read about far left in Sweden, especially Jan Guillou, author of famous Swedish Agent Hamilton series. Jan's relation with Olof Palme himself, especially after the scandal related to security services and Olof's party activities, are very interesting indeed.

Very interesting book, highly readable and most importantly very compact, with almost zero repetition of the story line across the chapters. While some readers are stating that inconclusive ending is a downside, I have to say it is not. Book gives a very strong case on possible culprits but after 40 years there is no political will (if there ever was one to begin with) to find the killers (or at least name them) because it would open some festering graves and implicate people that do not want to be put under the spotlight.

Recommended to fans of history and crime investigations involving shady spy groups and assassins.… (más)