Speaker 1: Welcome back everybody. Today we're gonna be looking at the
Speaker 1: rise and fall of Ilich Ramir Sanchez, also know as
Speaker 1: the Jackal. He was born in October twelfth, nineteen forty nine,
Speaker 1: in Venezuela. His father was a wealthy Marxist lawyer who
Speaker 1: named his three sons after Lenin, Ilich, Vladimir and Lenin.
Speaker 1: That tells you something about the household. Young Yelich got
Speaker 1: the political education early. He spent time in Europe, ended
Speaker 1: up at the Patrise Lumumba University in Moscow and got
Speaker 1: himself kicked out around nineteen seventy for per performance and troublemaking.
Speaker 1: From there, he made his way to the Middle East
Speaker 1: and linked up with the Popular Front for the Liberation
Speaker 1: of Palestine. They gave him the name Carlos. He wasn't
Speaker 1: some pure hired gun waiting for a contract. He was
Speaker 1: an ideological operator who also took work when it aligned
Speaker 1: with his goals or paid well enough. Some regimes looked
Speaker 1: the other way or offered limited support because it suited
Speaker 1: their interests at the time. That's the reality of the
Speaker 1: period Cold Gray War zones, proxy fights, and people who
Speaker 1: moved between causes and paymasters. His real first real action
Speaker 1: that due attention came at the end of nineteen seventy
Speaker 1: three and London, he forced his way into the home
Speaker 1: of Joseph Seife, a prominent Jewish businessman and Mark Spencer executive.
Speaker 1: Carlos shot him in the face. The gun jammed in
Speaker 1: the second round See survived. Carlos walked away. That set
Speaker 1: the tone bold, close range and not always clean. He
Speaker 1: moved into France. In September nineteen seventy four, he threw
Speaker 1: a grenade into a Paris drug store, killing two people,
Speaker 1: wounding thirty. Around the same time, he helped pressure the
Speaker 1: French government doing the Japanese Red Army size or the
Speaker 1: French EMBEC and the Hog by staging attacks in Paris.
Speaker 1: Early nineteen seventy five, he tried twice to hit Israeli
Speaker 1: Allal airliners at or Lee Airport with rock a propel grenades.
Speaker 1: Both attempts failed. Then came to night to put his
Speaker 1: name on every intelligence board. June twenty seventh, nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 1: Carlos was at a party in a Paris apartment French
Speaker 1: DST agents led there by his own PFLP contact, Mikhail
Speaker 1: Morcabad showed up to talk. Carlos played a cool, offered
Speaker 1: drinks and stepped away. Came back with a weapon. It
Speaker 1: opened fire. He killed Mchel and two French officers. A
Speaker 1: third was wounded. Carlos escaped the country. Suddenly the Quiet
Speaker 1: Operator was a priority target. While searching one of his
Speaker 1: London safe houses, he found a copy of Frederick Forsythe's
Speaker 1: novel The Day of the Jackal. The media ran with it.
Speaker 1: The book is fiction. An assassin hired to kill Charles
Speaker 1: de Gaul has nothing to do with Sanchi's actual operations,
Speaker 1: but the nickname stuck. Carlos the Jackal. He never chose it.
Speaker 1: He preferred other names, but it didn't matter. December twenty first,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy five, in Vienna Opek headquarters, Carlos led a
Speaker 1: team of five others Palestinians and German militants from the
Speaker 1: Revolutionary Cells. They walked into the building on a quiet
Speaker 1: Sunday morning with weapons and bags that killed three people
Speaker 1: in the initial assault, two security personnel and the Libyan
Speaker 1: economists who charged them. They seized the conference floor and
Speaker 1: took more than sixty hostages, including oil ministers from multiple countries.
Speaker 1: Carlos announced himself to the captives. He demanded a bus
Speaker 1: to the airport, a plane in the broadcasts of a
Speaker 1: pro Palestinian kuminika. Austrian authorities, facing the risk of a
Speaker 1: blood blath, complied. The group flew out with a large
Speaker 1: number of hostages. The plade made stops in Algiers and Tripoli.
Speaker 1: The original plan from his PFLP superiors had been to
Speaker 1: execute the Saudi and Iranian ministers, but that never happened.
Speaker 1: Negotiations produced a substantial ransom, reports put it in the
Speaker 1: tens of millions, and the remaining hostages were released in
Speaker 1: Algiers and Carlos and his team walked away free. The
Speaker 1: PFLP was not happy he had failed to carry out
Speaker 1: the executions and was suspected of keeping some of that money.
Speaker 1: They eventually expelled him. From that point, he operated independently,
Speaker 1: building his own network. He moved through Eastern Europe to
Speaker 1: Middle East and North Africa. He had periods of supporter
Speaker 1: of tolerance from certain governments Libya and Akhadaffia, times Syria.
Speaker 1: Others who found him useful carried out or directed bombings
Speaker 1: in France in the early eighties, including attacks on trains
Speaker 1: and other targets that killed and injured civilians, summer retaliation
Speaker 1: for the arrest of people close to him. The body
Speaker 1: cam from the operations tied to him climbed. By the
Speaker 1: late eighties and early nineties, the environment had changed. The
Speaker 1: Cold War was ending. Old patrons were less interested in
Speaker 1: keeping a high profile liability. He ended up in Soudan
Speaker 1: in August nineteen ninety four. French intelligence working with local
Speaker 1: cooperation took them accounts to describe him being seized while
Speaker 1: under medical care and khartoon and flown to France. He
Speaker 1: was forty four. The trials followed. In nineteen ninety seven,
Speaker 1: he received a life sentence for the nineteen seventy five
Speaker 1: Paris killings of the two French agents. Later proceedings out
Speaker 1: in more life turns for the nineteen eighty bombings in France.
Speaker 1: He has been in French custody ever since. As of
Speaker 1: now he remains imprisoned, aging and still claiming the mantle
Speaker 1: of professional revolutionary. Carlos was never a pure contractor working
Speaker 1: for one client. He was a true believer, though an
Speaker 1: anti imperialist in Palestinian causes, who also took opportunities though
Speaker 1: and protected his lifestyle and leveraged state tolerance when it
Speaker 1: was available. The Opeque operation had made him famous, the
Speaker 1: Parachuteout made him hunted. The combination of ideology, competence under pressure,
Speaker 1: and the willingness of certain governments to look all the
Speaker 1: way kept them operational sadly for two decades, but when
Speaker 1: the protection dried up, the system closed in. That's the
Speaker 1: arc from a privileged Venezuelan radical to one of the
Speaker 1: most recognizable faces of nineteen seventies transnational violence, and finally
Speaker 1: to a to a life sentence.