The book originally published (1999) before Belgium's Parliament had an inquiry (2001) into their role in the assassination of Lumumba. It is carefully researched, focusing on the people in power: Belgian, but also in the UN, and to a lesser extent the US and UK. Their decisions, to act and not act, that very deliberately lead to the death of Lumumba, and the undermining of the potential democratic nationalist movement that he could lead. As such, despite De Witte's own analysis, contained toward the end of the book, it is more of history of the actions of those individuals and less the larger powers that they are part of. Even so it does make a compelling case about the Western states interests overriding those of the people of DRC itself.