LUCA TRENTA
Biographic Data
| ID | 5786638 |
|---|---|
| NAME | LUCA TRENTA |
| GIVEN NAMES | LUCA |
| FAMILY NAME | TRENTA |
| SIGNATURE | TRENTA L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Swansea University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5681-8176 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 3 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 15 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2013 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
From Consensus to Fracture
Congress has a long history of deference to the Executive with regard to foreign policy and the intelligence community. During the Cold War in particular, Congress often wished to be kept at arm’s reach from covert operations conducted by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. Yet in the 1980s, Members of Congress began to assert themselves over the Reagan administration’s covert operation to provide aid and weapons to the contra…
The politics of complicity
This article analyzes the United States role in Bolivia’s 1967 operation to capture and execute Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara. Existing literature is marked by three interpretations. One dismisses claims of CIA involvement as sensationalist and unfounded. Another, based on Bolivian military accounts, frames the operation as domestic and sovereign. A third perspective argues for US complicity, ranging from claims that the CIA ‘got away with murder’ to sha…
Operation Wrath of God
The CIA
The President's Kill List
From Fidel Castro to Qassem Soleimani, the US government has been involved in an array of assassinations and assassination attempts against foreign leaders and officials. The President’s Kill List utilises extensive and often recently declassified archival material to unveil the history and politics of assassination in US foreign policy. It reveals how the US government has relied on a variety of methods, from the use of poison to the delivery of…
The President’s Kill List
Investigates the US government’s involvement in the assassination of foreign officials from the early Cold War to the present day Traces continuities in the conduct of US foreign policy and in the arguments used to justify and legitimate assassination plots Details the direct and indirect methods deployed by the US government to assassinate foreign officials Utilises extensive and often recently declassified archival material to unveil new detail…
Secrecy and the politics of selective disclosures
Recent scholarship debates the signaling function of secrecy and covertness. At the international level, covertness is used to achieve strategic objectives without risking escalation or openly violating international law. Domestically, secrecy is understood as a method to pacify domestic constituencies. These are typically understood as obstacles to the conduct of (covert) foreign policy. Building primarily on archival material, the analysis high…
The Lumumba plot
Journal Article The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination Get access The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination. By Stuart A Reid. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 2023. 624pp. £30.00. Isbn978 1 52474 881 4. Available as e-book. Luca Trenta Luca Trenta Swansea University, UK Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 100, Iss…
Death by Reinterpretation
Recent scholarship analyzes norm dynamics in the US context using the prohibition on assassination contained in Executive Order 12333 as the relevant norm. These studies argue that—before 9/11—the ban on assassination was largely uncontested and effectively constrained US foreign policy. In doing so, these studies overlook the impact of the Reagan administration on the evolution of the ban. This article establishes that the Reagan administration …
Remote killing? Remoteness, covertness, and the US government’s involvement in assassination
The recent assassinations of General Soleimani and Mohsen Fakhrizadeh have renewed debates surrounding governments’ use of assassination. Some commentators have interpreted these episodes as an escalation in practices of “remote warfare.” Recently, the literature on remote warfare has expanded to include multiple activities at – and below – the threshold of war. From its original focus on geographical distance, “remoteness” now encompasses the “p…
The Obama administration’s conceptual change
Starting in 2010, the Obama administration engaged in an effort to justify drone strikes relying on the concept of ‘imminence’. The aim of this article is to understand the reasons behind such insistence and to assess the administration’s efforts at conceptual change. Building on Skinner’s and Bentley’s work, the article argues that the administration has followed an ‘innovating ideologist’ strategy. The analysis shows how waves of criticisms exp…
Risk and Presidential Decision-making
This book aims at gauging whether the nature of US foreign policy decision-making has changed after the Cold War as radically as a large body of literature seems to suggest, and develops a new framework to interpret presidential decision-making in foreign policy. It locates the study of risk in US foreign policy in a wider intellectual landscape that draws on contemporary debates in historiography, international relations and Presidential studies…
Project plowshare
Clinton and Bosnia
The Champion of Human Rights Meets the King of Kings
Building on the recent re-discovery of the Iranian Revolution, this analysis examines the policies of the Carter Administration and their effects on Iran and the Iranian opposition. Starting with Jimmy Carter's election and hopes for a new era in American–Iranian relations, there occurred the progressive creation and expansion of a rift between the Carter Administration and the Iranian opposition. This rift was exacerbated by stubborn American su…
The Lumumba plot
Journal Article The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination Get access The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination. By Stuart A Reid. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 2023. 624pp. £30.00. Isbn978 1 52474 881 4. Available as e-book. Luca Trenta Luca Trenta Swansea University, UK Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 100, Iss…
Death by Reinterpretation
Recent scholarship analyzes norm dynamics in the US context using the prohibition on assassination contained in Executive Order 12333 as the relevant norm. These studies argue that—before 9/11—the ban on assassination was largely uncontested and effectively constrained US foreign policy. In doing so, these studies overlook the impact of the Reagan administration on the evolution of the ban. This article establishes that the Reagan administration …
The Champion of Human Rights Meets the King of Kings
Building on the recent re-discovery of the Iranian Revolution, this analysis examines the policies of the Carter Administration and their effects on Iran and the Iranian opposition. Starting with Jimmy Carter's election and hopes for a new era in American–Iranian relations, there occurred the progressive creation and expansion of a rift between the Carter Administration and the Iranian opposition. This rift was exacerbated by stubborn American su…
The Champion of Human Rights Meets the King of Kings
Building on the recent re-discovery of the Iranian Revolution, this analysis examines the policies of the Carter Administration and their effects on Iran and the Iranian opposition. Starting with Jimmy Carter's election and hopes for a new era in American–Iranian relations, there occurred the progressive creation and expansion of a rift between the Carter Administration and the Iranian opposition. This rift was exacerbated by stubborn American su…
Project plowshare
Clinton and Bosnia
Risk and Presidential Decision-making
This book aims at gauging whether the nature of US foreign policy decision-making has changed after the Cold War as radically as a large body of literature seems to suggest, and develops a new framework to interpret presidential decision-making in foreign policy. It locates the study of risk in US foreign policy in a wider intellectual landscape that draws on contemporary debates in historiography, international relations and Presidential studies…
The Obama administration’s conceptual change
Starting in 2010, the Obama administration engaged in an effort to justify drone strikes relying on the concept of ‘imminence’. The aim of this article is to understand the reasons behind such insistence and to assess the administration’s efforts at conceptual change. Building on Skinner’s and Bentley’s work, the article argues that the administration has followed an ‘innovating ideologist’ strategy. The analysis shows how waves of criticisms exp…
Death by Reinterpretation
Recent scholarship analyzes norm dynamics in the US context using the prohibition on assassination contained in Executive Order 12333 as the relevant norm. These studies argue that—before 9/11—the ban on assassination was largely uncontested and effectively constrained US foreign policy. In doing so, these studies overlook the impact of the Reagan administration on the evolution of the ban. This article establishes that the Reagan administration …
Remote killing? Remoteness, covertness, and the US government’s involvement in assassination
The recent assassinations of General Soleimani and Mohsen Fakhrizadeh have renewed debates surrounding governments’ use of assassination. Some commentators have interpreted these episodes as an escalation in practices of “remote warfare.” Recently, the literature on remote warfare has expanded to include multiple activities at – and below – the threshold of war. From its original focus on geographical distance, “remoteness” now encompasses the “p…
The President's Kill List
From Fidel Castro to Qassem Soleimani, the US government has been involved in an array of assassinations and assassination attempts against foreign leaders and officials. The President’s Kill List utilises extensive and often recently declassified archival material to unveil the history and politics of assassination in US foreign policy. It reveals how the US government has relied on a variety of methods, from the use of poison to the delivery of…
The President’s Kill List
Investigates the US government’s involvement in the assassination of foreign officials from the early Cold War to the present day Traces continuities in the conduct of US foreign policy and in the arguments used to justify and legitimate assassination plots Details the direct and indirect methods deployed by the US government to assassinate foreign officials Utilises extensive and often recently declassified archival material to unveil new detail…
Secrecy and the politics of selective disclosures
Recent scholarship debates the signaling function of secrecy and covertness. At the international level, covertness is used to achieve strategic objectives without risking escalation or openly violating international law. Domestically, secrecy is understood as a method to pacify domestic constituencies. These are typically understood as obstacles to the conduct of (covert) foreign policy. Building primarily on archival material, the analysis high…
The Lumumba plot
Journal Article The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination Get access The Lumumba plot: the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination. By Stuart A Reid. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 2023. 624pp. £30.00. Isbn978 1 52474 881 4. Available as e-book. Luca Trenta Luca Trenta Swansea University, UK Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 100, Iss…
Operation Wrath of God
The CIA
From Consensus to Fracture
Congress has a long history of deference to the Executive with regard to foreign policy and the intelligence community. During the Cold War in particular, Congress often wished to be kept at arm’s reach from covert operations conducted by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. Yet in the 1980s, Members of Congress began to assert themselves over the Reagan administration’s covert operation to provide aid and weapons to the contra…
The politics of complicity
This article analyzes the United States role in Bolivia’s 1967 operation to capture and execute Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara. Existing literature is marked by three interpretations. One dismisses claims of CIA involvement as sensationalist and unfounded. Another, based on Bolivian military accounts, frames the operation as domestic and sovereign. A third perspective argues for US complicity, ranging from claims that the CIA ‘got away with murder’ to sha…
Political science (12 works) · Politics (10 works) · Law (7 works) · Law (6 works) · History (5 works) · History (4 works) · Intelligence, Security, War Strategy (4 works) · Administration (probate law (3 works) · Global Peace and Security Dynamics (3 works) · Philosophy (3 works)