'Three things come with taking a man's life. The first one is the easy bit – going into a room and shooting somebody… The second is preparing yourself if you get caught coming or going and getting life in prison – could you do it? And the third and final and most important is can you live with it for the rest of your life? And that's where a lot of people fail.' With these chilling words we are afforded a glimpse into the mind of Northern Ireland's most infamous paramilitary godfather, Johnny 'Mad Dog' Adair.
Enemies Within explores Adair's rise from neo-Nazi skinhead to leader of the notorious Ulster Freedom Fighters, a cover-name for the assassination wing of the Ulster Defence Association, a Protestant paramilitary group that killed hundreds of people during the Troubles.
With unprecedented access to Adair and his associates, critically acclaimed author and counter-terrorism expert Aaron Edwards paints a vivid picture of how the loyalist godfather built up an extensive terror network that was at one time responsible for more deaths than the IRA. Using his extensive contacts in the paramilitary underworld and security services, Edwards reveals for the first time the inside story of the race against time to bring down Adair in a bid to save the peace process, not once but three times. He also discovers startling new evidence of how attempts to remove Adair with informers inadvertently ushered in a return of UDA gangsterism that continues to pose serious challenges to peace and stability in Northern Ireland today.
Enemies Within is the gripping, no-holds-barred story of loyalty, murder and betrayal.