This book could not have been written without the data and information published on the Internet and in the world press collected over a period of years, starting in 2000, when I wrote Offshore Islands, and Pat Kennedy was launched on his initially precarious international career.
I have trawled numerous British, Irish, US, Russian, French, Spanish, Chinese, Israeli, Colombian newspapers, news blogs and specialist Internet sites, and books (authors’ cited). And of course Wikipedia.
During this period I have collected information during my visits to the USA, China, Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, India, Dubai, Thailand, Cambodia, Libya, Egypt, Kenya, Tanzania, Senegal, Mali, Morocco, Mexico, Colombia, Panama, Brazil, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, the Philippines, the UK, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain and Italy. To this I have added my experience in other parts of the world, notably Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Taiwan, Japan, Burma, Switzerland, Algeria, Russia, Scandinavia, the Baltic Countries, Poland, Hungary, the countries of ex-Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey, Russia, Turkmenistan, Jordan, Syria, Israel, Egypt, the Caribbean, Central and South America.
I present my thanks and excuses to all the willing and unwilling contributors to the information included in this book, I am not the first to tread in the footsteps of Jack London, using the information supplied to us from those who convey it. I have tried to verify all the facts, but this is an impossible task. In my humble opinion most data reflects real events and the opinions of the vast majority of persons affected, directly or indirectly, by the multiple events and crises that constitute our collective existence.
This story is a serialised novel of events, real or not, where the fictitious characters are fictitious, and where the real characters, such as Vladimir Putin, Nicolas Maduro, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and Emanuel Macron, are real.
The story of 2000, and its sequels in 2010-2012, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2019, are recounted in my other tales.
With my very sincere thanks to all contributors, direct and indirect, knowing and unknowing, willing and unwilling.
John Francis Kinsella
Paris, November 15, 2020
