East and West both plotted assassinations during the Cold War, but for different reasons. In the Eastern bloc, assassination was most often a tool to silence dissidents or defectors; in the West, the objective was usually to oust the unfriendly leader of another nation. And while the KGB and its sister security agencies have been tied to a number of actual murders, there is no conclusive evidence the CIA ever assassinated anyone -- though as the late CIA Director William Colby once pointed out, it was not for lack of trying.

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