The World: The Milieu of the Corsican Godfathers

The eyes in the walnut face held his. "I am the head of the Union Corse." The Union Corse! More deadly, and perhaps even older than the Unione Siciliano, the Mafia. Bond knew that it controlled most organized crime throughout metropolitan France and her colonies—protection rackets, smuggling, prostitution, and the suppression of rival gangs.

—Ian Fleming, On Her Majesty's Secret Service

THE Union Corse, an organization that originated in the parched hills of Corsica but is today centered in Marseille, rules more in fact than even James Bond imagined in fiction. It dominates...

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