Assassination
Assassination is a sudden, usually unexpected act of murder committed for impersonal reasons, typically with a political or military leader as its target. Assassinations have not infrequently been conducted by secret groups, thus being examples of conspiracies, contributing to there being many conspiracy theories regarding (possible) assassinations.
History
An added distinction between assassination and other forms of killing is that the assassin (one who performs an assassination) usually has an ideological or political motivation, though many assassins (especially those not part of an organization) also demonstrate insanity. Other motivations may be money (contract killing), revenge, or a military operation.
The assassination euphemism "targeted killing" (extrajudicial execution) is also used for the government-sanctioned killing of opponents, sometimes outside a judicial procedure or a battlefield, such as by bombing from drones, not infrequently killing or wounding bystanders.
Assassination itself, along with terms such as 'terrorist' and 'freedom fighter', may in this context be considered a loaded term, as it implies an act in which the proponents of such killings may consider them justified or even necessary. Assassination may also be used as a form of hyperbole, as in the phrase character assassination, meaning an attempt to impugn another's character, and thus kill, or "assassinate" his reputation and credibility.
