WEBVTT - The Wagner Update 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:04.800 From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:09.159 riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or 0:00:09.280 --> 0:00:12.240 learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A 0:00:12.320 --> 0:00:13.960 production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:26.280 Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:27.440 my name is Noah. 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:28.680 They call me Ben. 0:00:28.800 --> 0:00:32.080 We're joined as always with our super producer Paul mission 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:36.200 controlled decads. Most importantly, you are you, You are here, 0:00:36.240 --> 0:00:39.400 and that makes this the stuff they don't want you 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:42.760 to know. Tonight, we are returning to a story that's 0:00:42.800 --> 0:00:46.480 been on quite a few people's minds, quite often. 0:00:46.600 --> 0:00:47.320 Quite recently. 0:00:47.880 --> 0:00:51.360 Several weeks ago, a guy that you've probably heard about, 0:00:51.479 --> 0:00:55.840 Yevgeny Pregoshan, the leader of a group called Wagner, appears 0:00:55.840 --> 0:00:59.040 to have died in an airplane explosion north of Moscow. 0:00:59.360 --> 0:01:01.680 You can see all sorts of analysis about it, as 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:05.600 well as a chilling announcement by Vladimir Putin, still President 0:01:05.640 --> 0:01:08.120 of Russia. As a matter of fact, Can we play 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:10.280 the video? Can we play a clip of this? Have 0:01:10.360 --> 0:01:11.320 you guys heard this guy? 0:01:11.640 --> 0:01:14.080 Let's do it? 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:17.399 Dona snatch. 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:33.920 Yeah, a man with a complex destiny. That's interesting, yes, 0:01:34.319 --> 0:01:37.479 so Ben, just just a very little clarity around the clip. 0:01:37.760 --> 0:01:42.640 Is this post attempted coup? Mm hmm, okay, yeah. 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:47.160 This is after after the unfortunate airplane expedition. 0:01:47.520 --> 0:01:47.760 You know. 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:51.760 Uh, Vladimir Putin, current President of Russia, comes out and says, 0:01:52.480 --> 0:01:55.480 I've known you've got any progosion for a very long time, 0:01:55.600 --> 0:01:59.240 since the nineties. He was a man with a complicated fate. 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:02.840 He made serious mistakes in life. It's kind of cold 0:02:03.080 --> 0:02:04.080 as eulogies go. 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:07.040 I think that's why I was confused, because it didn't 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:11.200 even seem like a eulogy. And it also you off off, Mike, 0:02:11.280 --> 0:02:14.400 You skipped through a whole bunch of other stuff before 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:16.400 you even got to the slight mention. 0:02:16.639 --> 0:02:19.799 So it's like really kind of a footnote. Very cold. 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:22.760 Yeah, but guys, what do you say about a guy 0:02:22.800 --> 0:02:25.720 that just tried to leave a mutiny against you? When 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:31.280 that person dies? I liked him. You know, what do 0:02:31.320 --> 0:02:34.840 you say this jerk tried to overthrow my government? You know? 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:35.840 I mean, I don't know. 0:02:36.639 --> 0:02:40.760 Yeah, it's a good question. Earlier, we'd speculated on the 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:47.200 many rumors surrounding the alleged death or various death theories 0:02:47.240 --> 0:02:50.200 of Pregosian and his top men, at Wagner, But tonight's 0:02:50.240 --> 0:02:55.000 episode is asking what happens next the king is dead, 0:02:55.800 --> 0:02:59.080 what happens to the kingdom? Here are the facts. We 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:03.720 need to give a quick recap on Wagner in general, 0:03:03.880 --> 0:03:07.200 because a lot of times, I think people in the 0:03:07.240 --> 0:03:10.839 West hear the phrase Wagner and they think like it's 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:14.320 a battalion of the Russian military or something like that. 0:03:14.520 --> 0:03:16.480 But it's a lot closer to Blackwater. 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:20.320 Yeah, I mean, you know, it's something that people I 0:03:20.360 --> 0:03:23.920 think in the West weren't hearing about at all for 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:26.880 many years. I mean, it's really acted as kind of, 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:29.240 like I think, been the term that you've used in 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:32.280 the past, as sort of shadow military, you know, for 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:36.640 Russia for a lot longer than this conflict has been 0:03:37.360 --> 0:03:41.080 at play, and these most recent kind of hiccups in 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:41.920 the relationship. 0:03:41.960 --> 0:03:47.400 Let's just say, right, agreed, Yeah, Wagner is a private 0:03:47.560 --> 0:03:52.160 military contractor or PMC, and like you said, Noel, for 0:03:52.200 --> 0:03:54.960 a long time it was a de facto shadow army 0:03:55.080 --> 0:04:00.920 for Russia, similar to for instance, Blackwater. Oh wait, Matt, sorry, 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:05.200 is it z X Oh wait is it ACADEMI? 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:05.760 Oh? 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:07.680 Hang on, is it constell Us? 0:04:08.520 --> 0:04:13.640 I don't know. It's all of those. Yeah, yeah, but 0:04:13.720 --> 0:04:18.799 private military contractors became famous or at least a known thing. 0:04:19.080 --> 0:04:22.000 That phrase became a known thing in the US during 0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:25.640 the Afghanistan War or whatever they want to call it, 0:04:25.640 --> 0:04:29.560 the war in Afghanistan, when we invaded Afghanistan as a 0:04:29.640 --> 0:04:34.000 country United States. We learned about Blackwater. Then we learned about, 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:37.479 you know, operations in Iraq and other countries that maybe 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:41.440 we shouldn't have been operating in where private military contractors 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:45.719 went in and did some operations again on other countries 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:48.279 soil while they were operating in a place where the 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:52.880 US military is officially operating. Just some weird stuff has happened. 0:04:52.880 --> 0:04:56.240 We also saw stuff like that back during the Vietnam War, 0:04:56.400 --> 0:04:59.400 right when Laos and other countries were you know, there 0:04:59.440 --> 0:05:02.479 was activity going on when it really wasn't supposed to be. 0:05:04.720 --> 0:05:07.400 What I'm saying is that is what you can kind 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:11.680 of do with a private military military contractor like the 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:14.960 Wagner Group. You can have them do some things that 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:18.680 are maybe they it would be an international incident if 0:05:19.000 --> 0:05:23.000 let's say the official Russian Army was taking part in 0:05:23.200 --> 0:05:25.320 actions in parts of Africa. 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:29.080 One hundred percent ah Man so well put uh. Wagner 0:05:29.160 --> 0:05:32.719 is also common misconception in the West. Wagner is also 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:38.880 a group of private entities operating under one name. It's 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.719 kind of like, you know, the Portuguese Man of War 0:05:42.560 --> 0:05:47.960 is essentially a colony of independent, very small organisms functioning 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.520 as a super colony that appears like one organism from 0:05:51.560 --> 0:05:52.080 far away. 0:05:52.600 --> 0:05:55.400 Yeah, sort of like the human The human being is 0:05:55.440 --> 0:06:01.320 a combination, complex, combination of cells and bios, all of 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:04.200 that good stuff. This one just happens to be one 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:07.560 that in this particular case is very specifically serving the 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:12.640 interests of Russia up until you know, the whole coup thing, 0:06:14.080 --> 0:06:17.560 which was weird, and I think the reason all of 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:20.680 this still perplexes me where I'm like, you know, we 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:23.359 we even conjectured i think with Jake Hanrahan where it 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:27.200 was sort of like could it have been a manufactured thing? 0:06:27.600 --> 0:06:30.359 You know, there's so many questions around that it was 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:31.400 just real weird. 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:35.280 And then this guy's plane gets well, we don't know 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:37.160 if it was shot. We didn't, we don't have evidence 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:39.320 of that, I don't believe yet, but falls out of 0:06:39.360 --> 0:06:41.480 the sky. And another thing we talked about with Jake 0:06:41.520 --> 0:06:48.440 Hanrahan was the the seeming issues with gravity that opponents 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:50.240 of Vladimir Putin tend to face. 0:06:52.120 --> 0:06:53.800 Yeah, they faced them head on. 0:06:54.200 --> 0:06:57.280 Usually to me, when this news popped, I think probably 0:06:57.320 --> 0:06:59.479 to all of us, we were much more inclined to 0:06:59.480 --> 0:07:03.640 be like, oh, yeah, that wasn't manufactured. That guy was 0:07:03.800 --> 0:07:07.920 doing a thing and Putin popped him out of the sky, 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:10.200 or did he. 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:12.680 We'll get into some of that too. 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:18.200 God, this stuff is as greasy as bubbles from Trailer 0:07:18.240 --> 0:07:19.360 Park Boys would say. 0:07:20.320 --> 0:07:23.760 Love it, love it. Also check out the sea shanty 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:27.480 that Trailer Park Boys did. It's all about cats. It's 0:07:27.600 --> 0:07:32.240 very good. So, like we talked about in our previous 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:36.840 primer episode on Wagner, before all this went down, before 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:42.360 these conspiracies came to fruition, these Wagner guys, they get 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:43.920 into all kinds of high jinks. 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:44.520 You know. 0:07:44.720 --> 0:07:49.200 They got international notoriety in the Dombas War back in 0:07:49.240 --> 0:07:52.680 twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen, and since that point they have 0:07:52.760 --> 0:07:57.320 been involved in multiple coups and civil wars across the 0:07:57.360 --> 0:08:03.440 continent of Africa. In the Middle East. They fought in Sudan, Mali, Mozambique. 0:08:03.720 --> 0:08:08.000 And what they're doing in those situations is exerting Russian 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:13.440 influence and interest by proxy, they are resource extracting and 0:08:13.680 --> 0:08:19.080 force projecting. As we established earlier, Wagner in its heyday 0:08:19.600 --> 0:08:25.800 got a percentage a vig of every resource when they 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:30.480 interfered or when they, excuse me, interceded in the country's activity. 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:34.520 Oh, exactly, they're getting their cut. Just to clarify there, 0:08:34.640 --> 0:08:38.280 the dawnbas War, if you're not aware, is the conflict 0:08:38.320 --> 0:08:41.319 between Russia and Ukraine that started back in twenty fourteen, 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:44.120 as you said, Ben, and that is really one of 0:08:44.200 --> 0:08:47.480 the things that has just kind of continued when there 0:08:47.480 --> 0:08:52.120 were separatists inside Ukraine that were you at least according 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:54.920 to the best knowledge that we have, they're Russian supported 0:08:55.240 --> 0:08:59.200 operating inside Ukraine, and then large conflicts started there and 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:01.360 then the Wagner came in to kind of fill in 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:02.719 what a military would. 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:06.880 Do one hundred percent. Yeah, And Wagner was also up 0:09:07.000 --> 0:09:13.520 until quite recently a cult of personality similar to Heart 0:09:13.559 --> 0:09:15.600 of Darkness or Apocalypse. 0:09:15.679 --> 0:09:15.959 Now. 0:09:16.360 --> 0:09:20.680 The followers of Pragosion treated him like a real life 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:24.200 Colonel Kurtz or like Judge Holden, probably one of the 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:28.240 best villains in American literature. Check out Blood Meridian by 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:32.480 Kormack McCarthy. They treated Progosion as though he could do 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:38.960 no wrong, and internal tensions arose. The Russian Ministry of 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:43.240 Defense was beefed up with Progosion for a long time. 0:09:43.400 --> 0:09:47.440 Eventually it boiled over. And what you were referencing earlier, 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:55.199 Nol Wagner marched on Moscow unsuccessfully and for a short time, 0:09:55.240 --> 0:09:59.040 for like twenty three hours around June twenty fourth, twenty 0:09:59.120 --> 0:10:02.200 twenty three. And if you look back now, analysts will 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:07.520 overwhelmingly say by hook or by crook, this is what 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:12.240 led to Pregosians aircraft accident. 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:16.680 Yeah, and as we said before, allegedly it began because 0:10:16.880 --> 0:10:20.080 of Wagner group what I don't know what you'd call it? 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:27.679 A group of Wagners. We're allegedly attacked by the Russian military, 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:32.079 either accidentally or purposefully, which then led them to march 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:36.760 on Moscow. So just just who knows exactly what happened? 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:39.000 Those are the reports we have access to. 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:42.760 You know, it makes me think of I was just 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:48.920 listening to our earlier episode on controlling the future via 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:52.440 controlling the past, and Matt, you brought up this excellent 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:55.199 group name for historians. 0:10:55.320 --> 0:10:55.760 What was it? 0:10:55.800 --> 0:10:57.840 No, it was an argumentation of his. 0:10:58.400 --> 0:10:59.760 My idea that was the author. 0:10:59.800 --> 0:11:02.079 I yeah, no, it's good. 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:06.040 I mean again, it's all about perspective. And as we've 0:11:06.080 --> 0:11:08.240 started to see much more and more in these days, 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:10.560 it starts to feel a little more nineteen eighty fourish 0:11:10.600 --> 0:11:13.440 by the day in terms of like what is objective 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:18.200 truth that at some point leaves perspective behind entirely and 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:21.880 it becomes just like which fabrication have you decided to 0:11:21.920 --> 0:11:22.880 throw your lot in with? 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:23.320 You know? 0:11:24.440 --> 0:11:28.040 So maybe on that note, maybe you can help us out. 0:11:28.080 --> 0:11:32.880 Fellow conspiracy realist, what is the correct group name for 0:11:33.040 --> 0:11:38.400 some Wagner boys? Is it a mutiny of Wagner's? I 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:42.839 don't think old VP would like that one. Let's give 0:11:42.840 --> 0:11:47.239 you the official story of what happens. According to Russia's 0:11:47.640 --> 0:11:52.920 Emergency Ministry, Progolsion and company die in an airplane crash 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:56.320 on August twenty third, twenty twenty three. We did a 0:11:56.360 --> 0:12:01.359 strange news piece immediately after. He was in a relatively 0:12:01.400 --> 0:12:05.960 small plane and rooted from Moscow to Saint Petersburg. There 0:12:06.000 --> 0:12:10.119 were only ten people on the plane, seven Wagner, two pilots, 0:12:10.520 --> 0:12:14.760 one flight attendant. Because there's always an innocent bystander. 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:15.640 And like right off the rip. 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:19.400 We even have you know, opposing versions of the stories 0:12:19.440 --> 0:12:21.599 to that, some people saying it didn't make sense for 0:12:21.679 --> 0:12:23.599 him to be back on the way to Saint Petersburg. 0:12:23.960 --> 0:12:26.520 His interests were in Africa, you know, he like and 0:12:26.559 --> 0:12:28.640 there was I believe an incident in the past where 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:31.439 a plane went down that he was on the manifest for. 0:12:32.440 --> 0:12:34.960 But then he turned up, you know, all well and 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:38.640 good later. So this is like, these are tactics. There's 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:41.600 reason to disbelieve the official narrative. Not to mention the 0:12:41.600 --> 0:12:44.959 fact that we're never going to see an independent investigation 0:12:45.040 --> 0:12:48.800 of any of this stuff. You know, folks with the 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:54.720 Russian government have said that they've done DNA right, DNA 0:12:54.920 --> 0:12:57.280 samples or whatever kind of irol. 0:12:57.520 --> 0:13:00.360 You know, well, it's so weird because we're going to 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:03.160 get into this guys. But just to point out there 0:13:03.200 --> 0:13:05.600 you may have seen as you're listening to this, if 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:08.320 you're searching through there are reports of him showing up 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:10.920 other places in the world alive today as we're recording 0:13:10.920 --> 0:13:17.400 this episode. So just like Tupac, it's so similar. Yeah, 0:13:18.000 --> 0:13:18.640 let's keep going. 0:13:18.880 --> 0:13:20.520 I guess the point here just to put like a 0:13:20.520 --> 0:13:23.120 little bow on it. I guess is that when you 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:28.839 have a government that is inherently siloing information, just by 0:13:28.880 --> 0:13:32.600 their very nature, it makes these kinds of conspiracy theories. 0:13:32.920 --> 0:13:35.000 It gives them a lot more air, a lot more 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:39.080 room to grow and breathe. Yeah, I think, yeah, agreed. 0:13:39.240 --> 0:13:45.040 Our So we saw that everyone in the world, every 0:13:45.040 --> 0:13:49.200 credible source in the world, assumed this aircraft accident was 0:13:49.280 --> 0:13:54.240 not a random malfunction. Initial reports claimed that the plane 0:13:54.360 --> 0:13:57.880 was shot down by Russian air defense, and that came 0:13:58.000 --> 0:14:03.240 from Wagner itself. Western intelligence later looked at this and said, 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:07.360 they probably weren't shot down because we sort of, you know, 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:12.040 follow the missiles. They said, there was an explosion aboard 0:14:12.080 --> 0:14:17.440 the craft, and to your point, Pregosion is a sneaky, 0:14:17.480 --> 0:14:20.800 sneaky boy, or he was. He is a little rascal. 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:24.560 So a lot of credible analysts thought it would be 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:28.320 possible or not outside of the realm of possibility, that 0:14:28.360 --> 0:14:31.480 he had faked his own demise, and later the Russian 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:35.560 government did appear to confirm his death through genetic testing. 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:40.840 They claimed that according to their forensics, the identities of 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:44.040 all ten people on the craft had been established and 0:14:44.160 --> 0:14:47.560 all ten of them corresponded to someone published on the 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:52.720 flight manifest So the next question is who ordered this explosion? 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:54.080 We mentioned this earlier. 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:54.600 I love this. 0:14:54.960 --> 0:14:57.240 I think you should leave now. A hot dog car 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:00.600 crashes through the store. There's a guy in a hot 0:15:00.600 --> 0:15:03.080 dog costume saying it could be any one of us. 0:15:03.200 --> 0:15:05.280 We gotta find out who did this. 0:15:05.480 --> 0:15:08.800 So well, you know, and and to your point, been 0:15:09.080 --> 0:15:12.120 with that clip that you play where Putin just kind 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:16.240 of casually drops a tiny little mention of this incident. 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:19.720 There are some in the media, you know, or analysts, 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:23.800 I guess, especially because there's quite a few Russian journalists 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:26.000 who maybe don't quite toe the party line, who have 0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:28.000 actually been exiled and like live in Germany. 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:30.520 And I'm kind of so I should have written down 0:15:30.560 --> 0:15:30.880 the names. 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:33.320 But I saw some interviews with a few of them 0:15:33.320 --> 0:15:36.600 who were saying that is an example of Putin basically 0:15:36.640 --> 0:15:39.320 saying yeah I did this without saying yeah I did this, 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:41.720 and that it's his way of like he does this 0:15:41.800 --> 0:15:44.520 kind of stuff all the time while not openly acknowledging 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:47.280 it or admitting it. He kind of wants people to 0:15:47.320 --> 0:15:49.920 think he did it, even if maybe they didn't find 0:15:49.960 --> 0:15:52.520 his body it's in his best interest to think that 0:15:52.520 --> 0:15:54.000 they for people to think that he did it. 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:57.600 Yeah, anything that makes him scarier, right, not only to 0:15:57.720 --> 0:16:00.880 the to his enemies, but to people who have to 0:16:00.920 --> 0:16:03.560 follow orders from him, that's probably a great thing for him, 0:16:03.840 --> 0:16:07.400 or at least he perceives it as such. And you know, oh, man, 0:16:07.440 --> 0:16:10.880 I had a whole point about this, Oh, Pregosian didn't 0:16:10.920 --> 0:16:14.520 just have enemies in Russia, even though he was pretty 0:16:14.560 --> 0:16:17.840 much fighting for them. He had enemies, you know, in 0:16:18.040 --> 0:16:21.960 Ukraine and all of the people who are allied to 0:16:22.000 --> 0:16:25.040 defend Ukraine now all the NATO countries in the US. 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:28.560 So, I mean, a soldier of fortune is not someone 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:32.760 who's exactly known for their you know, stand up attitude 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:35.960 and then like and steadfastness. You know, there's someone who 0:16:35.960 --> 0:16:39.160 will basically work for whoever is the highest bidder in 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:42.520 exchange for cash, capital assets. You know, I mean, this 0:16:42.600 --> 0:16:45.200 is not someone that cares about making friends. 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:46.440 Yeah. 0:16:46.480 --> 0:16:50.840 Also, sof doesn't have a very long shelf life, you 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:53.560 know what I mean. So it's like, right now, the 0:16:53.640 --> 0:16:58.480 current running theories for the demise of Progosion are a 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:04.000 direct order from Latimir Putin. Possible third party leveraging the chaos. 0:17:04.040 --> 0:17:09.040 To your point, Matt, this would be ah, this would 0:17:09.080 --> 0:17:13.960 be an opportunity or an act by one of Bragosian's many, 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:19.240 many internal enemies. The thing that gallows humor here, the 0:17:19.280 --> 0:17:22.240 thing that is amazing and cracks me up right now, 0:17:22.600 --> 0:17:26.080 is that absolutely no one is pretending it was an accident. 0:17:27.000 --> 0:17:29.919 Everyone is in who done it mode automatically. 0:17:30.000 --> 0:17:33.920 There's no way the time, it just doesn't know, there's 0:17:33.960 --> 0:17:36.160 no But also not to mention, and I can't remember 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:39.720 if we mentioned this quite yet. Everybody else that was 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:43.760 on that plane, besides the unfortunate presence of the flight attendant, 0:17:43.920 --> 0:17:46.840 they were all high ups in the organization too, So 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:49.840 it was like a kind of a one shot kill 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:54.440 for like some serious muscle in terms of leadership in Wagner. 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:57.959 But this is why it's the perfect thing, guys, because 0:17:58.960 --> 0:18:03.160 it is it is plausible that a plane crashes. That happens. 0:18:03.400 --> 0:18:07.560 Planes crash, they do, small private planes do crash. 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:12.880 Coincidences, though, man, they're never they're never coincidences. 0:18:12.320 --> 0:18:14.879 I know, but that but that's the the messed up 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:16.840 perfect thing. What are we going to do about it? 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:19.720 What is anybody gonna do about it? Planes crash man, 0:18:20.400 --> 0:18:21.200 what are you going to do? 0:18:21.760 --> 0:18:23.280 Yeah, I believe you. Know. 0:18:24.040 --> 0:18:25.880 They were saying it was too high to have been 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:28.600 shot down by like a shoulder mounted weapon of some kind, 0:18:29.000 --> 0:18:31.640 like a like a rocket launcher or something. It could 0:18:31.640 --> 0:18:33.080 have been what you were saying, been some kind of 0:18:33.080 --> 0:18:36.600 anti aircraft situation, But I think the prevailing theory might 0:18:36.680 --> 0:18:37.240 be that it. 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:39.520 Was some sort of device on the plane itself. 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:40.399 Right. 0:18:40.600 --> 0:18:46.280 Yeah, the West is thinking on board explosive sabotage, right, 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:51.760 which means the timer was either activated in the air, 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:56.600 remotely activated, or the time the clock started ticking around 0:18:56.680 --> 0:19:01.040 left off, all three of which are plausible, or we 0:19:01.080 --> 0:19:02.640 got ourselves a gremlin situation. 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:06.800 Well, maybe could have been a gremlin on the plane. 0:19:06.880 --> 0:19:11.639 But do you guys remember back in April in Strange 0:19:11.680 --> 0:19:15.520 News we talked about a Russian vlagger that was killed 0:19:16.200 --> 0:19:21.160 while in a wasn't it a Wagner bar or something, 0:19:21.320 --> 0:19:24.320 and a woman brought in an explosive device, edit it 0:19:24.359 --> 0:19:27.040 to the guy and it ended up exploding and killing him. 0:19:27.280 --> 0:19:27.720 Mm hmmm. 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:29.240 That was in Saint Petersburg. 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:35.520 Well, no one's gonna accuse human forces of creativity nor originality, 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:38.280 but the like this is where we're at, you know, 0:19:38.320 --> 0:19:41.360 and that's an excellent precedent to set there, Matt. There 0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:45.280 you have it, folks. The head of an enormously dangerous, 0:19:45.359 --> 0:19:50.080 at times rogue mercenary military force just left the big 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:55.360 chess board. But all the soldiers remain. After the leader's demise, 0:19:56.080 --> 0:19:59.639 what happens to them, you know, what will become of 0:19:59.720 --> 0:20:03.000 Russi Army. It's kind of like asking what happens to 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:06.199 Coca Cola when all the people with the secret recipe 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:09.080 ride the same plane and die. We're gonna pause for 0:20:09.080 --> 0:20:12.120 a word from our sponsors and then we'll dive in. 0:20:18.640 --> 0:20:20.280 Here's where it gets crazy. 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:24.880 Yes, the Wagner folks, the name brand might change, but 0:20:24.960 --> 0:20:28.960 they're still going to be around. Armies are a lot 0:20:29.000 --> 0:20:32.840 like a snowball, a lot like an avalanche. There's an inertia. 0:20:33.240 --> 0:20:33.440 Right. 0:20:33.760 --> 0:20:38.679 Once something gets going, it is incredibly difficult to stop it. 0:20:38.760 --> 0:20:42.720 You can change the name, right, Oh no, now we're Constellis. 0:20:42.800 --> 0:20:46.760 We're so different, Now we're Infinity whatever. But you can 0:20:46.800 --> 0:20:49.920 cut off the head, you can fire or kill the leadership. 0:20:50.280 --> 0:20:53.080 You can make all sorts of you know, little paperwork 0:20:53.200 --> 0:20:58.680 laws restricting saying the name. But you cannot unteach the skills. 0:20:58.920 --> 0:21:03.960 You cannot remove the experience. It is incredibly difficult, virtually 0:21:04.000 --> 0:21:07.600 impossible to keep an eye on every small group or 0:21:07.720 --> 0:21:10.880 loan operator that sets up shop afterwards. 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:15.480 Dude, I was just reading about again the coups in Africa, 0:21:15.960 --> 0:21:20.720 and we talked about that recently, and just about the 0:21:20.760 --> 0:21:24.520 splitting of militaries in several African countries. I think it 0:21:24.640 --> 0:21:29.679 was Niger I want to say, yeah, it was specifically 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:32.000 I was reading about. Oh, I don't think it was, 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:34.120 but it was a it was a recent coup where 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:37.399 it was two factions of the military itself that split apart, 0:21:37.720 --> 0:21:40.679 and there were two leaders. One of them is running 0:21:40.720 --> 0:21:43.840 like a special forces kind of group and then the 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:46.159 other one is the official you know, military of the 0:21:46.160 --> 0:21:49.520 country's leader, and they are the two factions that are 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:53.119 fighting each other. And so it just it's reminded me 0:21:53.160 --> 0:21:55.320 of that bend where as you're saying, like, once you 0:21:56.160 --> 0:21:59.960 once you create a military group that is cohesive and together, 0:22:00.040 --> 0:22:02.399 there it is gonna stick around. 0:22:02.600 --> 0:22:07.440 Yeah, I mean you can't. You can't unteach goria tactics, 0:22:07.680 --> 0:22:09.800 you know what I mean, people are gonna remember it. 0:22:10.280 --> 0:22:14.639 Uh And and Matt to your point, I I need 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:16.919 to bone up on this. It could be Niger, it 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:19.679 could be uh Mali, it could be a number of 0:22:19.720 --> 0:22:23.879 other countries. It's pretty pretty deep water at this point. 0:22:24.480 --> 0:22:27.000 There were so many Oh maybe it was Chad, I 0:22:27.000 --> 0:22:27.760 can't remember. 0:22:28.080 --> 0:22:31.720 It's always chad Man. There's Chad's chadding around. 0:22:32.920 --> 0:22:36.840 There's there's also a strong sense to this point that 0:22:37.440 --> 0:22:43.040 Vladimir Putin, the Putin administration wants some version of Wagner, 0:22:43.119 --> 0:22:46.760 indeed needs some version of Wagner. We have to remember 0:22:47.200 --> 0:22:52.159 they exist to give the Russian state plausible deniability. The 0:22:52.280 --> 0:22:56.399 need for that does not dissipate just because seven guys 0:22:56.400 --> 0:22:56.840 are dead. 0:22:57.280 --> 0:23:00.520 Well, but it does give you a vacuum that you 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:05.280 can then fill yourself with your handpicked successors. Because while 0:23:05.320 --> 0:23:07.520 it might not be an extension, well, it is an 0:23:07.560 --> 0:23:09.840 extension of the government. Why it might not be a 0:23:09.880 --> 0:23:13.440 direct wing of the government or branch, there's influence there. 0:23:13.480 --> 0:23:16.679 There's got to be friendlies within the organization, you know. 0:23:17.040 --> 0:23:20.280 And maybe this is just Putin rooting out the folks 0:23:20.280 --> 0:23:22.840 that were starting to kind of buck on him a 0:23:22.880 --> 0:23:26.240 little bit. And now he's got the ability to insert 0:23:26.280 --> 0:23:28.200 the people into the situation that he wants to make 0:23:28.240 --> 0:23:31.840 them back to being his little pet army again quite possibly. 0:23:31.920 --> 0:23:34.280 You know that's I'm glad you're bringing that up, because 0:23:34.320 --> 0:23:39.280 now there are several options on the table. One Russia 0:23:39.400 --> 0:23:44.359 attempts to completely dismantle Wagner. It's possible in a legal sense, 0:23:44.640 --> 0:23:47.280 it's far less likely in practice, to your point that, 0:23:47.480 --> 0:23:53.560 given Wagner's entrenched established rules in the African theater. And 0:23:53.600 --> 0:23:57.080 then the second one Russia attempts to co opt to 0:23:57.240 --> 0:24:00.800 digest Wagner. Right, let's get rid of the guys who 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:04.280