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Speaker 1: Mmm, Hello Internet, and welcome back. I am Robert Evans,

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Speaker 1: and this is Behind the Bastards, the show where we

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Speaker 1: tell you everything you don't know about the worst people

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Speaker 1: in history. Today, our subject is a little guy named

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Speaker 1: Eric Prince. Miles, what do you know about Eric Prince?

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Speaker 1: I know they started black Water, Okay, I know he's

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Speaker 1: the brother of Betsy Devas, right, uh. And I just

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Speaker 1: know about like how generally black Water is evil and

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Speaker 1: there's some Funcker involved. But aside from that, I just

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Speaker 1: know Eric Prince equals Blackwater, equals military contractors equals war crimes. Okay, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's a good that's a good basic basic line. Well,

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Speaker 1: Eric was born on June SI. Yes, but nine, so

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Speaker 1: the summer D Day of the Summer of Love. I

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Speaker 1: don't know why I'm obsessed with D Day. It's a

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Speaker 1: good it's a good day. Yeah, it was, I think

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Speaker 1: Private Ryan actually yeah. Uh. I was born in Holland, Michigan.

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Speaker 1: His father was Edgar Prince, an entrepreneur who built a

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Speaker 1: billion dollar company, the Prince Machine Corporation, from the ground up.

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Speaker 1: His company built like a type of illuminated mirror that's

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Speaker 1: common in cars today, so his family got super rich

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Speaker 1: weight off what do you mean an illuminated like a

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Speaker 1: like a back lit mirror exactly, so that like you

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Speaker 1: can see it in the mirror at night or whatever.

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Speaker 1: They're living off that invention. Basically that that's how his

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Speaker 1: family got rich. So his his dad was like a

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Speaker 1: legitimate started making forty cents an hour and like created

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Speaker 1: a business, got super rich. Uh, and then you know,

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Speaker 1: with his money, decided he should do some good in

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Speaker 1: the world. But his version of good was founding the

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Speaker 1: Family Research Council. You know what the Family Research Council does.

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Speaker 1: The I know they were spreading some kind of really

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Speaker 1: bad misinformation back in the day, back in the now too. Um.

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Speaker 1: One of their staffers wrote in nine gaining access to

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Speaker 1: children was a long term goal of the homosexual movement. Um.

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Speaker 1: So it's that kind of like anytime there's family mean facts, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I shout out to the Family Research Council for their Wow.

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Speaker 1: So that was his version, okay, that he wanted to spread.

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Speaker 1: That's what he wanted to do with his money. Full

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Speaker 1: fucking conspiracy. Okay. Yeah. Eric's mother, Elsa, donated seventy dollars

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Speaker 1: to a campaign to stop same sex marriage in two

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Speaker 1: thousand four clearly worked. Uh at, Elsa and Edgar also

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Speaker 1: formed the Prince Foundation so that they could use their

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Speaker 1: families wealth to advance general right wing causes like abstinence

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Speaker 1: only education, state sponsored prayer in the fight against abortion UM.

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Speaker 1: In order to get around restrictions on lobbying, the Princes

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Speaker 1: reclassified their lobbying as prayer warrior networks. So basically they said, like,

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Speaker 1: we're not lobbying politicians. We're asking them to pray over

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Speaker 1: certain issues. So we're not saying vote against abortion. We're

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Speaker 1: saying pray against abortion, and that's different. So we can

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Speaker 1: spend our money with less restrictions. So they were they

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Speaker 1: were registered as lobbyists before, uh yeah, and there's more

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Speaker 1: restrictions on how lobbyists conspinue, so they were like, we're

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Speaker 1: not lobbyists. Were prayer warriors? Do? They just kind of

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Speaker 1: do that thing where a lot of people dark money

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Speaker 1: groups just become five oh one C four's Yeah. It

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Speaker 1: was something like that, like those nonprofits that don't have

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Speaker 1: to disclose any of their origins of their money so

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Speaker 1: they can do whatever. Yeah. Yeah, they found a shady

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Speaker 1: way to make themselves less accountable with the billions or

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Speaker 1: millions of dollars that they were spending on garbage. Um,

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Speaker 1: you obviously heard that Eric's sister is Betsy Divace. Um,

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Speaker 1: it's probably won't surprise you to know that he grew

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Speaker 1: up religious, conservative and rich. No, he donated fifteen thousand

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Speaker 1: dollars to the Republican Party when he was nineteen. Um,

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry, fifteen thousand dollars when he was well, so

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Speaker 1: he's a normal guy. Yeah. I know, for a second,

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Speaker 1: I've I forgot that. You said he grew up rich,

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Speaker 1: and I was like, what fucking job did you have

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Speaker 1: in high school that he had? That with twenty But

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Speaker 1: you're rich, So his job was being a rich kid.

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Speaker 1: Or you know, his parents just used him to make

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Speaker 1: as much of a max out donation to the party.

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Speaker 1: They love to do that, just like get the kids

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Speaker 1: to donate and we can give you a lot of money,

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Speaker 1: donate a lot of money. Yeah, nineteen year old has

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Speaker 1: fifteen thousand dollars. Yeah, but he was he was. He was,

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Speaker 1: you know, a normal, down to earth kid like most people.

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Speaker 1: He got his pilot's license before he got his driver's license,

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Speaker 1: you know that that old canard. Uh. He attended a

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Speaker 1: Christian high school in Holland. But but halland Michigan, not

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Speaker 1: the cool halland that the Netherlands. Yeah. Uh. He went

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Speaker 1: to the Naval Academy, but according to one of his professors,

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Speaker 1: he did not think it was conservative enough, so he

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Speaker 1: left to attend Hillsdale College. That the military wasn't conservative.

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Speaker 1: The Naval Academy is a bastion of left wing job

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Speaker 1: and hippies with long hair. Like that almost seems like

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Speaker 1: he's trying to impress someone. But I mean, like, oh,

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Speaker 1: the Navy wasn't conservative enough for me, so I had

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Speaker 1: to leave like that. Well, Eric denies that that's why

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Speaker 1: he left the Navy. One of his professors is the

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Speaker 1: one saying he was piste off because we, the Navy professors,

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Speaker 1: weren't conservative enough for him. Oh got you that? Yeah right,

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Speaker 1: He didn't want people to expand his way of thinking. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: that that's what it seems like. Um, so, do you

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Speaker 1: know anything about Hillsdale College. No, I don't know anything

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Speaker 1: about college. Hillsdale College is like one of the rightest

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Speaker 1: wing colleges in the country. Um. They basicallyly worship the

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Speaker 1: economic theories of Vine rand Um for some sort of

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Speaker 1: color on what the schools. Like in two thousand fifteen,

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Speaker 1: their school chaplain sent this email out to students and faculty. Hey, friends,

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Speaker 1: exclamation point uh, just to give you a heads up.

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Speaker 1: Ugly things are happening in the Supreme Court right now.

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Speaker 1: Justice Anthony Kennedy is seen as the quote swing vote,

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Speaker 1: and if that is the case, he will have the

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Speaker 1: power to legalize same sex marriage all caps nationwide. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I do not even think we can imagine the effects

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Speaker 1: this would have in our nation, the church and families.

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Speaker 1: So we are praying for God to give the justices

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Speaker 1: and the courts wisdom, courage, and discernment, for evil to

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Speaker 1: be revealed and destroyed, and for a heart of love

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Speaker 1: and sound mind. So we want to destroy the gays

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Speaker 1: with a heartful of love. I love when conservatives like

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Speaker 1: sort of like, you know, sound the war drums of

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Speaker 1: like the gays might be able to have rights, and

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Speaker 1: like I'm always curious how they play that out in

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Speaker 1: their head that leads to exactly what, Like I really

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Speaker 1: want to know if they have a very clear vision

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Speaker 1: of what that looks like. When you know, the LGBTQ

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Speaker 1: community has like nuh disturbed rights, Like do they think

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Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean it always seems like very

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Speaker 1: aggressive what they think will happen. Well, if we let

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Speaker 1: gays mary, then we could wind up with a country where,

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Speaker 1: like I don't know, the president sleeps with porn stars

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Speaker 1: and pays them a hundred and thirty thou dollars, And

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Speaker 1: that would be just It would be a post morality America. Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 1: Where is Hillsdale College. It's in Michigan. So he's not leaving.

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Speaker 1: He's a Michigan boy. Uh. Well, at least he was

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Speaker 1: a Michigan boy, right, So he's all about his comfort zone.

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Speaker 1: Uh yeah, at this point in his life. That's kind

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Speaker 1: of where Eric is. Um And yeah, so in in

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Speaker 1: nineteen nine, he uh gets a sweet job becoming an

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Speaker 1: intern in George H. W. Bush's White House. Um, which

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Speaker 1: you think would be like this kid's dream job, you know,

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Speaker 1: super conservative president uh not considering to work for him. Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 1: Eric gets piste off that George H. W. Bush's administration

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Speaker 1: is not conservat of enough. Quote. I saw a lot

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Speaker 1: of things. I didn't agree with homosexual groups being invited

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Speaker 1: in the budget agreement, the Clean Air Act. I mean,

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Speaker 1: that's what the fun I understand What that means is

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Speaker 1: that like his sort of like you know, big government philosophy,

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Speaker 1: is that what he's sort of Yeah, you know, the

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Speaker 1: Clean Air Act is anti business because it wants people

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Speaker 1: to be able to breathe, and like, right, it's better

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Speaker 1: for business if people can't breathe. I mean, that's basic capitalist.

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Speaker 1: Christ professed his love for capital, hated air, hated air

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Speaker 1: because he didn't need it. He's Christ, yeah, exactly, so

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Speaker 1: why should anyone else? Like that's I'm trying to be

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Speaker 1: more like Christ and not breathe there tupping your lungs upright,

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Speaker 1: walk on some water. Um. After his time as an intern,

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Speaker 1: Eric got a gig as a volunteer firefighter fighter. Uh

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Speaker 1: so that's nice until he joined the Navy Seals. Um.

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Speaker 1: He was apparently good at his job. He was deployed

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Speaker 1: to Bosnia Haiti in the Middle East, but tragically for Eric,

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Speaker 1: his service came during a time of unprecedented peace and

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Speaker 1: prosperity and he never saw combat. Oh he didn't know.

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Speaker 1: That's the shittiest kind of Navy seals, you know what

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Speaker 1: I mean, Like, you don't even have a fucking good

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Speaker 1: story at a bar when something like yeah, man, what

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Speaker 1: did you see have you seen g I Jane, I

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Speaker 1: went to Haiti. You did some fund up ship and Haiti. No,

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Speaker 1: we kind of did a lot of push ups. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of just moving potable water around. But uh yeah,

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Speaker 1: oh wow. That really that must have been heartbreaking for

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Speaker 1: him because he seems like somebody who really like a

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Speaker 1: war bonner. Right. No, but he's he just I mean basically,

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Speaker 1: if you're a Navy seal and you don't fight, you're

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Speaker 1: just a really good swimmer. Yeah, and like future fitness instructor. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and I'm sure in fairness to Eric, he's I'm sure

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Speaker 1: he's a great swimmer. Oh this this dude can tear

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Speaker 1: up and that pool. No matter what your politics are,

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Speaker 1: your your body and your your your physical fitness is

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Speaker 1: at another level as a Navy seal. Yeah and and yeah,

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Speaker 1: I have the body of just a harbor seal. So um.

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Speaker 1: So Eric leaves the Navy Seals early in because his

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Speaker 1: dad dies of a heart attack and he's got a

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Speaker 1: deal with that deal with the family money they sell

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Speaker 1: the company and they make like one point three billion

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Speaker 1: gets split up between him and the rest of his

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Speaker 1: family members. Uh. He gets hit with a second tragedy

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Speaker 1: when his wife gets breast cancer. She was able to

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Speaker 1: have two kids, but she died not that long after. Um.

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Speaker 1: But Eric, you know, settled down to a quiet life

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Speaker 1: of being incredibly wealthy, and he started a six thousand

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Speaker 1: acre training facility for security operators. Uh. He named this

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Speaker 1: space Blackwater. Um Um. It was a place where you know,

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Speaker 1: you could go if you were a military unit or

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Speaker 1: a police unit, a swat team and do training. They

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Speaker 1: had like a fake high school there, um so that

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Speaker 1: you could practice like dealing with a Columbine situation where

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Speaker 1: they had like recorded one or perpetrating one. Right, this

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Speaker 1: is a crisis actor conspiracy theory. Thinking he'll drop on

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Speaker 1: us Miles like Robert, when you're on my podcast, we'll

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Speaker 1: talk about crisis acting. It's called Inside the Crisis Actor's Studio,

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Speaker 1: talk about the craziest conspiracies and once a crisis act. No,

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Speaker 1: I'm not no, I don't mean to cast his persons

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Speaker 1: on that person. But yeah, wait so black Oh so

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Speaker 1: in a way, he was just kind of like, I

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Speaker 1: want to create like the gym for cops and military

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Speaker 1: people to beef up there. It's not an unreasonable thing

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Speaker 1: to do, Like people who's are in SWAT teams and

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Speaker 1: whatever need like fake schools to practice and because that's

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Speaker 1: the thing they might have to do. So he's providing that.

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Speaker 1: So far, relatively reasonable. Um. But over the next couple

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Speaker 1: of years, Print shifted black Water from a training facility

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Speaker 1: to a company that also provided security personnel for the

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Speaker 1: US government. UM. One of Blackwater's first contracts was actually

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Speaker 1: in China guarding North Korean defectors that the government was

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Speaker 1: afraid the Chinese would abduct to send back to North Korea.

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Speaker 1: So they didn't want to put US soldiers or CIA

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Speaker 1: guys on these guys because that could be a diplomatic incident.

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Speaker 1: So they have private security to get them out of

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Speaker 1: the country and stuff that they were extracting them from China. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's what I understand was was sort of the situation

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Speaker 1: UM at that point. So again, not an unreasonable thing.

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Speaker 1: The government always needs a couple of kind of deniable

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Speaker 1: asset of course, that stuff with so pretty low level,

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Speaker 1: low key. Um, that's kind of what he's moving into.

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Speaker 1: But it's not it's not total darkness yet, but I'm

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Speaker 1: starting to see the sun start to go down. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: sun's definitely setting right right now, we're past four pm here. Um,

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Speaker 1: so you know nine eleven happens after that? I'm sorry,

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Speaker 1: what was the nine eleven? Uh? Oh um, I feel

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Speaker 1: like we should stop and pull a Wikipedia page. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: let's can we pull something up? Oh that, yes, okay,

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Speaker 1: I'm on board. Also, jet fuel can't melt steel beams.

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Speaker 1: Yeah you say that a lot. Hey, look what happened

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Speaker 1: to Building seven? That's my question anyway, So nine eleven

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Speaker 1: goes great for Eric Prince. Uh. He's on the billow

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Speaker 1: Riley Show not that long after, and he notes that

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Speaker 1: his phone is ringing off the hook. Uh. He attempts

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Speaker 1: to join the CIA, but he fails to pass their

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Speaker 1: polygraph test. Whoa, yeah, what do you know what kind

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Speaker 1: of stuff they ask? You know? I mean, I know,

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Speaker 1: in general polygraph test, but I don't know what the

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Speaker 1: CIA was asking him. Well, clearly it's not must not

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Speaker 1: be good to be hooked up to a truth machine

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Speaker 1: and tell lies to the CIA. Although polygraph tests have

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Speaker 1: been kind of there, people to say they're dubious a

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Speaker 1: little right now, they're supposed to be pretty sketchy. Um,

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Speaker 1: I don't, I don't know, I'm not here defense, but yes, right. Yes,

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Speaker 1: he tries to get into the CIA, and the CIA

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Speaker 1: is like, you're a little too shape for us. We're

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Speaker 1: gonna go continue to smuggle crack into the inner cities. Exactly.

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Speaker 1: Um so, uh, Eric isn't gonna let the little thing

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Speaker 1: like the CIA stop him from living out his dream

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Speaker 1: of walking around with guns in foreign countries. Uh. He

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Speaker 1: forms Blackwater Security Consulting, and he moves his company into

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Speaker 1: the business of selling mercenaries to the government. His hope

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Speaker 1: was that Blackwater would quote do for national security apparatus

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Speaker 1: what FedEx did for the Postal Service. Hold on, let

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Speaker 1: me process this. That what that he wants to do

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Speaker 1: for the national security apparatus? What FedEx did for the

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Speaker 1: postal service. Wow, Like, let me take a little burden

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Speaker 1: off you and also do it in a crazy aggressive way.

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Speaker 1: I want to be the FedEx of shooting people. Yeah, right, exactly. Like, Look,

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Speaker 1: of course the US didn't kill those people, you know,

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Speaker 1: just US contractors did. Okay, Okay, Yeah, so that's where

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Speaker 1: we're going visionary. Start to see the vision. So two

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Speaker 1: thousand one, black Water has a total about seven hundred

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Speaker 1: and thirty thousand dollars in federal contracts, right, so kind

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Speaker 1: of small beans at this point. Uh. In two thousand four,

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Speaker 1: less than a year into the Iraq war, they had

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Speaker 1: forty eight million dollars in contracts. By two thousand seven,

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Speaker 1: they'd made more than a billion dollars in federal contracts

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Speaker 1: by two thousand seven. Yeah, wait, when did it started?

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Speaker 1: Two thousand one is when he started, and then two

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Speaker 1: thousand seven he turned that into a billion dollars, So

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Speaker 1: pretty good rate of return. Yeah. How do I invest

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Speaker 1: in black Water? Um, you probably don't getting into it now. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: two thousand one was the time. Yeah, you know, two

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Speaker 1: thousand was that? Yeah, that was the August of two

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Speaker 1: thousand one, September t was really the time you wanted

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Speaker 1: with money into mercenaries. Yeah. Um. So after the invasion

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Speaker 1: of Iraq, Eric volunteers to provide the government with hundreds

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Speaker 1: and eventually thousands of contractors. Has been carried guns and

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Speaker 1: guarded high value government officials and convoys. Since they were

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Speaker 1: private civilians who regularly got into gunfights and war zones

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Speaker 1: for money, some people call Blackwaters contractors mercenaries. This makes

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Speaker 1: Eric very angry. Here's a quote from a Newsweek article

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Speaker 1: titled profile Blackwaters. Eric Prince quote, that's a slanderous term,

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Speaker 1: an inflammatory word they used to malign us, says Prince. Mercenaries,

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Speaker 1: he says, are professional soldiers who worked for a foreign government.

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Speaker 1: Blackwaters men are Americans working for the American government. Okay,

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Speaker 1: semantics man, Yeah, okay. Yeah. So that's the Eric's point

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Speaker 1: of view on the mercenaries. He's providing the U. S.

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Speaker 1: Government you're not mercenaries because they're American and so is

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Speaker 1: the government. You're still a cell sword though. Yeah, you're

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Speaker 1: still I mean selling your ability to kill people for money, right, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And in a way it's like shittier because like it's

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Speaker 1: like you couldn't even make the real team, like could

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Speaker 1: be like an actual military personnels. It's like I guess

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Speaker 1: they'll do the mall cop version of being a cop,

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Speaker 1: which is a blackwater guy. Yeah. It's like one of

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Speaker 1: the things that's respectable about the military is like, oh,

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Speaker 1: you know, you know, you're not making that much money,

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Speaker 1: like you get there's got to be some degree I

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Speaker 1: like something you want to do or like there's some

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Speaker 1: degree of idealism as opposed to like, no, I'm making

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Speaker 1: a quarter of a million bucks a year to go

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Speaker 1: shoot people yeah, because you can. So you can argue

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Speaker 1: that someone in the military like they're sort of north

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Speaker 1: stars being patriotic or being nationalistic or whatever, yeah, versus like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: you're black Water, Like I'm here for the check and

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Speaker 1: to be and I get to shoot people for a

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Speaker 1: lot more money than I did when it was not honorable.

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Speaker 1: But I'm making eight times as much money to do

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Speaker 1: the same job, and I don't have to follow the

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Speaker 1: rule because a lot of their guys are are ex military, right, yes, absolutely,

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Speaker 1: So a guy can't just be like, hey, I'm here

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Speaker 1: to I'm here for the black Water tryouts. We'll get

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Speaker 1: to that a little. Um so in actuality, because he

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Speaker 1: was just saying, you know, an Americans working for the

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Speaker 1: American government. In actuality, many of Prince's employees in Iraq

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Speaker 1: were from Pakistan, Yemen, in other countries collectively known as

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Speaker 1: not America. A State Department investigation found that these quote

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Speaker 1: third world nationals were often forced to live in horrifying

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Speaker 1: conditions three people to a tiny room with no better

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Speaker 1: Erican to um so. This actually speaks to a big misconception.

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Speaker 1: When we think of black Water, we think of like

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Speaker 1: big burly mercenaries with beards and machine guns. They have

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Speaker 1: those guys. That's a big part of what they do.

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Speaker 1: But they also and all of the contracting companies in

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Speaker 1: Iraq and Afghanistan, most of the people they provide are

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Speaker 1: like poorly paid foreigners from Southeast Asia or the Middle

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Speaker 1: East to like run the kitchens and drive trucks and

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Speaker 1: convoys to transport food and ammunition. Um and so, like

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Speaker 1: those guys are doing horribly dangerous jobs and a lot

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Speaker 1: of them die. But if they die, the US government

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Speaker 1: doesn't have to say anyone died. So it's like, oh,

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Speaker 1: six Bangladeshi's died driving m R. E S two troops

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Speaker 1: in this base. Nobody needs to know. No US soldiers died. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: no Americans die. So that's a lot of what Prince

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Speaker 1: is doing. So and even then he's even hiring people

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Speaker 1: in like not combat roles necessarily, but just to do

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Speaker 1: sort of other leg work. Yeah, but they're going to

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Speaker 1: get shot and they're not in armored vehicles and they're yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know, yeah, it's it's really messed up. Um. So,

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Speaker 1: black Water Armed contractors, who were the guys who made

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Speaker 1: the company famous, were good at protecting their clients. They

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Speaker 1: never lost a client in iraq Um, but they were

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Speaker 1: bad at the winning hearts and minds thing. So one

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Speaker 1: of their favorite tactics was to drive on the opposite

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Speaker 1: side of the road as fast as they could and

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Speaker 1: shoot above any vehicle that didn't drive away fast enough,

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Speaker 1: which they said protected their convoys and which Iraqi said

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Speaker 1: was fucking terrified. They drove in the opposite direction of

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Speaker 1: traffic and shot above the cars that were coming towards them. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: if anyone got too close, they would shoot above them

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Speaker 1: to be like, get the funk out of the way,

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Speaker 1: wrong of the road. Yeah, this is black water. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: now in a little bit of fairness to blackwater. So

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Speaker 1: like one of the traffic is really bad, Well it's not.

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Speaker 1: It's not entirely unheard of an Iraq to direct traffic

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Speaker 1: with guns. When I was there last time, I kind

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Speaker 1: of made friends with a guy, an Iraqi army guy

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Speaker 1: who was directing traffic at this checkpoint in Mosle, and

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Speaker 1: whenever he'd get in to an argument with somebody, he

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Speaker 1: would shoot next to their head with his M sixteen.

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Speaker 1: And I was like, what do you That seems really

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Speaker 1: messed up. Really was like, well yeah, but like I'm

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Speaker 1: I'm doing this twelve hours a day, and if I

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Speaker 1: yell at everybody, I'm not gonna have a voice. And

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Speaker 1: I gotta be out here all the time. So it's

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Speaker 1: just easier to shoot next to him, just sucking shots

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Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, he said he put spent about a

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Speaker 1: dred and eight rounds a day doing that, just like

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Speaker 1: pop rather than talking. Yeah, I'll just squeeze off shots. Well,

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Speaker 1: just one or two at a time. But I mean

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Speaker 1: a lot of people will come right yeah. Um, but

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Speaker 1: black Water, you know, it's the driving on the opposite

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Speaker 1: side of the road thing that's that's the most controversial thing. Um.

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Speaker 1: So here's what one bad dead housewife told a French

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Speaker 1: journalist about them. Uh, they sail off the roads and

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Speaker 1: drive on the wrong side. They simply kill That Newsweek

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Speaker 1: profile and Eric quoted an advisor for the Coalition forces

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Speaker 1: who had traveled with both Blackwater guys as her guards

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Speaker 1: and American soldiers as her guards, and she said the

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Speaker 1: black Water guys that explain their attitude towards the iraqis

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Speaker 1: as our mission is to protect the principle at all costs.

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Speaker 1: If that means pissing off the iraqis too bad. So right.

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Speaker 1: In September two six, the black Water convoy, driving down

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Speaker 1: the wrong side of the road, struck an Iraqi car

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Speaker 1: and sent it careening into a telephone pole. The car

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Speaker 1: caught fire, black Wire drove without rendering aid, and the

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Speaker 1: driver died. It's not the only time that happened. That's

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Speaker 1: just a time that happened, right, because they're just always

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Speaker 1: driving on the other side of the road super fast,

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Speaker 1: shooting at people right there, Like you don't even know

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Speaker 1: what the right side of the road is. We just

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Speaker 1: know the black Water side. Yeah, here's another quote from

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Speaker 1: a Bagdad could traffic cop. They're impolite and do not

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Speaker 1: respect people. They bump other people's cars to frighten them

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Speaker 1: and shout at anyone who approaches them. Two weeks ago,

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Speaker 1: guards of a convoy open fire randomly and that led

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Speaker 1: to the killing of two policemen. Uh so Yeah. Another

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Speaker 1: journalist who spent a lot of time with them, Robert

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Speaker 1: Young Pelton, noted that they used their machine guns like

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Speaker 1: car horns. So, wow, Eric, you've got to You've got

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Speaker 1: a great group of employees here. Yeah. It's funny because

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Speaker 1: I only just know of like isolated incidents here or there.

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Speaker 1: Or that I was familiar with, like during the Iraq

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Speaker 1: War about hearing about black Water and the kind of

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Speaker 1: ship they did. But like when you when you really

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Speaker 1: start to, like as you're revealing it to me, now

405
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Speaker 1: realize like they're like frat bros in a war zone.

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Speaker 1: It's great, did you bring up frat Bros. We've got

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Speaker 1: a break for commercials, But once we come back, we're

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Speaker 1: gonna talk about black Waters drunken shenanigans in Iraq, and

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Speaker 1: then we're gonna move on to Eric Prince's new job

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Speaker 1: in China. So all that after some ads, uh, and

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Speaker 1: we're back and we're about to talk about the frat

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Speaker 1: bro aspect of Blackwater's history. I feel it. I can

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Speaker 1: feel it. I could feel it coming. I do want

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Speaker 1: to note I found a lot of these quotes in

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Speaker 1: a really good Brookings Institute article called The Dark Truth

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Speaker 1: about black Water. So if you're looking for more info

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Speaker 1: on these fox, uh, that's a good source. Um Two

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Speaker 1: Blackwater one an exciting new contract to help deliver kitchen

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Speaker 1: equipment in Fallujah. Uh. They were eager to impress the

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Speaker 1: immoratic company that hired them, and they rushed the delivery.

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Speaker 1: Now I don't know if Prince was eager to impress

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Speaker 1: this company, but he was the guy running the whole

423
00:20:55,840 --> 00:20:58,800
Speaker 1: company at this time. So somebody from Blackwater top side

424
00:20:58,840 --> 00:21:02,200
Speaker 1: said get this kitchen equipment to its source as quick

425
00:21:02,240 --> 00:21:04,399
Speaker 1: as possible. And the people whose job it is to

426
00:21:04,400 --> 00:21:06,080
Speaker 1: determine how to do things, we're like, okay, well, we

427
00:21:06,119 --> 00:21:08,639
Speaker 1: need at least six armed men and they should all

428
00:21:08,680 --> 00:21:12,320
Speaker 1: be in armored vehicles. And whoever was in charge of

429
00:21:12,359 --> 00:21:14,040
Speaker 1: the mission was like, no, we'll have four guys and

430
00:21:14,040 --> 00:21:18,120
Speaker 1: we'll drive normal cars. Four guys in a VW bus

431
00:21:18,600 --> 00:21:20,480
Speaker 1: And Um, they were supposed to let the U. S.

432
00:21:20,520 --> 00:21:22,320
Speaker 1: Marines who were in charge of Fallujah at the time,

433
00:21:22,359 --> 00:21:23,720
Speaker 1: know that they were going to be there in case

434
00:21:23,720 --> 00:21:25,760
Speaker 1: they needed back up. It's containing to let the Marines

435
00:21:25,800 --> 00:21:28,800
Speaker 1: know that someone might be operating that they need help. Okay,

436
00:21:28,800 --> 00:21:32,320
Speaker 1: they didn't. Uh So these four guys get ambushed and killed. Um,

437
00:21:32,320 --> 00:21:35,320
Speaker 1: and a quote enraged mob drags their burnt bodies through

438
00:21:35,320 --> 00:21:38,320
Speaker 1: the streets and hangs their corpses from a bridge. Remember, yeah,

439
00:21:38,359 --> 00:21:41,800
Speaker 1: you do. Um. That whole incident sparked the Battle of Fallujah,

440
00:21:41,800 --> 00:21:43,720
Speaker 1: which is one of the bloodiest fights of the entire

441
00:21:43,760 --> 00:21:46,600
Speaker 1: Iraq War. Around a thousand or so civilians died, it's

442
00:21:46,600 --> 00:21:50,240
Speaker 1: hard to say, along with nine U S. Soldiers. Wow,

443
00:21:50,400 --> 00:21:53,960
Speaker 1: the kitchen equipment was never delivered. Yeah, someone's got a

444
00:21:54,040 --> 00:21:56,960
Speaker 1: nice kitchen though, somebody's got a great kitchen or it

445
00:21:57,040 --> 00:22:01,440
Speaker 1: all got burnt. Um. I don't think Blackwater impress the company, No,

446
00:22:01,680 --> 00:22:03,440
Speaker 1: not at all, I guess. And they really did try

447
00:22:03,480 --> 00:22:05,800
Speaker 1: and do their FedEx thing where also were there and

448
00:22:06,240 --> 00:22:09,840
Speaker 1: at their record time because they'll be poor so understaffed. Well,

449
00:22:09,880 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 1: you know, I've lost cant of how many times I've

450
00:22:12,080 --> 00:22:14,920
Speaker 1: ordered something through FedEx and their employees been ambushed and

451
00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:18,400
Speaker 1: hung from a bridge and sparked a brutal month long

452
00:22:18,840 --> 00:22:21,000
Speaker 1: siege of the city. Yeah, that's why I don't order

453
00:22:21,040 --> 00:22:24,240
Speaker 1: from Cranton Beryln. Yeah, they use FedEx. Yeah. Yeah, it's

454
00:22:24,280 --> 00:22:28,480
Speaker 1: just too many deaths. Yeah, it really is. Yeah, tragic.

455
00:22:29,320 --> 00:22:31,960
Speaker 1: So um. The high profile murder of four employees did

456
00:22:31,960 --> 00:22:36,120
Speaker 1: not exactly lower Blackwater's tempo in regards to flipping out

457
00:22:36,200 --> 00:22:38,880
Speaker 1: in any Iraqis who came near them. Uh. In two

458
00:22:38,920 --> 00:22:42,280
Speaker 1: thousand five, the Brigadier General responsible for Security and Bagdad

459
00:22:42,320 --> 00:22:44,560
Speaker 1: noted that in two months, contractors were involved in twelve

460
00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:48,159
Speaker 1: shootings that resulted in at least six civilian deaths. On

461
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:51,320
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve two thousand six, of Blackwater employee got ship

462
00:22:51,359 --> 00:22:54,080
Speaker 1: faced and started wandering around the Green Zone. He staggered

463
00:22:54,160 --> 00:22:56,159
Speaker 1: up to the Iraqi Vice President's house, got into an

464
00:22:56,240 --> 00:22:58,560
Speaker 1: argument with his bodyguards, and shot one of them to death.

465
00:22:58,760 --> 00:23:02,320
Speaker 1: What the This brave patriot ran back to a checkpoint

466
00:23:02,359 --> 00:23:04,640
Speaker 1: guarded by another group of contractors and told them he'd

467
00:23:04,640 --> 00:23:07,440
Speaker 1: been in a firefight with Iraqis. He was clearly drunk

468
00:23:07,440 --> 00:23:09,720
Speaker 1: and waving a gun around. They disarmed him and tried

469
00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:11,640
Speaker 1: to question him, but he was just way too hammered

470
00:23:11,720 --> 00:23:15,520
Speaker 1: to be questioned. Um So Blackwater fired the man, flew

471
00:23:15,600 --> 00:23:17,879
Speaker 1: him home, and paid fifteen thousand dollars to the family

472
00:23:17,880 --> 00:23:20,240
Speaker 1: of the dead guard. It was a tragic incident, but

473
00:23:20,359 --> 00:23:22,480
Speaker 1: not they assured a sign that their employees were a

474
00:23:22,520 --> 00:23:25,840
Speaker 1: bunch of irresponsibly violent cowboys. Holy ship, how is that

475
00:23:26,000 --> 00:23:29,680
Speaker 1: not an indication that there are a bunch of irresponsible cowboys?

476
00:23:29,840 --> 00:23:32,199
Speaker 1: You know what? The guy he got fired, and you

477
00:23:32,240 --> 00:23:34,800
Speaker 1: know it took him mean thousand dollars to that family.

478
00:23:34,880 --> 00:23:36,960
Speaker 1: I mean, I get it that in Iraq, that could

479
00:23:37,040 --> 00:23:39,560
Speaker 1: be a lot of money. So that's like that that

480
00:23:39,560 --> 00:23:42,199
Speaker 1: that maybe that's the going rate that Blackwater deems is

481
00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 1: like you know, consolation pay, but well it's in a

482
00:23:45,320 --> 00:23:47,760
Speaker 1: really messed up area. But like the initial amount the

483
00:23:47,840 --> 00:23:50,120
Speaker 1: US government suggested they give the family was two hudred

484
00:23:50,119 --> 00:23:52,399
Speaker 1: and fifty thousand. But then other people within the government,

485
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:54,199
Speaker 1: so this is in Blackwater, we're like, well, if we

486
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:57,560
Speaker 1: give that much money to the family that broke well,

487
00:23:57,560 --> 00:24:00,280
Speaker 1: no people are going to get their relatives old to

488
00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:03,120
Speaker 1: get money from us. That was their fear, not that

489
00:24:03,119 --> 00:24:04,840
Speaker 1: that ever happened, because I don't know that it like,

490
00:24:05,600 --> 00:24:07,600
Speaker 1: but of course it's like how all people think when

491
00:24:07,600 --> 00:24:10,040
Speaker 1: you're talking about destitute communities, like, well, they're gonna find

492
00:24:10,080 --> 00:24:11,760
Speaker 1: a way to take advantage of and they learned how,

493
00:24:12,240 --> 00:24:15,160
Speaker 1: and they'll self murderer and you know, frame less and

494
00:24:14,920 --> 00:24:18,800
Speaker 1: their kids murdered for cast ship and that was the government.

495
00:24:18,840 --> 00:24:22,480
Speaker 1: That's not on right. I mean the murders on black

496
00:24:22,480 --> 00:24:25,520
Speaker 1: Water absolutely um. But you know, you'll be happy to

497
00:24:25,600 --> 00:24:27,360
Speaker 1: know that the employee he was fired, he was sent

498
00:24:27,400 --> 00:24:28,920
Speaker 1: back to the US and it took him two months

499
00:24:28,960 --> 00:24:30,800
Speaker 1: to get another job at a private security firm and

500
00:24:30,840 --> 00:24:34,680
Speaker 1: wind up in Kuwait with a gun. Jesus right, back.

501
00:24:34,920 --> 00:24:37,640
Speaker 1: You can only fail up, yeah, or at least laterally.

502
00:24:38,160 --> 00:24:41,000
Speaker 1: And now I think he's Ryan Zinky right. The Interior Secretariat.

503
00:24:41,520 --> 00:24:45,120
Speaker 1: In August seven, the State Department decided they should investigate

504
00:24:45,160 --> 00:24:51,840
Speaker 1: Blackwater because of everything Naturally said so far. Yeah, they

505
00:24:51,920 --> 00:24:53,480
Speaker 1: came up with a bunch of fun incidents once they

506
00:24:53,520 --> 00:24:55,439
Speaker 1: started asking around. One of the things they found is

507
00:24:55,440 --> 00:24:58,720
Speaker 1: that several Blackwater employees had gotten hammered as fuck and

508
00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:02,119
Speaker 1: stolen a hundred and thousand dollar armored vehicle and driven

509
00:25:02,119 --> 00:25:04,320
Speaker 1: it to a party where they accidentally crashed it into

510
00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:09,920
Speaker 1: a concrete wall. Wow, what the fuck? It's so weird

511
00:25:09,960 --> 00:25:11,919
Speaker 1: to like hear this, right, because like, on one side,

512
00:25:12,040 --> 00:25:16,159
Speaker 1: it's just like deeply troubling, evil, tragic ship that they do,

513
00:25:16,320 --> 00:25:19,040
Speaker 1: and the other side is not that it's funny, but

514
00:25:19,160 --> 00:25:23,960
Speaker 1: it's so reckless that you can't believe that. Well, I

515
00:25:24,000 --> 00:25:26,240
Speaker 1: guess you can, because I've never you know, I feel

516
00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:28,640
Speaker 1: like all the things we hear about how the United

517
00:25:28,680 --> 00:25:30,720
Speaker 1: States operates outside of this country is just in a

518
00:25:30,840 --> 00:25:36,080
Speaker 1: very uh sort of haphazard way or irresponsible way. So yes, okay,

519
00:25:36,160 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 1: go on, let this uncomfortable laughter continue. So, the investigation

520
00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:43,520
Speaker 1: did find that Blackwater had been cutting corners um. They

521
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:46,360
Speaker 1: regularly reduced the number of their men guarding high profile

522
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:50,639
Speaker 1: people without actually charging for fewer guards. Automatic weapons were

523
00:25:50,680 --> 00:25:54,280
Speaker 1: found stored in private residences, which not supposed to do.

524
00:25:54,880 --> 00:25:57,960
Speaker 1: Blackwater employees were found to drink heavily, party with prostitutes,

525
00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:01,160
Speaker 1: and regularly failed to qualify on weapons. They were also

526
00:26:01,160 --> 00:26:03,760
Speaker 1: found to carry weapons like grenade launchers that they were

527
00:26:03,800 --> 00:26:09,359
Speaker 1: not certified to use. What wait, so they're drunk as

528
00:26:09,400 --> 00:26:10,879
Speaker 1: fun and then they'll be like, Yo, where did you

529
00:26:10,920 --> 00:26:13,360
Speaker 1: get that M two or three grenade launcher? They're like, hey,

530
00:26:13,400 --> 00:26:16,080
Speaker 1: I just I bought on eBay. Use it over here

531
00:26:16,080 --> 00:26:17,959
Speaker 1: in two oh three. I think we're talking about like

532
00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:20,680
Speaker 1: the automatic grenade launchers that you mount on the top

533
00:26:20,720 --> 00:26:27,840
Speaker 1: of a vehicle, like big like uh sort of murder canons. Yeah, okay,

534
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:29,399
Speaker 1: I don't. I think it's called like an m K.

535
00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:32,240
Speaker 1: I don't look at someone. I've seen him shoot a

536
00:26:32,280 --> 00:26:34,840
Speaker 1: couple of times. They're definitely fun looking, but um, you know,

537
00:26:34,880 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 1: maybe a qualified weight. So how are they getting it though?

538
00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:39,320
Speaker 1: Do you know, like are they self supplying it? And

539
00:26:39,320 --> 00:26:42,200
Speaker 1: they're just simply like you're actually not supposed to be. Yeah,

540
00:26:42,200 --> 00:26:44,520
Speaker 1: the Blackwater has is able to as one of these companies,

541
00:26:44,520 --> 00:26:46,480
Speaker 1: they're able to buy that sort of equipment to use

542
00:26:46,520 --> 00:26:49,280
Speaker 1: in these war zones. Um It's just that there are

543
00:26:49,320 --> 00:26:52,400
Speaker 1: certain standards that like the military has for anyone who's

544
00:26:52,400 --> 00:26:54,280
Speaker 1: going to be using that ship in a war zone,

545
00:26:54,320 --> 00:26:56,600
Speaker 1: Like if you're carrying that weapon in your a marine

546
00:26:56,680 --> 00:27:00,399
Speaker 1: or whatnot, you've done certain things. These guys are quired

547
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:02,399
Speaker 1: to qualify on those weapons too, if they're going to

548
00:27:02,440 --> 00:27:05,159
Speaker 1: carry them in war zones, and they're not. Blackwater is

549
00:27:05,160 --> 00:27:07,399
Speaker 1: basically not holding its people to the same standard as

550
00:27:07,400 --> 00:27:09,639
Speaker 1: the military, right, and they're treating it like, Yo, I

551
00:27:09,720 --> 00:27:12,479
Speaker 1: just put rims on my dad's fucking navigator. Let's take

552
00:27:12,520 --> 00:27:14,040
Speaker 1: it up for a spin, except this time it's a

553
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:16,840
Speaker 1: it's a rocket launcher and you're in a war zone exactly. Yeah.

554
00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:19,560
Speaker 1: Um So, in response to this, uh so, the State

555
00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:22,080
Speaker 1: Department you know, does this investigation and finds out black

556
00:27:22,080 --> 00:27:24,320
Speaker 1: Waters fucking up all over the place. The State Department

557
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:27,160
Speaker 1: investigator you know, sitting down and talking to the guy

558
00:27:27,280 --> 00:27:30,560
Speaker 1: Eric Prince, appointed to run Blackwater's operations in Iraq, uh

559
00:27:30,600 --> 00:27:34,000
Speaker 1: and this conversation turns heated, and the Blackwater guy threatens

560
00:27:34,040 --> 00:27:37,199
Speaker 1: to murder the State Department investigator and says, quote, no

561
00:27:37,200 --> 00:27:39,280
Speaker 1: one could or would do anything about it as we

562
00:27:39,280 --> 00:27:43,040
Speaker 1: were in Iraq. That's the State Department guy what we're

563
00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:46,600
Speaker 1: calling the conversation. It's basically like, I'm gonna murder you

564
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:49,200
Speaker 1: if you don't stop investigating Blackwater, and we're in Iraq,

565
00:27:49,359 --> 00:27:51,840
Speaker 1: so nobody's going to give a ship in space. No

566
00:27:51,920 --> 00:27:54,359
Speaker 1: one can hear you scream in Iraq. I can murder,

567
00:27:54,600 --> 00:27:56,800
Speaker 1: you know, undisturbed, and no one could and you know

568
00:27:56,920 --> 00:27:59,520
Speaker 1: I can because you just investigated all the times by

569
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:04,120
Speaker 1: companies murdered people here without any kind of repercussion. Yeah,

570
00:28:04,160 --> 00:28:06,520
Speaker 1: you would expect all of us to have some consequences.

571
00:28:06,760 --> 00:28:09,840
Speaker 1: Um but the US military, while government mainly, was kind

572
00:28:09,840 --> 00:28:11,320
Speaker 1: of in a bind when it came to Blackwater and

573
00:28:11,400 --> 00:28:14,119
Speaker 1: other contractors. So in two thousand seven there were at

574
00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:17,719
Speaker 1: least a hundred and sixty thousand contractors in Iraq. This

575
00:28:17,760 --> 00:28:20,280
Speaker 1: means they equalled and perhaps, since they weren't required to

576
00:28:20,320 --> 00:28:23,159
Speaker 1: disclose their true numbers, perhaps exceeded the numbers of the

577
00:28:23,240 --> 00:28:28,000
Speaker 1: US military in the country. Um So wow. Eric Prince's

578
00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:30,680
Speaker 1: pitch at the start of the whole fighting thing, which

579
00:28:30,680 --> 00:28:33,159
Speaker 1: the Bush administration had bought hook line and sinker was

580
00:28:33,200 --> 00:28:35,720
Speaker 1: that contractors would allow the government to vastly increase their

581
00:28:35,720 --> 00:28:38,240
Speaker 1: presence in the country without paying a political price for it.

582
00:28:38,680 --> 00:28:41,600
Speaker 1: So Bush can say, we only need a hundred and

583
00:28:41,600 --> 00:28:43,840
Speaker 1: sixty thousand troops to keep her acts safe, but thanks

584
00:28:43,880 --> 00:28:46,200
Speaker 1: to contractors that they've got three hundred thousand plus guys

585
00:28:46,240 --> 00:28:49,520
Speaker 1: in the country. Um. The government also left contractors and

586
00:28:49,560 --> 00:28:51,880
Speaker 1: needed them because their deaths were easy to ignore. By

587
00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:54,600
Speaker 1: two thousand seven, at least a thousand contractors had been

588
00:28:54,680 --> 00:28:58,200
Speaker 1: killed and thirteen thousand wounded, nine per day were dying

589
00:28:58,240 --> 00:29:00,600
Speaker 1: at the height of the surge. Any of those people

590
00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:04,280
Speaker 1: were the Third World nationals we talked about earlier, probably

591
00:29:04,400 --> 00:29:07,240
Speaker 1: because we don't actually know how many contractors died, it

592
00:29:07,240 --> 00:29:08,960
Speaker 1: could be even higher, and we don't know where any

593
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:11,320
Speaker 1: of them came from, because none of that is required

594
00:29:11,320 --> 00:29:14,000
Speaker 1: to be reported to anybody, and none of those deaths

595
00:29:14,040 --> 00:29:16,160
Speaker 1: go on the official tallies of US losses in the

596
00:29:16,200 --> 00:29:20,080
Speaker 1: War on Terror. So the government knows Blackwater is fucking

597
00:29:20,160 --> 00:29:22,840
Speaker 1: up and they're ruining the hearts and minds thing, which

598
00:29:22,840 --> 00:29:25,760
Speaker 1: is a critical part of being an insurgency. But also

599
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: they can't function the way that they've come used to

600
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:32,040
Speaker 1: functioning in Iraq without these guys because they're most of

601
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:35,880
Speaker 1: the effort now, right right, right, and so so a

602
00:29:35,880 --> 00:29:37,280
Speaker 1: lot of these people who are saying who were like

603
00:29:37,320 --> 00:29:39,800
Speaker 1: the third world nationals, are they coming with any kind

604
00:29:39,840 --> 00:29:42,560
Speaker 1: of military training? Most of them aren't doing. I mean,

605
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:44,880
Speaker 1: so most of are those who are getting are getting

606
00:29:44,960 --> 00:29:47,360
Speaker 1: killed in sort of non combat role exactly. Whenever you've

607
00:29:47,400 --> 00:29:50,000
Speaker 1: got the military occupation, like when the U S militaries

608
00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:52,400
Speaker 1: in Iraq, there's a hundred and sixty service members in Iraq.

609
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:54,600
Speaker 1: Most of them aren't kicking indoors and getting into gunfights.

610
00:29:54,640 --> 00:29:56,959
Speaker 1: Most of them are maintaining vehicles and doing you know,

611
00:29:57,080 --> 00:30:00,200
Speaker 1: built putting up communications equipment and all that stuff. It's

612
00:30:00,200 --> 00:30:02,000
Speaker 1: the same with the contractors. Most of them are driving

613
00:30:02,000 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 1: trucks or cooking for people, or maintaining building spaces. What

614
00:30:05,640 --> 00:30:07,360
Speaker 1: do you think that how does that percentage you think

615
00:30:07,480 --> 00:30:09,640
Speaker 1: or what's the ratio to like, I'm going to guess

616
00:30:09,840 --> 00:30:12,960
Speaker 1: most of the people dying or driving trucks because there's

617
00:30:13,080 --> 00:30:16,920
Speaker 1: constant streams of trucks all throughout right, and those guys, yeah,

618
00:30:16,920 --> 00:30:20,160
Speaker 1: those trucks aren't armored, right because Funckett, we don't have

619
00:30:20,200 --> 00:30:22,520
Speaker 1: to do anything because their third world nationals, who are

620
00:30:22,560 --> 00:30:25,360
Speaker 1: just a digit on a paper or spreadsheet. If they die,

621
00:30:25,400 --> 00:30:28,600
Speaker 1: it doesn't hurt us politically. Bush isn't being asked to

622
00:30:28,640 --> 00:30:33,320
Speaker 1: account for dead you know, uh, foreign national contractors. How

623
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:39,240
Speaker 1: many Bangladeshis were killing exactly? I don't know, You're not

624
00:30:39,240 --> 00:30:43,280
Speaker 1: going yeah. Um So, despite the rough patches, the first

625
00:30:43,320 --> 00:30:45,120
Speaker 1: four years of the Iraq War went pretty well for

626
00:30:45,160 --> 00:30:47,640
Speaker 1: Erik Prince. It is possible that some of this went

627
00:30:47,680 --> 00:30:50,000
Speaker 1: to his head. In mid two thousand seven, he gathered

628
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,920
Speaker 1: a bunch of contractors at Blackwater's headquarters in North Carolina

629
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:56,400
Speaker 1: and aman did they swear an oath of allegiance? Um? Okay.

630
00:30:56,440 --> 00:30:58,640
Speaker 1: I think the text of the oath said a lot about,

631
00:30:58,680 --> 00:31:01,320
Speaker 1: you know, swearing to fight war on terror and you know,

632
00:31:01,400 --> 00:31:03,920
Speaker 1: loyalty to the principles of America and stuff. But a

633
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:07,880
Speaker 1: former employee, an actual Blackwater armed contractor, told The New

634
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:10,520
Speaker 1: York Times, it kind of felt like pledging allegiance to Eric.

635
00:31:10,640 --> 00:31:14,280
Speaker 1: That's how a lot of us interpreted it. Wow. Yeah, he,

636
00:31:15,040 --> 00:31:18,760
Speaker 1: I mean, he has such a weird origin story to

637
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:22,200
Speaker 1: like to not watch it. Starting off as like rich

638
00:31:22,280 --> 00:31:26,480
Speaker 1: kid who for whatever reason was like, I mean, I

639
00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:28,800
Speaker 1: don't know whatever reason it, probably his upbringing was hyper

640
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:32,320
Speaker 1: conservative and now turned into like this sort of demi god. Yeah,

641
00:31:32,480 --> 00:31:36,760
Speaker 1: many little dictator in his own little fiefdom army thing. Yeah.

642
00:31:37,240 --> 00:31:39,760
Speaker 1: Um So, a couple of weeks after he has them

643
00:31:39,760 --> 00:31:43,480
Speaker 1: all pledged loyalty, disaster strikes when Blackwater employees freak out

644
00:31:43,520 --> 00:31:46,160
Speaker 1: and start firing machine guns and grenade launchers into a

645
00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:50,160
Speaker 1: crowd at back Dad's Nissoire Square. They killed at least

646
00:31:50,160 --> 00:31:53,360
Speaker 1: seventeen people, wounded dozens more. And one of the people

647
00:31:53,360 --> 00:31:54,840
Speaker 1: they killed was a nine year old boy. He was

648
00:31:54,880 --> 00:31:56,680
Speaker 1: like burnt to the bodies of his parents in a car.

649
00:31:56,760 --> 00:32:00,240
Speaker 1: It was horrible. Uh. Blackwater's immediate response to the masser

650
00:32:00,320 --> 00:32:02,360
Speaker 1: was to take down their website and refuse all interviews.

651
00:32:02,720 --> 00:32:05,520
Speaker 1: The company spokesperson sent out an email in English only

652
00:32:05,520 --> 00:32:08,920
Speaker 1: two Americans that said the civilians reportedly fired upon by

653
00:32:08,960 --> 00:32:12,400
Speaker 1: Blackwater professionals were in fact armed enemies. This contrast with

654
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:14,880
Speaker 1: the opinion of the US military, who found no evidence

655
00:32:14,880 --> 00:32:17,240
Speaker 1: of insurgent activity in the square that day. But that's

656
00:32:17,280 --> 00:32:19,680
Speaker 1: just the military, right righte? What do they know about

657
00:32:19,800 --> 00:32:25,360
Speaker 1: insurgents there? Let the contractors the real work. That's insane

658
00:32:25,360 --> 00:32:28,480
Speaker 1: and so their account to defend themselves for slaughtering a

659
00:32:28,480 --> 00:32:31,240
Speaker 1: bunch of innocence was that, like, is there was there

660
00:32:31,280 --> 00:32:33,920
Speaker 1: any like like in the reporting of it, like anything

661
00:32:33,960 --> 00:32:35,840
Speaker 1: that someone could even perceive to be as a threat

662
00:32:35,920 --> 00:32:39,120
Speaker 1: or do people just think like they're so unprofessional that

663
00:32:39,160 --> 00:32:41,280
Speaker 1: they got spooked and just fired on a bunch of civilians.

664
00:32:41,280 --> 00:32:42,720
Speaker 1: So I can tell you that when you hang out

665
00:32:42,760 --> 00:32:46,600
Speaker 1: in credit Iraqi cities, especially when there's a lot of unrest,

666
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:49,600
Speaker 1: you're gonna hear gunfire regularly. My guests, from what I've

667
00:32:49,600 --> 00:32:51,800
Speaker 1: read is that somewhere else in the city there was

668
00:32:51,840 --> 00:32:54,400
Speaker 1: some shooting or maybe even a fucking backfiring car. There

669
00:32:54,440 --> 00:32:56,120
Speaker 1: might have been a bomb that went off somewhere else

670
00:32:56,160 --> 00:32:59,120
Speaker 1: in the city, and these guys got spooked, oh right,

671
00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:00,840
Speaker 1: And they said from maybe they saw a guy who

672
00:33:00,840 --> 00:33:02,960
Speaker 1: looked shady and they heard a sound that was shady

673
00:33:02,960 --> 00:33:04,880
Speaker 1: and at the same time, and people just started firing,

674
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:07,040
Speaker 1: and maybe a couple of the bullets ricocheted passed and

675
00:33:07,080 --> 00:33:10,080
Speaker 1: that made him keep firing. Like It's it's hard to say,

676
00:33:10,120 --> 00:33:13,680
Speaker 1: but the military says there's no evidence, uh that they

677
00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:16,760
Speaker 1: were under fire at all, that there is any insurgent activity.

678
00:33:17,000 --> 00:33:20,040
Speaker 1: Um After releasing the statement, black Water put their website

679
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:22,360
Speaker 1: back up. They made no mention of the massacre, and

680
00:33:22,400 --> 00:33:24,920
Speaker 1: continue to sell black Water branded T shirts, baseball caps,

681
00:33:24,920 --> 00:33:28,440
Speaker 1: and baby clothes. Your strategies are like literally kind of

682
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:31,120
Speaker 1: putting their fingers in their ears by taking their website down,

683
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:33,080
Speaker 1: and like, well, just wait for this to pass, but

684
00:33:33,160 --> 00:33:35,240
Speaker 1: let's make sure we're getting the merch out there to

685
00:33:35,440 --> 00:33:37,520
Speaker 1: merch out there. I mean, I've ordered some of the

686
00:33:37,560 --> 00:33:39,880
Speaker 1: baby clothes for Jack. I feel like it's a good gift.

687
00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:42,920
Speaker 1: I think, I mean he I think Jack is wearing

688
00:33:42,960 --> 00:33:47,360
Speaker 1: the black Water hoodie. Got Jack loves black Yeah, he's

689
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:49,560
Speaker 1: big into contractor where I mean if Jack, I think

690
00:33:49,560 --> 00:33:51,320
Speaker 1: he should really be thinking about in terms of if

691
00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:54,520
Speaker 1: his own powerful ascension, he should have a private army

692
00:33:54,520 --> 00:33:57,640
Speaker 1: to everyone needs a private army. Nobody's disagreeing with that.

693
00:33:58,120 --> 00:34:01,040
Speaker 1: We're talking about Jack O'Brien. Jacob, you haven't. If you

694
00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:02,920
Speaker 1: know about this podcast, you know what universe you're in.

695
00:34:03,160 --> 00:34:08,520
Speaker 1: The only Jack there is is Jack O'Brien black Water enthusiast. Um.

696
00:34:08,560 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 1: We could keep talking about black Water for several podcasts.

697
00:34:11,560 --> 00:34:14,080
Speaker 1: There's so much that I just didn't even include. Um,

698
00:34:14,120 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 1: But the Eric Prince story is much bigger and dumber

699
00:34:16,239 --> 00:34:19,200
Speaker 1: than that, and so we have to move on. Oh okay,

700
00:34:19,320 --> 00:34:23,440
Speaker 1: so that was a moose bush for the main main course, Well,

701
00:34:23,480 --> 00:34:25,439
Speaker 1: there's just there's just a lot to cover here. Um.

702
00:34:25,880 --> 00:34:28,160
Speaker 1: So you know, after after that whole massacre thing, some

703
00:34:28,200 --> 00:34:31,960
Speaker 1: people go to jail, although their convictions were overturned last year.

704
00:34:32,600 --> 00:34:36,120
Speaker 1: What yeah, again, it's a lot of stories here, um.

705
00:34:36,160 --> 00:34:39,279
Speaker 1: But Prince changed the company's name to x E from

706
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:42,200
Speaker 1: Blackwater to avoid the bad press, and then he sold

707
00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:44,799
Speaker 1: the company like two ten. It's now called Academy with

708
00:34:44,840 --> 00:34:48,040
Speaker 1: an Eye because I don't I don't really know why. Um,

709
00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:50,520
Speaker 1: Blackwater is no longer black Water. Prince was no longer

710
00:34:50,520 --> 00:34:52,560
Speaker 1: with black Water, he was still devoted to the company,

711
00:34:52,600 --> 00:34:54,080
Speaker 1: and one of the last things he did was work

712
00:34:54,120 --> 00:34:56,600
Speaker 1: with the game's developer to make a black Water video game.

713
00:34:57,040 --> 00:35:00,399
Speaker 1: According to Prince, the game's purpose was to quote give

714
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:02,719
Speaker 1: players the chance to experience what it is like to

715
00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:04,920
Speaker 1: be on a Blackwater team on a mission without being

716
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:08,480
Speaker 1: dropped into a real combat situation. We already have games

717
00:35:08,520 --> 00:35:11,680
Speaker 1: for that, sir. They're every other video yeah, exactly. If

718
00:35:11,719 --> 00:35:15,239
Speaker 1: you just want to kill people randomly. Whatever it was

719
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:19,000
Speaker 1: like a Connect Motion game. I haven't actually played it. Yeah,

720
00:35:19,120 --> 00:35:24,480
Speaker 1: oh yeah, it was a Connect Motion video Blackwater Blackwater Guy.

721
00:35:24,520 --> 00:35:26,560
Speaker 1: It was apparently very bad. All of the reviews I've

722
00:35:26,600 --> 00:35:29,040
Speaker 1: read are terrible. Yeah, because I can't imagine like people.

723
00:35:29,280 --> 00:35:30,840
Speaker 1: I found a lot like people who are sort of

724
00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:33,239
Speaker 1: like in the very conservative side of things. They tend

725
00:35:33,239 --> 00:35:35,640
Speaker 1: to not have the best taste in creatives that they

726
00:35:35,680 --> 00:35:37,719
Speaker 1: work with. So I'm sure they probably just found some

727
00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:39,239
Speaker 1: kid who's like, you know, it's like they went to

728
00:35:39,239 --> 00:35:42,000
Speaker 1: Infinity Ward who made like Call of Duty, and we're like, hey,

729
00:35:42,160 --> 00:35:43,920
Speaker 1: we need you for the new black Water game. They

730
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,160
Speaker 1: didn't pull all the stops out for this. Are the

731
00:35:46,360 --> 00:35:49,239
Speaker 1: gestures like, anyway, I'll have to I'll have to read something.

732
00:35:49,239 --> 00:35:50,680
Speaker 1: I've got a couple. There's a quote from I g

733
00:35:50,840 --> 00:35:53,920
Speaker 1: N that could double his review for the actual company Blackwater. Um.

734
00:35:53,960 --> 00:35:56,160
Speaker 1: They said it employs nothing but bad ideas and it

735
00:35:56,200 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 1: fails to do anything exciting with any of them. Um.

736
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:01,800
Speaker 1: Another reviewer from Giant Bomb noted that the game presents

737
00:36:01,800 --> 00:36:05,720
Speaker 1: Blackwater employees as quote a bunch of selfless, good natured

738
00:36:05,800 --> 00:36:08,600
Speaker 1: totally not mercenaries who save hostages and deliver food and

739
00:36:08,640 --> 00:36:11,160
Speaker 1: totally don't kill civilians. How could they when there are

740
00:36:11,200 --> 00:36:19,400
Speaker 1: literally no civilians anywhere in this game? No margin. Yeah yeah,

741
00:36:19,440 --> 00:36:21,480
Speaker 1: so I know what you're thinking. Isn't it sad that

742
00:36:21,480 --> 00:36:23,360
Speaker 1: poor Eric Prince had to give up on his dreams

743
00:36:23,360 --> 00:36:26,200
Speaker 1: of having his own private armies. Well, don't worry. Eric

744
00:36:26,239 --> 00:36:28,239
Speaker 1: does not give up on his dreams. He's not that

745
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:31,880
Speaker 1: kind of man. After selling Blackwater, he relocated to Dubai.

746
00:36:32,120 --> 00:36:35,600
Speaker 1: The Immati police ponied up five million dollars for him

747
00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:38,880
Speaker 1: to create an eight hundred man foreign fighting force because

748
00:36:38,920 --> 00:36:42,200
Speaker 1: you know, they have internal revolts to suppress. Um. The

749
00:36:42,239 --> 00:36:44,600
Speaker 1: emirates are filled with crowded labor camps. That's who builds

750
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:50,080
Speaker 1: all those fans slave slave labor from Southeast Asia at

751
00:36:50,120 --> 00:36:53,040
Speaker 1: best a half step up from object slavery. Uh, and

752
00:36:53,040 --> 00:36:54,680
Speaker 1: there's a lot of unrest there. So the U a E.

753
00:36:54,880 --> 00:36:57,439
Speaker 1: Was like, Eric Prince, would you make us an army

754
00:36:57,520 --> 00:37:00,000
Speaker 1: of foreign soldiers that we can use to brutally suppress

755
00:37:00,040 --> 00:37:05,160
Speaker 1: us up right? Yeah, I need something to uh quell

756
00:37:05,280 --> 00:37:09,640
Speaker 1: the revolts that are impending with your professional killer groups.

757
00:37:09,760 --> 00:37:12,720
Speaker 1: Eric Prince was just the guy to make that happen. Um.

758
00:37:12,760 --> 00:37:15,839
Speaker 1: The whole operation was almost certainly illegal. American citizens are

759
00:37:15,880 --> 00:37:18,360
Speaker 1: not allowed to train foreign soldiers without permission from the

760
00:37:18,360 --> 00:37:21,360
Speaker 1: State Department. During his last year in charge of Blackwater,

761
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:23,719
Speaker 1: the company had paid a forty two million dollar fine

762
00:37:23,760 --> 00:37:26,040
Speaker 1: for illegally training troops in Jordan's So this is like

763
00:37:26,040 --> 00:37:29,040
Speaker 1: a pattern with Eric Prince is illegally training foreign troops.

764
00:37:29,400 --> 00:37:31,719
Speaker 1: In order to sidestep any problems, this time, Prince just

765
00:37:31,840 --> 00:37:34,960
Speaker 1: pretended he wasn't involved. He adopted the code name Kingfish

766
00:37:35,080 --> 00:37:36,840
Speaker 1: so no one would know that he was committing blatant

767
00:37:36,840 --> 00:37:39,160
Speaker 1: international crimes. Wait, what do you mean the code name?

768
00:37:39,239 --> 00:37:43,399
Speaker 1: Like he's just like the documents, so they would never

769
00:37:43,760 --> 00:37:45,759
Speaker 1: the words Eric Prince wouldn't show up. There was a

770
00:37:45,800 --> 00:37:47,719
Speaker 1: company like RS two or something like. That was the

771
00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:50,400
Speaker 1: name of the company doing the training, and Prince was

772
00:37:50,400 --> 00:37:52,400
Speaker 1: connected to them and own them, but like didn't Like

773
00:37:52,440 --> 00:37:54,560
Speaker 1: it's one of those like when you've got enough lawyers

774
00:37:54,560 --> 00:37:57,560
Speaker 1: and stuff and figure out the layers of it. There's

775
00:37:57,560 --> 00:38:00,480
Speaker 1: been some great journalists, particularly the Inner Stup to have

776
00:38:00,520 --> 00:38:04,200
Speaker 1: spent years sort of unappealing the onion of Eric Princess.

777
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:07,759
Speaker 1: So he's showing like sort of the mechanics of his

778
00:38:07,800 --> 00:38:11,360
Speaker 1: plausible deniability machine. Basically, yeah, exactly, but kingfish is what

779
00:38:11,400 --> 00:38:13,399
Speaker 1: he goes by at this time, so of course, yeah,

780
00:38:14,080 --> 00:38:16,920
Speaker 1: uh not no longer Prince Fish. Yeah, he's become king.

781
00:38:17,000 --> 00:38:20,799
Speaker 1: He's a kingfish. Yeah. Um. So rather than hiring US

782
00:38:20,840 --> 00:38:24,200
Speaker 1: Special Forces veterans, which remembers what he promised to do

783
00:38:24,239 --> 00:38:26,560
Speaker 1: and why he said that he wasn't a mercenary warlord,

784
00:38:26,680 --> 00:38:30,319
Speaker 1: because he was because I hire American people, right. Uh,

785
00:38:30,320 --> 00:38:32,480
Speaker 1: he opted to bring in soldiers from Colombia because they

786
00:38:32,480 --> 00:38:35,919
Speaker 1: were cheaper. The project immediately encountered problems when it turned

787
00:38:35,920 --> 00:38:37,759
Speaker 1: out that many of these soldiers had never even fired

788
00:38:37,800 --> 00:38:41,120
Speaker 1: a weapon. Uh. Prince initially hoped that this battalion would

789
00:38:41,120 --> 00:38:43,120
Speaker 1: be the first of many, but after numerous problems, the

790
00:38:43,120 --> 00:38:45,440
Speaker 1: force was reduced in size to five and eighty men.

791
00:38:45,840 --> 00:38:48,359
Speaker 1: Men who actually served in the battalion reported being locked

792
00:38:48,360 --> 00:38:51,200
Speaker 1: indoors all day and being incredibly bored. The boredom was

793
00:38:51,239 --> 00:38:53,400
Speaker 1: only broken up by occasional trips paid for by the

794
00:38:53,440 --> 00:38:57,520
Speaker 1: company to divide the prostitutes. Wow. Otherwise they're just like

795
00:38:58,040 --> 00:39:00,239
Speaker 1: in a room. Slave kill squad just had to hang

796
00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:02,560
Speaker 1: out in a room until it was process. They would

797
00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:04,520
Speaker 1: do some running and training, but then they were locked

798
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:08,040
Speaker 1: in a room. Uh, but every now and then they

799
00:39:08,080 --> 00:39:13,000
Speaker 1: got some prostitutes. So that's okay, okay, Eric Prince, this

800
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:15,279
Speaker 1: this all seems above board. So yeah, I mean, at

801
00:39:15,280 --> 00:39:17,839
Speaker 1: this point, Eric Prince's first army had committed numerous war

802
00:39:17,920 --> 00:39:20,799
Speaker 1: crimes and his second army uh seemed to be on

803
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:23,640
Speaker 1: its way to fizzling out. Um So in two fourteen,

804
00:39:23,640 --> 00:39:25,960
Speaker 1: Erik Prince decided to take a break from making armies

805
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:28,480
Speaker 1: to try a bold new business strategy, making his own

806
00:39:28,480 --> 00:39:35,200
Speaker 1: air force. WHOA, what the fuck? So that year Eric

807
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:38,799
Speaker 1: Prince gets closes up with an investment firm called the

808
00:39:38,840 --> 00:39:42,080
Speaker 1: Civic Group and founded a company named Frontier Logistics Group.

809
00:39:42,320 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 1: Now Civic Group is an investment company that is owned

810
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:47,880
Speaker 1: by the Chinese government. So this meant Eric Prince was

811
00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:50,520
Speaker 1: either in business with or straight up working for China.

812
00:39:50,560 --> 00:39:54,120
Speaker 1: Now wow, so he doesn't he does not give up.

813
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:56,680
Speaker 1: You think he's a patriot in any way, or he's

814
00:39:56,719 --> 00:39:59,359
Speaker 1: just like pure reptilian brand, like I'm just gonna do

815
00:39:59,520 --> 00:40:01,799
Speaker 1: what I want. I know nothing else but for me

816
00:40:01,920 --> 00:40:04,840
Speaker 1: to obtain what I want. I am sure he would

817
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:07,600
Speaker 1: consider himself a patriot and have a justification. What kind

818
00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:09,799
Speaker 1: of mental gymnastics do you think he's doing to say, like, oh,

819
00:40:09,880 --> 00:40:11,960
Speaker 1: I made a you know, like a kill squad for

820
00:40:12,080 --> 00:40:14,279
Speaker 1: the U A E. And now I'm making a weird

821
00:40:14,320 --> 00:40:16,400
Speaker 1: private Chinese air force the U a EAR sort of

822
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:19,000
Speaker 1: allies of the United States. He's not making an air

823
00:40:19,040 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 1: force for China. We're about to get into that. He's

824
00:40:21,080 --> 00:40:23,480
Speaker 1: just so The Frontier Logistics Group is supposed to be

825
00:40:23,480 --> 00:40:25,440
Speaker 1: just a logistics company. They're the people you call if

826
00:40:25,440 --> 00:40:27,560
Speaker 1: you're a corporation. You're like, we've got a bunch of

827
00:40:27,560 --> 00:40:30,279
Speaker 1: diamonds in this country. I got him shipped here. Can

828
00:40:30,320 --> 00:40:32,719
Speaker 1: you help us arrange that? Or we've got sick executives

829
00:40:32,760 --> 00:40:36,040
Speaker 1: in Central Africa, can you get a metavact. We're building

830
00:40:36,080 --> 00:40:38,279
Speaker 1: an oil field in this country. Help us figure out

831
00:40:38,320 --> 00:40:40,080
Speaker 1: how to set it up an organize so that like

832
00:40:40,080 --> 00:40:42,520
Speaker 1: that's a perfectly legitimate business. Somebody needs to do that

833
00:40:42,560 --> 00:40:47,520
Speaker 1: work if you're like in that industry. Um so secretly

834
00:40:47,719 --> 00:40:49,640
Speaker 1: without getting the approval of the rest of the company.

835
00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:52,880
Speaker 1: Eric Prince also started trying to use FLG to build

836
00:40:52,880 --> 00:40:55,080
Speaker 1: his own private air force, which you could then rent

837
00:40:55,120 --> 00:40:58,080
Speaker 1: out to small African nations who needed to suppress insurgencies.

838
00:40:58,440 --> 00:41:00,399
Speaker 1: So the Chinese as far as we know, have no

839
00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:02,760
Speaker 1: idea he's doing this, and neither do the other people

840
00:41:02,800 --> 00:41:05,160
Speaker 1: he's working with at f LG. He has his own

841
00:41:05,160 --> 00:41:07,719
Speaker 1: tiny team within the company, and he decides, We're going

842
00:41:07,760 --> 00:41:10,719
Speaker 1: to build an air force and not tell anyone. How

843
00:41:10,719 --> 00:41:13,120
Speaker 1: do you fucking hide your It's like you have a

844
00:41:13,239 --> 00:41:15,200
Speaker 1: you're making a bong in your room at a teenager

845
00:41:15,200 --> 00:41:16,440
Speaker 1: and mom was like, what are you doing in there?

846
00:41:16,440 --> 00:41:19,239
Speaker 1: Like nothing, just like playing with this cups, like I

847
00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:22,720
Speaker 1: smell fire, I smell plastic mountain. It's like you're building

848
00:41:22,719 --> 00:41:24,960
Speaker 1: a straight up rental air force and you can keep

849
00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:27,640
Speaker 1: it under wraps. Well, you can't keep it under rest.

850
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:30,840
Speaker 1: We've got some commercials and after that we're going to

851
00:41:30,880 --> 00:41:33,160
Speaker 1: talk about Eric tried to hide his private air force

852
00:41:33,560 --> 00:41:36,520
Speaker 1: and how it didn't quite work out the way he planned.

853
00:41:36,600 --> 00:41:45,919
Speaker 1: So all of that, after some capitalism ditties, we're back,

854
00:41:46,680 --> 00:41:50,080
Speaker 1: uh and we are talking about Eric Prince's noble quest

855
00:41:50,400 --> 00:41:54,480
Speaker 1: to build his own private air force without anyone knowing. Um,

856
00:41:54,520 --> 00:41:56,439
Speaker 1: so I probably shouldn't have to say it, but I will.

857
00:41:56,520 --> 00:41:59,359
Speaker 1: It is illegal to make your own air force U

858
00:41:59,360 --> 00:42:02,440
Speaker 1: S government does and allowed you just mean like creating

859
00:42:02,480 --> 00:42:05,960
Speaker 1: a collection of like fighter jets or armed planes meant

860
00:42:06,000 --> 00:42:08,160
Speaker 1: to murder people from the sky. Can even buy an

861
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:11,080
Speaker 1: armed plane? No, no, you cannot, So you need the

862
00:42:11,120 --> 00:42:14,480
Speaker 1: cover of a government even obtain a kill plane. There

863
00:42:14,520 --> 00:42:18,560
Speaker 1: are ways for private companies to deploy air assets that

864
00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:21,280
Speaker 1: can attack people, provide close air support. There are companies

865
00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:22,920
Speaker 1: that do that. But there's like a problem, like you

866
00:42:22,960 --> 00:42:25,319
Speaker 1: have to get a lot. Like you the government has

867
00:42:25,360 --> 00:42:26,880
Speaker 1: to issue you a bunch of ships like it's a

868
00:42:27,160 --> 00:42:30,360
Speaker 1: it's a thing. Like some of Prince's competitors. We're able

869
00:42:30,400 --> 00:42:33,239
Speaker 1: to get government approval to provide close air support and

870
00:42:33,320 --> 00:42:35,440
Speaker 1: have small fleets of aircraft, but like you know, you

871
00:42:35,480 --> 00:42:37,239
Speaker 1: agree to government inspections, you get a bunch of And

872
00:42:37,400 --> 00:42:39,560
Speaker 1: Eric Prince is not a big fan of licenses or

873
00:42:39,640 --> 00:42:43,239
Speaker 1: qualifications or not breaking international law. What are you doing

874
00:42:43,239 --> 00:42:48,759
Speaker 1: in your room? Nothing? Mom, it's not an airport. Um,

875
00:42:49,080 --> 00:42:52,160
Speaker 1: so Eric Prince. So just to catch you up, he

876
00:42:52,280 --> 00:42:55,160
Speaker 1: starts a company with a Chinese government called Frontier Logistics

877
00:42:55,160 --> 00:42:58,319
Speaker 1: Group that's supposed to like help companies particularly working like

878
00:42:58,360 --> 00:43:01,200
Speaker 1: Africa and Southeast Asia. Um, you know, get stuff from

879
00:43:01,200 --> 00:43:02,719
Speaker 1: A to b right, because China's got their eye on

880
00:43:02,760 --> 00:43:04,640
Speaker 1: Africa right now, China's got their eye on a lot

881
00:43:04,680 --> 00:43:06,600
Speaker 1: of places. Yeah, well, and I think they're smart. It's funny.

882
00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:09,120
Speaker 1: When I was in Ghana, like in two thousand and eight,

883
00:43:09,560 --> 00:43:12,320
Speaker 1: they were the African Cup of Nations was happening and

884
00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:14,239
Speaker 1: they had to build a bunch of new stadiums there

885
00:43:14,680 --> 00:43:16,760
Speaker 1: and when I was like, oh, wow, like this is crazy,

886
00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:18,480
Speaker 1: like these are huge modern stadiums, and one of the

887
00:43:18,560 --> 00:43:21,440
Speaker 1: locals are like, yeah, if they're all Chinese prisoners building it,

888
00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:23,759
Speaker 1: And then I was like whoa what? And I was like, yeah,

889
00:43:23,760 --> 00:43:26,760
Speaker 1: they use these guys because if they try and escape

890
00:43:26,840 --> 00:43:29,000
Speaker 1: there in the middle of Africa, and they're just gonna

891
00:43:29,000 --> 00:43:31,040
Speaker 1: be like have you seen the Chinese guy? And they

892
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:32,719
Speaker 1: can like they just know. They don't really have to

893
00:43:32,719 --> 00:43:36,080
Speaker 1: put them under much, you know, surveillance. But I mean,

894
00:43:36,120 --> 00:43:37,719
Speaker 1: at least I could have been a myth. But I

895
00:43:38,080 --> 00:43:39,879
Speaker 1: feel like and also a lot of the consumer goes.

896
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:42,560
Speaker 1: I was surprised how much of it came from China,

897
00:43:43,080 --> 00:43:46,040
Speaker 1: but I guess they see a market. So yeah. Um.

898
00:43:46,080 --> 00:43:49,280
Speaker 1: What Prince tells Civic Group, which is the Chinese company

899
00:43:49,320 --> 00:43:52,600
Speaker 1: that owns Frontier with him, what Prince tells them is that,

900
00:43:53,520 --> 00:43:55,200
Speaker 1: you know, he thinks there's a market where they can

901
00:43:55,239 --> 00:43:57,520
Speaker 1: make some quick cash if they have a couple of

902
00:43:58,200 --> 00:44:01,640
Speaker 1: moderately armored planes with sensors on them. So that like,

903
00:44:01,800 --> 00:44:04,520
Speaker 1: if a company has a mine somewhere and they're worried

904
00:44:04,600 --> 00:44:06,759
Speaker 1: that insurgents are going to rob the mine, you know,

905
00:44:06,880 --> 00:44:09,440
Speaker 1: the government can pay us to surveil the area to

906
00:44:09,520 --> 00:44:11,839
Speaker 1: let them know if an attacks company. That's legal. There's

907
00:44:11,840 --> 00:44:15,280
Speaker 1: nothing illegal about, you know, government paying you to provide

908
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:18,759
Speaker 1: aerial surveillance uh or an area like a mine. So

909
00:44:18,800 --> 00:44:22,279
Speaker 1: that's what Prince says he's doing to his backers in

910
00:44:22,400 --> 00:44:25,440
Speaker 1: China and to his other American friends who work in

911
00:44:25,480 --> 00:44:30,480
Speaker 1: Frontier with him. Without telling them, he buys of another company,

912
00:44:30,880 --> 00:44:34,160
Speaker 1: h an Austrian company called Airborne Technologies, so it becomes

913
00:44:34,160 --> 00:44:36,719
Speaker 1: an owner in this company, and he uses them to

914
00:44:36,760 --> 00:44:40,080
Speaker 1: start producing an aircraft. They take an old Thrush five

915
00:44:40,120 --> 00:44:42,799
Speaker 1: tin crop dusting plane and they turned it into an

916
00:44:42,800 --> 00:44:44,880
Speaker 1: engine of war. And now at this point and for

917
00:44:45,000 --> 00:44:46,960
Speaker 1: most of the air Force stuff. Here, I'm quoting from

918
00:44:47,000 --> 00:44:50,600
Speaker 1: a fabulous article in the intersect called Echo Papa Exposed.

919
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:53,800
Speaker 1: Now here's a quote describing the airplane he has built.

920
00:44:54,160 --> 00:44:57,279
Speaker 1: In addition to surveillance and laser targeting equipment. Airborne had

921
00:44:57,280 --> 00:45:00,719
Speaker 1: outfitted the plane with bulletproof cockpit windows and arm engine block,

922
00:45:00,800 --> 00:45:03,880
Speaker 1: anti explosive mesh for the fuel tank, and specialized wiring

923
00:45:03,880 --> 00:45:07,120
Speaker 1: that could control rockets and bombs. The company also installed

924
00:45:07,160 --> 00:45:10,120
Speaker 1: pods for mounting two high powered twenty three millimeter chain

925
00:45:10,160 --> 00:45:14,600
Speaker 1: guns straight Vulcan canon in that thing. So to maintain secrecy,

926
00:45:15,120 --> 00:45:17,040
Speaker 1: Prince does his best to keep his name out of

927
00:45:17,040 --> 00:45:19,759
Speaker 1: this project. So the people at Airborne, other than like

928
00:45:19,840 --> 00:45:21,480
Speaker 1: a couple of their top people, don't know him as

929
00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:23,560
Speaker 1: Eric Prince. He's referred to in all of their papers

930
00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:29,319
Speaker 1: as Echo Papa. But he purchased or he I mean, yeah,

931
00:45:29,480 --> 00:45:32,279
Speaker 1: essentially that's the only name he's known by in any

932
00:45:32,320 --> 00:45:34,080
Speaker 1: of the public or not even public, and even the

933
00:45:34,120 --> 00:45:37,319
Speaker 1: documents the engineer see. So the engineers see that someone

934
00:45:37,400 --> 00:45:40,040
Speaker 1: with a codename Echo Papa is ordering them to build

935
00:45:40,040 --> 00:45:43,640
Speaker 1: a military aircraft. That doesn't seem weird to them initially

936
00:45:43,680 --> 00:45:46,160
Speaker 1: because they've done some contracts that are secret for like

937
00:45:46,200 --> 00:45:48,800
Speaker 1: the German government in the Swiss government, so they think, okay,

938
00:45:48,800 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: this is probably a government thing. Be done this kind.

939
00:45:51,480 --> 00:45:53,360
Speaker 1: Our bosses assure us it's on the up and up.

940
00:45:53,400 --> 00:45:55,520
Speaker 1: We're not breaking any laws, but they knew they were

941
00:45:55,520 --> 00:45:58,440
Speaker 1: getting into bed with Eric Prince. Right, A couple of

942
00:45:58,440 --> 00:46:00,319
Speaker 1: people at the top of the company knew. The people

943
00:46:00,320 --> 00:46:02,320
Speaker 1: actually building the plane think they're working for like a

944
00:46:02,400 --> 00:46:04,640
Speaker 1: German But yeah, but I guess, I guess yeah, to

945
00:46:04,680 --> 00:46:07,200
Speaker 1: buy stake in a company like obviously, the people at

946
00:46:07,200 --> 00:46:09,279
Speaker 1: the top are gonna know. Oh, I see who this

947
00:46:09,320 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: person is, Okay, So yeah, one day, near the end

948
00:46:13,239 --> 00:46:15,760
Speaker 1: of finishing this plane, Eric Prince comes by the hangar

949
00:46:15,800 --> 00:46:18,879
Speaker 1: to inspect it, and one of these engineers recognizes him

950
00:46:19,239 --> 00:46:21,160
Speaker 1: and knows who he is, and it's like, oh fuck,

951
00:46:22,320 --> 00:46:26,400
Speaker 1: we're building a military aircraft for Eric Prince. Uh. And

952
00:46:26,480 --> 00:46:28,080
Speaker 1: so these guys go to their bosses and they're like,

953
00:46:28,080 --> 00:46:30,799
Speaker 1: we're pretty sure we're committing an international crime by making

954
00:46:30,880 --> 00:46:33,759
Speaker 1: most right right, but the management is shares them things

955
00:46:33,760 --> 00:46:36,880
Speaker 1: will be fine if they keep their mouth shut. Um,

956
00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:39,319
Speaker 1: it's funny. Everything will be fine if you keep your

957
00:46:39,360 --> 00:46:43,680
Speaker 1: mouth shut. It don't say anything. It's everything we find.

958
00:46:43,719 --> 00:46:46,040
Speaker 1: If you could keep your mouth shut, you don't tell anyone.

959
00:46:46,120 --> 00:46:48,319
Speaker 1: We will get in trouble for building a bomber. The

960
00:46:48,440 --> 00:46:50,680
Speaker 1: plane you're talking about that they retrofitted. You said, it's

961
00:46:50,719 --> 00:46:55,680
Speaker 1: a crop like a propeller plane engine. It's got like

962
00:46:55,800 --> 00:46:57,960
Speaker 1: engines and stuff. It doesn't look like a prop plane, okay,

963
00:46:58,000 --> 00:47:00,160
Speaker 1: because in my mind, a crop dusting plane is like,

964
00:47:00,239 --> 00:47:02,480
Speaker 1: you know, like the old propeller plant, like like a

965
00:47:02,560 --> 00:47:05,040
Speaker 1: right brother. No, it's it's like a nice crop dusting

966
00:47:05,760 --> 00:47:07,600
Speaker 1: But they had a bunch of problems because like it

967
00:47:07,640 --> 00:47:10,080
Speaker 1: wasn't made to have thousands of pounds of armor they

968
00:47:10,080 --> 00:47:12,640
Speaker 1: had to build. So like the things that bombs hang

969
00:47:12,680 --> 00:47:15,799
Speaker 1: on on a plane but are called pylons and they're

970
00:47:15,800 --> 00:47:19,120
Speaker 1: either like made for US munitions or Warsaw Pact, you know,

971
00:47:19,200 --> 00:47:22,360
Speaker 1: Russian munitions, and so these guys even designed pylons that

972
00:47:22,360 --> 00:47:24,279
Speaker 1: could fit both because Eric didn't know what kind of

973
00:47:24,280 --> 00:47:28,160
Speaker 1: bombs he was going to be able to get from. Yeah,

974
00:47:28,280 --> 00:47:29,840
Speaker 1: so like that this is the kind of thing he

975
00:47:29,880 --> 00:47:32,279
Speaker 1: has made. And before the plane's even finished, Eric goes

976
00:47:32,320 --> 00:47:34,920
Speaker 1: out to a bunch of prospective clients, mainly people that

977
00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:38,200
Speaker 1: we would call warlords or dictators, uh, and tries to

978
00:47:38,239 --> 00:47:41,200
Speaker 1: sell them on his sexy new murder engine. Um. He

979
00:47:41,280 --> 00:47:44,600
Speaker 1: told his partners in Frontier, including the CEO, that they

980
00:47:44,640 --> 00:47:46,719
Speaker 1: were not running a security company, you know. Again, they

981
00:47:46,760 --> 00:47:50,000
Speaker 1: just thought they were buying surveillance planes. Um So nobody

982
00:47:50,120 --> 00:47:53,080
Speaker 1: knows but Eric Prince and a couple of his close

983
00:47:53,160 --> 00:47:56,319
Speaker 1: people what he's doing. Yeah that for for the other people,

984
00:47:56,360 --> 00:47:58,600
Speaker 1: they just think, oh, we've got a surveillance plane, and

985
00:47:58,640 --> 00:48:01,120
Speaker 1: he's like, I've got something and that can do it

986
00:48:01,200 --> 00:48:05,600
Speaker 1: all baby. Yeah. Uh so that's that's the situation. Um,

987
00:48:05,640 --> 00:48:07,720
Speaker 1: nobody but Prince knows that he's planning to put missiles

988
00:48:07,760 --> 00:48:11,360
Speaker 1: on this plane and use it to murder dissidence. Um

989
00:48:11,400 --> 00:48:13,400
Speaker 1: So having his own air force to track back a

990
00:48:13,400 --> 00:48:14,799
Speaker 1: bit has been a goal of Eric since at least

991
00:48:14,800 --> 00:48:17,200
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight, when he purchased an unarmed attack

992
00:48:17,239 --> 00:48:19,360
Speaker 1: aircraft that he later at least to the Pentagon to

993
00:48:19,440 --> 00:48:21,400
Speaker 1: use an Afghanistan to test it out to see if

994
00:48:21,400 --> 00:48:24,200
Speaker 1: it would be good for the Afghan Air Force. Um.

995
00:48:24,239 --> 00:48:26,480
Speaker 1: In Iraq, he tried and failed to sell a contract

996
00:48:26,560 --> 00:48:29,080
Speaker 1: providing close air support to the CIA. Also in Iraq,

997
00:48:29,120 --> 00:48:31,920
Speaker 1: Blackwater had a feat of tiny helicopters. Prince would have

998
00:48:32,080 --> 00:48:34,160
Speaker 1: men with machine guns hang off them and shoot at people.

999
00:48:34,320 --> 00:48:37,560
Speaker 1: Those helicopters can be known by the Iraqis as little birds.

1000
00:48:38,000 --> 00:48:42,200
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah yeah, but those are unarmored helicopter. Armed

1001
00:48:42,200 --> 00:48:45,399
Speaker 1: helicopter but which that that's a specific kind of helicopter though,

1002
00:48:45,520 --> 00:48:48,000
Speaker 1: the little bird, right, and maybe you know it's not

1003
00:48:48,120 --> 00:48:50,040
Speaker 1: like a Huey or the other ones, but it looks

1004
00:48:50,040 --> 00:48:52,680
Speaker 1: a little bit like a Huey, but even tinier. Yeah right, right.

1005
00:48:52,760 --> 00:48:54,640
Speaker 1: I just think of it because I know, like I

1006
00:48:54,719 --> 00:48:57,520
Speaker 1: read a lot about like Somalia ninety three kind of stuff,

1007
00:48:57,560 --> 00:48:59,480
Speaker 1: and that was like those are like a lot of

1008
00:49:00,239 --> 00:49:02,759
Speaker 1: the other guys were in like those little bird helicopters. Yeah,

1009
00:49:04,120 --> 00:49:07,200
Speaker 1: from the video games I always hoppen. Yeah. Yeah. Uh

1010
00:49:07,440 --> 00:49:09,399
Speaker 1: So Prince had never gotten to order his own private

1011
00:49:09,440 --> 00:49:12,960
Speaker 1: military aircraft bomb insurgents, and that's what was his dream, um,

1012
00:49:13,040 --> 00:49:14,560
Speaker 1: And in two thousand and fourteen it seems like it

1013
00:49:14,600 --> 00:49:17,200
Speaker 1: was finally going to come true. So the Austrians finished

1014
00:49:17,239 --> 00:49:18,920
Speaker 1: this thing and they've taken on the practice flight, and

1015
00:49:19,000 --> 00:49:21,520
Speaker 1: its dozens of problems pop up because of course you're

1016
00:49:21,520 --> 00:49:25,120
Speaker 1: not supposed to put armaments on a crop duster. Um.

1017
00:49:25,440 --> 00:49:28,040
Speaker 1: So they fix whatever they can, but Prince rushes them

1018
00:49:28,040 --> 00:49:30,160
Speaker 1: and says, basically, I need this thing in two days.

1019
00:49:30,200 --> 00:49:32,600
Speaker 1: I've already promised it to somebody and it needs to

1020
00:49:32,680 --> 00:49:35,480
Speaker 1: be right. God, what the fund is wrong with this guy?

1021
00:49:35,800 --> 00:49:38,000
Speaker 1: So during the plane's first flight, it's grounded for a

1022
00:49:38,040 --> 00:49:41,120
Speaker 1: faulty fuel pump that's eventually fixed, and the plane makes

1023
00:49:41,160 --> 00:49:43,600
Speaker 1: it to Juba, South Sudan, where it was expected to

1024
00:49:43,640 --> 00:49:47,080
Speaker 1: help with the civil war. Unfortunately for Eric Prince, but

1025
00:49:47,160 --> 00:49:50,960
Speaker 1: thankfully for humanity. Some random guy in Greece took picture.

1026
00:49:51,120 --> 00:49:53,200
Speaker 1: You know, there's there's this this random guy in Greece

1027
00:49:53,239 --> 00:49:55,520
Speaker 1: whose hobby is taking pictures of planes that take off

1028
00:49:55,560 --> 00:49:58,359
Speaker 1: from He's just one of those nerds, and he takes

1029
00:49:58,400 --> 00:50:01,080
Speaker 1: a picture of this thing as it lifts off from Greece. Oh,

1030
00:50:01,120 --> 00:50:03,000
Speaker 1: because that's how they were getting it into Sudana, was

1031
00:50:03,040 --> 00:50:04,839
Speaker 1: taking off from like they were taking off from Greece.

1032
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:06,880
Speaker 1: And the plane was registered in San Marino, which is

1033
00:50:06,920 --> 00:50:09,320
Speaker 1: a tiny micro state in like northern Italy or in

1034
00:50:09,400 --> 00:50:13,359
Speaker 1: that area. Um So this thing takes off, this guy

1035
00:50:13,440 --> 00:50:15,560
Speaker 1: uploads a picture. It gets back to the authorities in

1036
00:50:15,640 --> 00:50:18,640
Speaker 1: San Marino, who realized that the plane that Eric Prince

1037
00:50:18,719 --> 00:50:21,440
Speaker 1: had registered bore no resemblance to the plane on that runway,

1038
00:50:21,480 --> 00:50:24,319
Speaker 1: which is clearly a military aircraft. All right, He's like, Hi,

1039
00:50:24,480 --> 00:50:28,400
Speaker 1: I want to register my nice little process plane. It's

1040
00:50:28,440 --> 00:50:31,360
Speaker 1: a hobby plane. Nothing to see here, right, And They're like,

1041
00:50:31,440 --> 00:50:33,920
Speaker 1: those are missile pylons on the bottom. No, no, no,

1042
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:38,080
Speaker 1: those are fun holders. So credit to the government of

1043
00:50:38,160 --> 00:50:41,400
Speaker 1: San Marino. They pulled his registration. The plane had to

1044
00:50:41,440 --> 00:50:43,839
Speaker 1: be flown to another hangar in a different East African nation,

1045
00:50:43,960 --> 00:50:46,520
Speaker 1: and it's probably still there right now. The whole project

1046
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:48,840
Speaker 1: fell apart and Eric Prince never got to bomb anyone.

1047
00:50:49,440 --> 00:50:54,960
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he really is like a tortured guy with

1048
00:50:55,080 --> 00:50:57,640
Speaker 1: a war boner who never got to get his war

1049
00:50:57,960 --> 00:51:01,320
Speaker 1: penis off. Basically, yeah, credit to Airborne Technology. It was

1050
00:51:01,360 --> 00:51:03,440
Speaker 1: one of the engineers who worked on the plane that

1051
00:51:03,600 --> 00:51:05,839
Speaker 1: leaked this story to the intercept or at least leaked

1052
00:51:05,880 --> 00:51:08,279
Speaker 1: a big intercept who was like, this is fucked up.

1053
00:51:08,400 --> 00:51:10,720
Speaker 1: I'm I'm okay making a plane for the German government.

1054
00:51:11,239 --> 00:51:14,200
Speaker 1: I really don't want to make one for this guy. God.

1055
00:51:14,239 --> 00:51:16,400
Speaker 1: That must have been such a moment though, to realize

1056
00:51:16,440 --> 00:51:18,480
Speaker 1: it's air Princes. Yeah, he looks him up on his

1057
00:51:18,600 --> 00:51:21,680
Speaker 1: phone and it's like like in a movie, like he's

1058
00:51:21,719 --> 00:51:23,359
Speaker 1: holding it up next to him, just like going back

1059
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:27,480
Speaker 1: and forth. It's the guy. Yeah, this isn't gonna be

1060
00:51:27,520 --> 00:51:33,919
Speaker 1: good for my resume. Um, okay, So they clearly say

1061
00:51:34,640 --> 00:51:38,200
Speaker 1: you made a kill jet. Yeah, but is there any

1062
00:51:38,320 --> 00:51:42,480
Speaker 1: trial or like, so does anyone get in trouble, anyone

1063
00:51:42,560 --> 00:51:45,600
Speaker 1: to release a statement or anything? Like as far as

1064
00:51:45,640 --> 00:51:49,239
Speaker 1: I understand at this point, Airborne denies uh making a

1065
00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:52,560
Speaker 1: fighter jet. FLG denies that the fighter jet was made

1066
00:51:52,600 --> 00:51:55,200
Speaker 1: with their money. Prince just doesn't talk about it. Like

1067
00:51:55,320 --> 00:51:57,360
Speaker 1: the reason we know about this is the Intercept report,

1068
00:51:57,360 --> 00:51:59,920
Speaker 1: and they have everything. If you go read Echo Pop Expose,

1069
00:52:00,400 --> 00:52:04,880
Speaker 1: they have like advertising documents he built for this attack craft,

1070
00:52:05,120 --> 00:52:07,800
Speaker 1: like you can see like, yeah, you can see his

1071
00:52:07,840 --> 00:52:10,839
Speaker 1: marketing materials. It's very well documented. It's like this could

1072
00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:13,680
Speaker 1: be yours or if they were just making it up

1073
00:52:13,719 --> 00:52:15,759
Speaker 1: for some reason, all of these companies would have sued

1074
00:52:15,800 --> 00:52:17,680
Speaker 1: them to ship. But nothing's happened. Like that's the way

1075
00:52:17,719 --> 00:52:19,920
Speaker 1: it wout. Nothing has happened. The plane is still sitting

1076
00:52:20,040 --> 00:52:22,200
Speaker 1: in a hangar somewhere in East Africa. As far as

1077
00:52:22,239 --> 00:52:25,879
Speaker 1: we know, it was never used. Um right, So that's

1078
00:52:26,040 --> 00:52:30,760
Speaker 1: that's exactly what the situation any like conspiracy or logic

1079
00:52:30,840 --> 00:52:33,600
Speaker 1: to why we think like he has never had to

1080
00:52:33,640 --> 00:52:36,480
Speaker 1: answer for that, like because clearly that those are international crimes.

1081
00:52:36,560 --> 00:52:40,200
Speaker 1: If he's creating an armed aircraft, that that's that's probably

1082
00:52:40,239 --> 00:52:42,800
Speaker 1: in violation of many laws. Well, because what they have

1083
00:52:43,000 --> 00:52:46,600
Speaker 1: is the picture, which is why San Marino pulled his registration. UM.

1084
00:52:46,840 --> 00:52:50,080
Speaker 1: But they don't have like you don't have hard documented

1085
00:52:50,120 --> 00:52:53,360
Speaker 1: evidence outside of like what the journalists put up about

1086
00:52:53,800 --> 00:52:56,520
Speaker 1: how it was made or about exactly who ordered it,

1087
00:52:56,640 --> 00:52:58,960
Speaker 1: Like Prince doesn't have his name TI do it in

1088
00:52:59,080 --> 00:53:02,840
Speaker 1: legal documents. These are allegations in a news report that

1089
00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:05,920
Speaker 1: has a significant amount of backing to it. Um. But

1090
00:53:06,080 --> 00:53:08,840
Speaker 1: also it's not like he was caught bombing civilians in

1091
00:53:08,920 --> 00:53:11,759
Speaker 1: Soudan got stopped before that point, so it's just sort

1092
00:53:11,800 --> 00:53:14,280
Speaker 1: of fizzled out. It's like being called like a homemade

1093
00:53:14,320 --> 00:53:16,920
Speaker 1: gun or something. Yeah. Well, it's like Prince didn't get

1094
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:20,160
Speaker 1: in trouble when like when he was found illegally training

1095
00:53:20,200 --> 00:53:23,160
Speaker 1: troops for a foreign country company got a forty two

1096
00:53:23,160 --> 00:53:26,480
Speaker 1: million dollar uh lost, like had to pay forty two

1097
00:53:26,480 --> 00:53:28,959
Speaker 1: million dollars in fines, but that he didn't get charged

1098
00:53:29,000 --> 00:53:31,160
Speaker 1: with anything, and then they consider that an operating cost.

1099
00:53:31,440 --> 00:53:34,120
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly, I mean they made billions at this point.

1100
00:53:34,200 --> 00:53:36,680
Speaker 1: It's forty two million. What's forty two million? It's like

1101
00:53:36,760 --> 00:53:40,880
Speaker 1: when you sue Perdue Pharmaceuticals for you know, marketing illegally

1102
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:43,080
Speaker 1: and hiding like the truth about the pain killers they

1103
00:53:43,120 --> 00:53:45,120
Speaker 1: were selling, Like they pay one and a half percent

1104
00:53:45,239 --> 00:53:47,520
Speaker 1: of the profits that they've made refines and they're like, yeah,

1105
00:53:47,560 --> 00:53:49,840
Speaker 1: it's fine. What also doing a business like this is

1106
00:53:50,320 --> 00:53:52,200
Speaker 1: it's not like Eric Prince was flying a jet and

1107
00:53:52,280 --> 00:53:55,319
Speaker 1: dropping bombs on people himself. He had shell companies set

1108
00:53:55,360 --> 00:53:57,000
Speaker 1: up through all this and the plane never actually got

1109
00:53:57,080 --> 00:53:59,560
Speaker 1: to drop anything. So he's he's in the clear, right,

1110
00:53:59,680 --> 00:54:02,120
Speaker 1: And it's it's murky enough that people can just point

1111
00:54:02,200 --> 00:54:03,880
Speaker 1: fingers at thin air and no one really has to

1112
00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:05,800
Speaker 1: take the but like the back, you can see the

1113
00:54:05,840 --> 00:54:07,960
Speaker 1: plane and you can trace its registration back and you

1114
00:54:08,040 --> 00:54:10,759
Speaker 1: can like it's a picture of the planet. It's all

1115
00:54:10,800 --> 00:54:14,200
Speaker 1: pretty well documented. Um, if you get Echo Papa exposed

1116
00:54:14,440 --> 00:54:16,920
Speaker 1: on the intercept, it will be there. I wonder if too,

1117
00:54:16,960 --> 00:54:20,399
Speaker 1: if because the government has done so much business with him,

1118
00:54:20,480 --> 00:54:22,040
Speaker 1: it's like better to be like, dude, don't we don't

1119
00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:24,600
Speaker 1: even need to dig that whole part of It's possible

1120
00:54:24,719 --> 00:54:28,080
Speaker 1: that if the government filed a case against him, he

1121
00:54:28,120 --> 00:54:30,360
Speaker 1: would win in court because he's a billionaire with a

1122
00:54:30,440 --> 00:54:32,279
Speaker 1: lot of lawyers, and he's I mean, it's not like

1123
00:54:32,360 --> 00:54:35,160
Speaker 1: he just like did this haphazardly. He sat every step

1124
00:54:35,200 --> 00:54:36,880
Speaker 1: of the way. How does this have to be structured

1125
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:39,000
Speaker 1: to minimize my risk? How does this like what we

1126
00:54:39,080 --> 00:54:43,839
Speaker 1: do to reduce my exposure? So Eric Prince is still

1127
00:54:43,920 --> 00:54:46,800
Speaker 1: keeping busy today. His current project involves working with the

1128
00:54:46,920 --> 00:54:49,080
Speaker 1: Chinese government co owner of his company to set up

1129
00:54:49,080 --> 00:54:52,320
Speaker 1: a forward operating base in the Yunan Province of China

1130
00:54:52,480 --> 00:54:54,800
Speaker 1: as part of a Chinese government initiative to help remake

1131
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:57,719
Speaker 1: the Silk Road. Princess quote about the matter is we're

1132
00:54:57,760 --> 00:55:00,759
Speaker 1: not helping to serve Chinese foreign policy goals. We're helping

1133
00:55:00,800 --> 00:55:03,960
Speaker 1: to increase trade. Uh, it is possible, that's true. The

1134
00:55:04,000 --> 00:55:06,720
Speaker 1: basis stated goal is to quote provide logistics and unarmed

1135
00:55:06,760 --> 00:55:10,640
Speaker 1: security training services to facilitate Chinese trade throughout Southeast Asia.

1136
00:55:10,960 --> 00:55:12,360
Speaker 1: So I'm sure that's all on the up and up.

1137
00:55:12,480 --> 00:55:15,200
Speaker 1: And this mercenary warlord won't try to hide committing war

1138
00:55:15,280 --> 00:55:17,320
Speaker 1: crimes in the guise of a legitimate business venture with

1139
00:55:17,360 --> 00:55:19,880
Speaker 1: the same company twice in a row. Um. So his

1140
00:55:19,960 --> 00:55:21,839
Speaker 1: other hobby right now is trying to convince the US

1141
00:55:21,920 --> 00:55:23,920
Speaker 1: government to hand the war in Afghanistan over to an

1142
00:55:24,000 --> 00:55:28,480
Speaker 1: army of private contractors. M Yeah, about six thousand mercenaries

1143
00:55:28,520 --> 00:55:33,279
Speaker 1: ought to be enough to really get Afghanistan under yea,

1144
00:55:34,360 --> 00:55:36,719
Speaker 1: and to make sure nothing terrible happens. These guys, they're

1145
00:55:36,760 --> 00:55:38,400
Speaker 1: not going to be lawless out there. They're gonna be

1146
00:55:38,440 --> 00:55:40,920
Speaker 1: commanded by someone Prince thinks should be put in charge

1147
00:55:40,960 --> 00:55:43,480
Speaker 1: of the Afghanistan effort, and he calls the guy of Viceroy.

1148
00:55:43,760 --> 00:55:45,399
Speaker 1: So that's a good idea, Like we should go back

1149
00:55:45,440 --> 00:55:48,000
Speaker 1: to that. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, back when Viceroy

1150
00:55:48,360 --> 00:55:50,600
Speaker 1: that that's really one. That's the time we all miss

1151
00:55:50,719 --> 00:55:53,239
Speaker 1: the world was great. Yeah, So that's that's that's it,

1152
00:55:53,800 --> 00:55:57,120
Speaker 1: simple man um. So far, the Pentagon hasn't bitten. And

1153
00:55:57,200 --> 00:56:00,400
Speaker 1: in fact, all of like like Maddison, all of the

1154
00:56:00,520 --> 00:56:04,279
Speaker 1: generals in the world are like right, like I've been

1155
00:56:04,360 --> 00:56:07,120
Speaker 1: around these assholes, like they can't even drive on the

1156
00:56:07,200 --> 00:56:08,680
Speaker 1: right side of the road. Yeah. But if I know Eric,

1157
00:56:08,760 --> 00:56:10,680
Speaker 1: a little thing like you know, complete lack of interest

1158
00:56:10,680 --> 00:56:13,200
Speaker 1: isn't going to stop him from trying, clearly, and he's

1159
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:15,480
Speaker 1: gonna keep plugging away that keep making that bong in

1160
00:56:15,600 --> 00:56:18,239
Speaker 1: his room. Yea, even when his mom asks, no, he's

1161
00:56:18,239 --> 00:56:20,040
Speaker 1: got it. He's got an active life, you know, several

1162
00:56:20,120 --> 00:56:23,200
Speaker 1: days before the election, Prince showed up on Breitbart Radio

1163
00:56:23,280 --> 00:56:25,640
Speaker 1: to claim that Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton laundered money

1164
00:56:25,680 --> 00:56:29,040
Speaker 1: and regularly visited a quote sex island with quote underage

1165
00:56:29,080 --> 00:56:33,640
Speaker 1: sex slaves. Uh. And in January if seventeen, Prince met

1166
00:56:33,680 --> 00:56:36,480
Speaker 1: with a guy named Kirol Dmitriev, a Russian businessman with

1167
00:56:36,560 --> 00:56:39,680
Speaker 1: strong ties to Vladimir Putin. They met in say Chell's right,

1168
00:56:39,760 --> 00:56:43,040
Speaker 1: Say Chell yeah? And he claims that the trip was

1169
00:56:43,160 --> 00:56:45,680
Speaker 1: just for business purposes and had nothing to do with

1170
00:56:45,760 --> 00:56:48,560
Speaker 1: the Trump campaign. But earlier this year, George Nader, a

1171
00:56:48,600 --> 00:56:50,879
Speaker 1: guy who helped organize the meeting, told a grand jury

1172
00:56:50,960 --> 00:56:53,319
Speaker 1: that it was quote an effort to establish a back

1173
00:56:53,360 --> 00:56:56,359
Speaker 1: channel between the incoming administration and the Kremlin. It's also

1174
00:56:56,400 --> 00:56:59,000
Speaker 1: worth noting that Prince donated about two to the Trump

1175
00:56:59,040 --> 00:57:01,000
Speaker 1: campaign and group support con try it during it left.

1176
00:57:01,040 --> 00:57:05,080
Speaker 1: They're representative, isn't natter? Uh? He represents inters of the

1177
00:57:05,440 --> 00:57:07,640
Speaker 1: U A E. Two, doesn't he? Probably? I think because

1178
00:57:07,640 --> 00:57:09,719
Speaker 1: that that was like the connection, because now that makes

1179
00:57:09,719 --> 00:57:12,040
Speaker 1: sense to me when you're saying that he created a

1180
00:57:12,120 --> 00:57:16,080
Speaker 1: mercenary army with them, that they've already done business. And

1181
00:57:16,280 --> 00:57:19,240
Speaker 1: but also he's like an easy go between. Prince was

1182
00:57:19,280 --> 00:57:22,320
Speaker 1: also regularly in contact with Steve Bannon throughout the transition,

1183
00:57:22,360 --> 00:57:26,360
Speaker 1: where while he's having this meeting with Love the conspiracy

1184
00:57:26,360 --> 00:57:28,439
Speaker 1: about the Sex Island because it goes back to sort

1185
00:57:28,440 --> 00:57:31,680
Speaker 1: of this bizarre form of what a conservative thinks is like,

1186
00:57:32,520 --> 00:57:35,480
Speaker 1: you know, the most evil ship. It's like sex Island.

1187
00:57:35,560 --> 00:57:38,560
Speaker 1: I mean, if Hillary Clinton had a Sex Island, she

1188
00:57:38,640 --> 00:57:40,800
Speaker 1: would not have lost the election. No, she would have.

1189
00:57:40,880 --> 00:57:42,960
Speaker 1: There would have been some flavor in that putting there

1190
00:57:43,000 --> 00:57:46,120
Speaker 1: would absolutely yea, yeah, that's not That is someone who

1191
00:57:46,160 --> 00:57:48,600
Speaker 1: I don't even think has been to an island, even

1192
00:57:48,640 --> 00:57:53,000
Speaker 1: though a restaurant called islands. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, that's

1193
00:57:53,000 --> 00:57:55,280
Speaker 1: where we are right now. The whole incident is of

1194
00:57:55,360 --> 00:57:57,560
Speaker 1: extreme interest to Robert Mueller because it might be proof

1195
00:57:57,600 --> 00:57:59,720
Speaker 1: that Kushner was trying to establish a back channel and

1196
00:58:00,040 --> 00:58:03,160
Speaker 1: go back channel to Russia. Um. So we'll be hearing

1197
00:58:03,200 --> 00:58:06,800
Speaker 1: more about Eric Prince in the future, probably before the

1198
00:58:06,840 --> 00:58:13,520
Speaker 1: time this podcast drops. Possibly. Um yeah, I again, it's crazy.

1199
00:58:13,880 --> 00:58:15,840
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not crazy to me, right because we've

1200
00:58:16,040 --> 00:58:19,040
Speaker 1: we see people like this all the time, but like that,

1201
00:58:19,320 --> 00:58:22,600
Speaker 1: this is the guy who has constantly just been trying

1202
00:58:22,640 --> 00:58:25,280
Speaker 1: to make his secret little play army and do all

1203
00:58:25,320 --> 00:58:27,680
Speaker 1: the fun stuff that he maybe was never able to do.

1204
00:58:28,160 --> 00:58:32,320
Speaker 1: He's clearly like haunted, you know, from his like familial life.

1205
00:58:32,600 --> 00:58:35,080
Speaker 1: I'm almost curious to know what that what that upbringing

1206
00:58:35,400 --> 00:58:37,680
Speaker 1: was like, like what that household must have been a

1207
00:58:37,800 --> 00:58:41,440
Speaker 1: lot of fun. Yeah, And there's no there's nothing that

1208
00:58:41,480 --> 00:58:44,960
Speaker 1: I would call like trustworthy information out about like what

1209
00:58:45,240 --> 00:58:47,680
Speaker 1: that upbringing was like, like like a lot of these guys,

1210
00:58:47,840 --> 00:58:49,800
Speaker 1: you know, we're able to talk a little bit about,

1211
00:58:49,920 --> 00:58:51,880
Speaker 1: like the abuse that Saddam Hussein and Jurd. I don't

1212
00:58:51,920 --> 00:58:54,080
Speaker 1: know what, I don't know. It's possible he had great

1213
00:58:54,120 --> 00:58:56,960
Speaker 1: parents who were just crazy far right nut jobs, and

1214
00:58:57,080 --> 00:58:59,600
Speaker 1: so Prince grew up because maybe he's just a happy

1215
00:58:59,680 --> 00:59:02,640
Speaker 1: guy being a billionaire nut job. Also he's a billionaire now,

1216
00:59:04,080 --> 00:59:06,440
Speaker 1: it's like worth two and a half billion dollars. So

1217
00:59:06,640 --> 00:59:09,240
Speaker 1: this has all worked out great for Prince and is

1218
00:59:09,280 --> 00:59:11,880
Speaker 1: there is there? You think the closest he would come

1219
00:59:11,920 --> 00:59:15,360
Speaker 1: to any kind of liability legally would be through the probe,

1220
00:59:15,400 --> 00:59:19,640
Speaker 1: the Russia probe. I mean, at this point, so many

1221
00:59:19,720 --> 00:59:22,520
Speaker 1: international crimes and never gotten in trouble me in a

1222
00:59:22,600 --> 00:59:26,280
Speaker 1: meaningful way. I haven't trouble believing that anything is going

1223
00:59:26,320 --> 00:59:29,520
Speaker 1: to happen that puts this guy away. Being a rich

1224
00:59:29,600 --> 00:59:32,200
Speaker 1: white guy is the best ship ever. And it's like

1225
00:59:32,640 --> 00:59:36,280
Speaker 1: getting the suit like the star in Mario. Yeah, you know, Yeah,

1226
00:59:36,360 --> 00:59:39,320
Speaker 1: he's he's Yeah, he's always got that flashing and vulnerability thing.

1227
00:59:41,280 --> 00:59:43,800
Speaker 1: I mean, most of the people talk about on this

1228
00:59:43,840 --> 00:59:46,600
Speaker 1: podcast have been dead for a while. Um, but Eric

1229
00:59:46,760 --> 00:59:49,560
Speaker 1: is still alive. And yeah, I'd be down with him

1230
00:59:49,600 --> 00:59:51,320
Speaker 1: spending the rest of his life in prison, Like that'd

1231
00:59:51,360 --> 00:59:54,280
Speaker 1: be great. That'd be the Bee's knees. Um. But he'll

1232
00:59:54,320 --> 00:59:57,400
Speaker 1: probably just keep on making more armies. And I got

1233
00:59:57,480 --> 00:59:59,240
Speaker 1: a feeling one of these days he's going to get

1234
00:59:59,280 --> 01:00:03,560
Speaker 1: his own air force, right God, I mean I believe it. Yeah,

1235
01:00:03,600 --> 01:00:08,280
Speaker 1: they'll Yeah, help I help problem prior Russia or something weird.

1236
01:00:08,520 --> 01:00:10,720
Speaker 1: You're just gotta have a dream and a hope and

1237
01:00:10,880 --> 01:00:13,720
Speaker 1: billions of dollars in a rich white family that's heavily

1238
01:00:13,760 --> 01:00:16,280
Speaker 1: connected to the U. S. President. Yeah, that's all you need,

1239
01:00:16,400 --> 01:00:18,840
Speaker 1: and you can do any anything. I just don't go

1240
01:00:18,960 --> 01:00:23,120
Speaker 1: to college. Miles. Yes, thank you so much for your

1241
01:00:23,160 --> 01:00:25,880
Speaker 1: help today. You've been wonderful. Thank you for illuminating this

1242
01:00:26,000 --> 01:00:27,960
Speaker 1: for me. Yeah, you got some plugs, you want to

1243
01:00:28,000 --> 01:00:31,439
Speaker 1: plug in the plug zone? Do I want to plug anything? Yes?

1244
01:00:31,640 --> 01:00:34,120
Speaker 1: I do. Uh. There's a little podcast I do every

1245
01:00:34,200 --> 01:00:37,000
Speaker 1: day with Jack O'Brien called The Daily Seitgeist. But you

1246
01:00:37,120 --> 01:00:40,440
Speaker 1: probably knew that, right because everybody knows the most famous

1247
01:00:40,480 --> 01:00:42,440
Speaker 1: podcast out there. Not really, but please listen to that.

1248
01:00:42,480 --> 01:00:44,680
Speaker 1: We talked about the news and have fun and we

1249
01:00:44,720 --> 01:00:47,720
Speaker 1: always have funny comedians and just try and make the

1250
01:00:47,880 --> 01:00:50,240
Speaker 1: news of the day bearable. And you can follow me

1251
01:00:50,320 --> 01:00:52,640
Speaker 1: on social media and on you know all that Twitter,

1252
01:00:52,680 --> 01:00:54,760
Speaker 1: Instagram at Miles of Gray, and you can find us

1253
01:00:55,000 --> 01:00:58,720
Speaker 1: on all of the various social media platforms as Bastards

1254
01:00:58,800 --> 01:01:02,000
Speaker 1: pod or at the Hid the Bastards dot com, our

1255
01:01:02,040 --> 01:01:09,000
Speaker 1: home on the Worldwide Internet Web dot net. Peace m

1256
01:01:10,000 --> 01:01:15,760
Speaker 1: h m hm