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Speaker 1: Shit, damn it. Nope, bad Um. That's the introduction for

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Speaker 1: the podcast though, because we're recording. Welcome to Behind the Bastards,

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Speaker 1: the podcast that is not introduced very well, but often

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Speaker 1: include stories of terrible people. Uh today, my guest to

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Speaker 1: help me kind of rewright the ship. After that terrible

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Speaker 1: introduction is the inimitable Bridget Todd Bridget Hello, Hello, I'm

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Speaker 1: so happy to be here, and even though we're not

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Speaker 1: physically in the same place, I am happy to be

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Speaker 1: here doing this socially distant podcast to you. We are

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Speaker 1: very socially distant because you and I are almost as

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Speaker 1: distant as we could possibly be while still being on

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Speaker 1: the same continent. So that's very very responsible. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: you're You're on one side, I'm on the other. I'm

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Speaker 1: in d c Um. We're all wearing our masks and

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Speaker 1: freaking the funk out. You know, here are the nation's capital. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: here in where I am. Uh, no one is wearing

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Speaker 1: a mask and we all live in the woods. Um,

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Speaker 1: but we are both coastal elites, so that's fun. Um.

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Speaker 1: De Bridget, you are you are? You are a veteran podcaster.

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Speaker 1: You were on my podcast early on in behind the

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Speaker 1: Bastard's run. When we went to uh protest Nazis at

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Speaker 1: the second Unite the Right rally in d C. That

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Speaker 1: was fun. It was so fun. It was that was

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Speaker 1: my first time I protested a lot of things in

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Speaker 1: my life. That was my first time specifically protesting Nazis. Um,

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Speaker 1: it was a good time. It was it was it

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Speaker 1: was a little like um, it was a little it

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Speaker 1: was a new experience, I'll put it that way. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was a good thing to have done. And speaking

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Speaker 1: of good things to have done, Um, you know what's

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Speaker 1: not a good thing to do? What's that attempt to

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Speaker 1: overthrow the government of a sovereign nation for your own profit.

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Speaker 1: That's a good thing to do. Know, that was such

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Speaker 1: a good intro. I'm so proud, Thank you, thank cut. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's what we're talking about today. We're talking specifically about

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Speaker 1: we're talking about cups because coups are in the news. Um,

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Speaker 1: I'm proud of that one too. Uh. You remember when

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Speaker 1: I'm those guys tried to invade Venezuela and it didn't

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Speaker 1: work out and one of them wound up lying in

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Speaker 1: his own pa. Well, when that happened, I started getting

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Speaker 1: a whole bunch of people hit me up on Twitter

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Speaker 1: being like, you should do an episode about this, and

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Speaker 1: we will someday. But there's just there's there's so many

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Speaker 1: more dumb details that haven't come out yet. I'm certain

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Speaker 1: that it would be silly to cover it right now.

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Speaker 1: But also some folks reached out and said, like, you

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Speaker 1: should cover something called the Wonga Coup, which was a

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Speaker 1: coup in two thousand four in Equatorial Guinea that's generally

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Speaker 1: seen as one of the worst coup attempts at of

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Speaker 1: all time. So that's kind of what we're talking about today.

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Speaker 1: But I fell down a rabbit hole researching it, and

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Speaker 1: so mostly we're going to talk about like the whole

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Speaker 1: weird and dumb history of white people trying to overthrow

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Speaker 1: governments in Africa, um and usually being doing a really

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Speaker 1: bad job of it. So that's today. Yeah, that ship

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Speaker 1: never goes well, right, like it's it's always it always

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Speaker 1: turns out badly. Yeah, yeah, and it's awesome because like

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Speaker 1: it doesn't matter if the leader they're trying to overthrow

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Speaker 1: is legitimately shitty or not. They always make the situation worse.

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Speaker 1: And and given how bad some of the dictators are.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of incredible that they managed to like, like,

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Speaker 1: you've got a guy who like takes hands from people,

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Speaker 1: um for fun, and then like they make it worse somehow.

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Speaker 1: It's incredible. So that's today's podcast topic. Are you ready?

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Speaker 1: Are you ready to dive into this bridget I'm ready.

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Speaker 1: I'm locked and loaded. I'm stressed in let's do this, alright, alright, alright, alright,

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Speaker 1: So I want to start by going back in time

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Speaker 1: to what I think is the piece of fiction that

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Speaker 1: is kind of the seed for this desire in the

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Speaker 1: heads of some white dudes to carry out coups in Africa,

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Speaker 1: because there's a single fictional book that really started this

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Speaker 1: ball rolling, and it's a book called King's Solemn Minds.

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Speaker 1: Have you ever heard of King Solomon's Minds? Oh my gosh,

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Speaker 1: So this is um I read my dad read this

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Speaker 1: to me when I was a kid. Uh, And it's

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Speaker 1: like it was one of the big influences behind Indiana Jones,

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Speaker 1: which should give you an idea of kind of like

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Speaker 1: some of the themes that we can expect from King

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Speaker 1: Solomon's Minds. And it was it was written by a

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Speaker 1: fellow named h Writer Haggard and h writer Haggard is

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Speaker 1: like the colonial fiction writer of the eighteen hundreds in

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Speaker 1: early nineteen hundreds, UM and King Solomon's Minds is considered

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Speaker 1: to be like the quintessential classic of British colonialist leadership.

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Speaker 1: It's the first novel to star big game hunter and

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Speaker 1: explorer Alan Quartermain, who was like kind of like the

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Speaker 1: James Bond of the of the of of colonialism um.

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Speaker 1: And in fact, in the movie League of Extraordinary Gentleman

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Speaker 1: he was played by Sean Connery, So that's interesting. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: now I know, I know it. Yeah, he's like the

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Speaker 1: and if you've never even read one of these books,

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Speaker 1: you've been influenced by this guy because he's Alan Quartermain

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Speaker 1: is like the arc type of like the British big

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Speaker 1: game hunting like Safari dude, and like, yeah, like the

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Speaker 1: guy in um fucking Jumanji, like the White Guy Hunter

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Speaker 1: is based off of old Quartermain. Like that's just how

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Speaker 1: they always do it. It's a very influential character and

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Speaker 1: in King Solomon's Minds is generally regarded as the first

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Speaker 1: example of a book in the Lost World genre of fiction.

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Speaker 1: So you know those those kinds of books and movies

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Speaker 1: where like a bunch of explorers or scientists find a

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Speaker 1: loster forgotten city in some desolate chunk of the world. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I'm pretty familiar with that genre. Yeah, H Writer Haggard

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Speaker 1: invented it. King Solomon's Minds is like the first example

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Speaker 1: of that kind of book. I feel like, I feel

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Speaker 1: like I can picture what this guy looks like, Like

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Speaker 1: I'm picturing a safari hat, like maybe some like loose

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Speaker 1: khaki pants of some kind. Yeah, very specific kind of

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Speaker 1: facial hair. Yes, you you know you know everything about

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Speaker 1: H Writer Haggard in his life now, Um. I mean

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Speaker 1: you kind of get it by the name. Like if

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Speaker 1: someone tells you there's a famous author named H Writer Haggard,

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Speaker 1: you could probably guess, Oh, he wrote books about how

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Speaker 1: colonialism is awesome, didn't he? Yeah? Um. So, the basic

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Speaker 1: gist of the story is that a group of explorers,

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Speaker 1: led by my own quartermain go on the search for

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Speaker 1: a lost europe and who went missing looking for the

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Speaker 1: fabled King Solomon's minds, and that's the big Biblical King Solomon.

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Speaker 1: There's this rumor that he had these famous diamond minds YadA, YadA, YadA.

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Speaker 1: Uh So they go off looking for these this white

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Speaker 1: guy and these minds, and they wind up finding a

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Speaker 1: lost African civilization that possesses tremendous wealth. The movie Congo,

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Speaker 1: based off the Michael Crichton book of the same name,

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Speaker 1: is the modern adaptation of this story. So yeah, and

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Speaker 1: interestingly enough, for as racist as this book is, it's

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Speaker 1: not as racist as you might assume. Um it. Actually

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Speaker 1: it actually opens with the main character, Alan Quartermain going

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Speaker 1: on an angry and angry rant about how the in

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Speaker 1: word is never okay to use um and it's it's

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Speaker 1: always So that's good, right, Like that's a step that's

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Speaker 1: pretty progressive, I guess what you mean. Yeah. Yeah, And

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Speaker 1: there's even an interracial relationship in it, although the black

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Speaker 1: woman dating the white guy dies. Um, but like eight

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Speaker 1: that's about as good as your credit kids from a

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Speaker 1: white guy book. Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't be expecting

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Speaker 1: that from the eighteen hundreds, like a little interracial pairing.

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Speaker 1: Of course she has to die in the end, of course. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: um yeah. And h writer Haggard did repeatedly point out

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Speaker 1: through his characters that a lot of European colonialist officers

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Speaker 1: were horrible people. Alan Cortermain regularly notes that a lot

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Speaker 1: of black africancy meats are more worthy of the word

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Speaker 1: gentleman than British officials, so it's it's not the kind

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Speaker 1: of racist you'd expect, but it's also simultaneously still one

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Speaker 1: of the most racist books ever written for a very

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Speaker 1: specific reason. Um see. The climax of the book comes

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Speaker 1: when the explorers managed to finally okay the lost kingdom

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Speaker 1: of Kuwana Land, which is a surprisingly well organized and

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Speaker 1: advanced society that's completely cut off from the rest of

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Speaker 1: the world by tall mountains in a wide desert. The

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Speaker 1: kingdom is ruled by a cruel king, Twala, who maintains

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Speaker 1: power by dint of horrific violence. The white explorers are

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Speaker 1: able to get special treatment by convincing the natives that

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Speaker 1: they're white men from the stars, basically magical gods, but

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Speaker 1: they're horrified by the brutality of the king and his

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Speaker 1: evil advisor, Gagool, who regularly burns innocent people as witches

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Speaker 1: and traders. Um, yeah, I know, a yeah. So it

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Speaker 1: becomes gradually clear that the current king earned his position

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Speaker 1: by murdering his brother, the old King, and forcing his

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Speaker 1: brother's wife an infant son, out into the desert to die.

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Speaker 1: So there's a lot of the Lion King in this

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Speaker 1: story too, Like it was clearly inspired by King Solomon's

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Speaker 1: minds in a lot of ways. And anyway, it turns

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Speaker 1: out that one of the porters that the white expedition

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Speaker 1: team brought along, um, this guy named Umbopa is the

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Speaker 1: royal child who got ex sild you know, decades earlier,

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Speaker 1: and he was noted throughout the book is being better

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Speaker 1: looking and more well spoken than the other Africans who

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Speaker 1: like we're working for the expedition. So the white people

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Speaker 1: decided to overthrow the king of Kuwana Land and put

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Speaker 1: their friend Umboba on the front on the throne instead,

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Speaker 1: And after a vicious battle that kills a lot of

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Speaker 1: black people but no white people, they succeeded instituting regime

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Speaker 1: change in Kuwana Land and they get to go home

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Speaker 1: with pockets full of diamonds. So that's like the that's

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Speaker 1: the story of Like you can you can draw a

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Speaker 1: straight line from King Solomon's mind to the thinking that

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Speaker 1: led us to war in Iraq if you really like

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Speaker 1: it's not hard, yeah, just killing off black and brown

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Speaker 1: people and like like coming back with your pockets full

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Speaker 1: of diamonds. Yeah, that that fantasy and you make everything

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Speaker 1: better by putting your one black friend in charge and

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Speaker 1: like yeah, that's the whole like that's the story. Um.

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Speaker 1: So I also have to say it really is very

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Speaker 1: Lion King, this idea that you know, this guy was

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Speaker 1: more handsome and like somehow better and then like he comes,

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Speaker 1: he goes away, comes back like I want to be

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Speaker 1: watched The Lion King. Now, yeah, there's some there's some

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Speaker 1: of this in The Lion King for sure. Obviously it

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Speaker 1: has a lot of influences, but there's there's there's pieces

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Speaker 1: of h writer Haggard in that script. So um yeah,

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Speaker 1: this book was a huge success, was like one of

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Speaker 1: the biggest books of the nineteenth century period. Um And

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Speaker 1: like I said, it inspired the whole Lost World genre.

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Speaker 1: It inspired probably tens of thousands of particularly white British kids,

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Speaker 1: but a lot of Americans too, to go to Africa

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Speaker 1: and like overthrow fucking countries. Um And while he did,

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Speaker 1: like absolutely this book inspired real world coups, it was

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Speaker 1: also inspired by stuff that had happened earlier in the

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Speaker 1: history of like African colonialism. Um. Cecil Rhodes is mercenary

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Speaker 1: army with the British South Africa Company had conquered Zimbobwi

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Speaker 1: and Zambia. The British East Africa Company, under the command

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Speaker 1: of Mercenary Frederick Lugard, had conquered large chunks of East

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Speaker 1: and West Africa uh and in all these places, local

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Speaker 1: leaders were selected to rule based on their amended amenability

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Speaker 1: to the desires of white Europeans, and for decades the

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Speaker 1: whole story was repeated all over the continent. So H

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Speaker 1: writer Haggard didn't come up with this idea obviously, but

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Speaker 1: he created like this very classical and and and attractive

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Speaker 1: fictional justification for it that helped, um helped solidify it

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Speaker 1: in the heads of of white colonialists. Is like the

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Speaker 1: way things ought to go. Um. So yeah, that's that's

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Speaker 1: that's cool. It's not cool, but it happened. It's not cool,

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Speaker 1: it's funny. I really feel like in addition to the

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Speaker 1: way that we understand, you know, um kind of American

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Speaker 1: exceptionalism and the idea of like going to another country

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Speaker 1: or another continent and like and like we're going to

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Speaker 1: quote save them and then get rich in the process,

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Speaker 1: I feel like I see that vibe reverberated in so

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Speaker 1: many different ways, Like even the idea of like how

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Speaker 1: white people have this idea that they're going to go

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Speaker 1: to Africa and save the babies, and they post a

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Speaker 1: picture of them like helping in Africa Instagram. Like the

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Speaker 1: entire kind of gross vibe. I feel like it's sort

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Speaker 1: of established as a blueprint in this work. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: really is. And it's like right down to the fact

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Speaker 1: that this would actually be I think a less unsettling

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Speaker 1: novel King Solomon's Minds if h writer Haggard had been

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Speaker 1: super hatefully racist. Um, but he's like you see part

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Speaker 1: of like a lot of the horror that comes from

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Speaker 1: like attempts even as particularly in the modern day, like

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Speaker 1: when we we talked about that lady, that white girl

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Speaker 1: in Africa who like ran that baby killing clinic. Um, yeah,

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Speaker 1: fucking wild, yeah wild. And it's um, it's always it's

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Speaker 1: always sketchier and often more dangerous when the person doing

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Speaker 1: this stuff is like super woke about it, right, And

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Speaker 1: that's kind of what's so scary about King Solomon's Minds

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Speaker 1: is that it's this white guy being like, oh, these

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Speaker 1: white dudes in Africa are doing horrible things. I know,

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Speaker 1: the right thing. White dudes in Africa should be doing, Like, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think you totally hit on something that it's sort

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Speaker 1: of like scary. If someone is evil and racist, I

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Speaker 1: get it, I understand it. I know where they're coming from. Cool.

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Speaker 1: If they have a mentality that they are righteous or

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Speaker 1: that they're like the fact that this person probably thought

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Speaker 1: he was like doing something good like that is so

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Speaker 1: much scarier. And I feel like has such a more

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Speaker 1: a bigger capacity for evil when you think that you're righteous. Yep.

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Speaker 1: And and the person we will eventually get to who

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Speaker 1: carries out this possibly the worst planned coup in all

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Speaker 1: of history, is like the Patriot, well the archetype, at

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Speaker 1: least of of that kind of person. So uh. As

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Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds turned into the nineteen hundreds in the

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Speaker 1: world wars came and went, Europeans in particular and white

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Speaker 1: folks in general gradually started to accept that, on balance,

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Speaker 1: colonialism had at least been a problem amatic idea uh Europe.

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Speaker 1: Europe gradually began to release their active or their captive

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Speaker 1: African colonies from their chains, and since there was no

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Speaker 1: profit in doing this, colonies were generally let go in

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Speaker 1: the laziest way possible, slap dash elections were held, and

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Speaker 1: as a general rule, men were left in charge who

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Speaker 1: colonialists thought would be trusted to rule in a manner

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Speaker 1: beneficial to European economic interests. One example of this would

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Speaker 1: be former British military sergeant Idi Amine, who we we

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Speaker 1: did an episode about, you know you, just like we

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Speaker 1: gotta leave this country. It's there's no money in like

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Speaker 1: actually setting up a functional government before we go. So like, uh,

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Speaker 1: this guy is good at beating people up and likes us.

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Speaker 1: Let's put him in charge. Nothing will go wrong. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So obviously, sometimes these newly freed local people's made decisions

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Speaker 1: that white folks thought were dangerous. Since the militaries of

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Speaker 1: states like Great Britain and Belgium could no longer be

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Speaker 1: used to enforce order directly, they often turned to mercenaries

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Speaker 1: to do so. These modern datacendants of Alan Quartermain and

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Speaker 1: his companions regularly used their superior military training and access

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Speaker 1: to firepower to carry out their own coups. Mad Mike

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Speaker 1: core is probably the patron saint of this kind of guy.

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Speaker 1: He was originally a British soldier born in Calcutta and

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Speaker 1: raised on a steady diet of novels by h writer

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Speaker 1: Haggard and his fellow adventure writers. Mad Mike joined the

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Speaker 1: British Army, but by the nineteen sixties the Empire was

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Speaker 1: in steep decline and the colonies he'd been raised to

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Speaker 1: help control we're flying free. So Mad Mike became a mercenary.

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Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty one, he he traveled to the Congo

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Speaker 1: to fight Moishi Shamba, who wanted to create a breakaway

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Speaker 1: nation by leading the Congo's wealthiest territory and secession. Now

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Speaker 1: this was all, in reality a plot by rich Belgian

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Speaker 1: business owners in the CIA to ensure that black Africans

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Speaker 1: didn't have the opportunity to control a huge chunk of

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Speaker 1: their continents wealth. Like this breakaway chunk of the Congo

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Speaker 1: was more friendly to Belgian economic interests, and the Congo

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Speaker 1: at that point was controlled by the socialist leader who

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Speaker 1: they later assassinated. We did an episode on that, Patrice

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Speaker 1: lamumba Um. But yeah, so the whole attempt failed. The

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Speaker 1: secession attempt failed, and two of Mike's men were allegedly

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Speaker 1: cannibalized in the attempt, But he didn't lose the bug

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Speaker 1: for trying to like lead coups in African nations. A

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Speaker 1: couple of years later, Shambay was elected Prime Minister of

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Speaker 1: the Congo under shady read. The CIA put him in

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Speaker 1: power circumstances and Shambay angled himself as an anti communist fighter,

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Speaker 1: but he was really just a tyrant, unhappy Congolese people

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Speaker 1: revolted against Shamba, backed by the U. S. S R.

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Speaker 1: And the Cuban government. Se Guevara got involved, and obviously

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Speaker 1: these guys weren't super great either. So basically you just

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Speaker 1: had kind of and this is like the story of

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Speaker 1: Africa in a lot of the Cold War, you have

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Speaker 1: like Soviet imperialists on one side being like, we'll give

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Speaker 1: you guns if you do the thing we like, and

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Speaker 1: you have capitalist imperialists on the other side going like,

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Speaker 1: we'll give you guns if you do the thing that

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Speaker 1: we like. And Mad Mike Core and his fellow mercenaries

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Speaker 1: made a lot of money by just kind of standing

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Speaker 1: in the middle and shooting at whoever had the most

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Speaker 1: cash or shooting for whoever had the most cash. Um

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Speaker 1: For years, the Congo Wars provided white combat veterans with

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Speaker 1: steady employment. Mad Mike was a World War Two veteran.

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Speaker 1: A lot of these guys were World War two veterans,

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Speaker 1: and like they were just guys who, like after the

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Speaker 1: war ended, they couldn't do anything else but kill people.

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Speaker 1: And a number of them were actually Nazi military veterans.

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Speaker 1: That was even in like the French Foreign Legion had

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Speaker 1: a lot of Nazi military veterans because they were like,

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Speaker 1: all I know how to do is kill people. And

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Speaker 1: the French Foreign Legions like, will you help us kill

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Speaker 1: people who aren't white in Africa? And they were like absolutely,

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Speaker 1: as long as I'm killing so uh now, Mad Mike.

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Speaker 1: Uh again, it's probably the most famous of these guys,

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Speaker 1: and he he among other things, he was renowned for

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Speaker 1: telling black mercenaries who attempted to join his mercenary army

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Speaker 1: that he only hired white women or white men. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He earned a colorful reputation for, among other things, shooting

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Speaker 1: the toes off of a fellow mercenary who had raped

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Speaker 1: a woman in the field. Um And as a general rule, uh,

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Speaker 1: Mad Mike soldiers were kind of rough customers. You might say, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I would say they sound like rock customers. Yeah yeah,

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Speaker 1: shoot shot the toes off a man, I mean, you know.

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Speaker 1: So as the fighting in the Congo War on Mad

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Speaker 1: Mike wound up on the side of Mobotu sesse Ciccu,

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Speaker 1: the Congo's longest lived dictator. Uh Moboto also patterned himself

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Speaker 1: as an anti communist fighter, which was enough to earn

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Speaker 1: the allegiance of the CIA and of Mad Mike. In

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Speaker 1: order to help Mobot stay in power and fight against rebels,

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Speaker 1: he put together a commando army of Irish mercenaries, the

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Speaker 1: Wild Geese. Here's how the Washington Post recalled their service

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Speaker 1: in the obituary they wrote for Mad Mike earlier this year.

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Speaker 1: This guy fucking had the longest life. Like, sorry, and

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Speaker 1: I went a million years. I never would have thought

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Speaker 1: that you were going to say he died earlier this year. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he was a hundred years old. Like, get incredible, um quote,

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Speaker 1: I believe we have a great mission here, he told

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Speaker 1: a fellow mercenary. According to a history of the Simba

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Speaker 1: Rebellion by John Hopkins, professor Piero guil Jas, the Africans

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Speaker 1: have gotten used to the idea that they can do

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Speaker 1: whatever they like to us Whites, that they can trample

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Speaker 1: on us and spit on us. So that's that's the

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Speaker 1: kind of fella Mike is dubbed the White Giants. Mr

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Speaker 1: Horrors men spelled swept through the country, mowing down untrained

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Speaker 1: and outnumbered Seemba forces who believed that witchcraft made them impervious.

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Speaker 1: Two bullets in total. The mercenary unit was paid about

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Speaker 1: three thousand dollars a month by US authorities, according to

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Speaker 1: a Post report, and backed by what The New York

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Speaker 1: Times described as an instant air force created by the

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Speaker 1: c i A. So can way back up to the

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Speaker 1: White Giants just for like one second that needed. It's

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Speaker 1: it's actually the reason why they were called giants is

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Speaker 1: actually pretty sad. It's because they all grew up in

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Speaker 1: wealthier western countries and had access to a lot of

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Speaker 1: protein and milk and stuff like that when they were

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Speaker 1: growing up, and folks in the cong go Uh tended

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Speaker 1: to be malnourished, in large part due to the fact

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Speaker 1: that the Belgian colonialists who had owned them had starved

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Speaker 1: the entirety of Central Africa for decades prior to this point,

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Speaker 1: and so people in the Congo tended to be smaller,

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Speaker 1: and white mercenaries tended to be very large. Well that's up, Jesus. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's not great. It's not great. The world. Yeah, so

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Speaker 1: the white giants or the wild geese, whatever you wanna

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Speaker 1: call them, killed a shitload of people. Mike himself bragged

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Speaker 1: to journalists, quote, killing communist is like killing vermin. Killing

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Speaker 1: African nationalists is as if one is killing an animal.

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Speaker 1: My men and I have killed between five thousand and

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Speaker 1: ten thousand Congo rebels in the twenty months that I've

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Speaker 1: spent in the Congo. But that's not enough. There are

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Speaker 1: twenty million Congolees, you know, and I assumed that about

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Speaker 1: half of them at one point or another were rebels

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Speaker 1: whilst I was down there. This is interesting to me

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Speaker 1: for a couple of reasons. One of them is that, uh,

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Speaker 1: the generation prior to Mike, King Leopold of Belgium had

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Speaker 1: killed fully half of the population of the Congo. And

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Speaker 1: here you have another white guy generation later being like,

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Speaker 1: if we just got rid of another half, yeah, pretty

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Speaker 1: bad people, pretty bad. And Matt Mike is perfectly embodies

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Speaker 1: the fact that a lot of the men who were

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Speaker 1: responsible for fighting the Nazis would have been perfectly happy

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Speaker 1: with Nazism if Hitler had just picked slightly different white

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Speaker 1: people to fight. Oh yeah, I have to It's funny

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Speaker 1: that you say this, I feel like I have to

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Speaker 1: like tell, like admit something. When I was young, I

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Speaker 1: thought that there was just like white people. I had

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Speaker 1: no idea that there was like in like these white

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00:21:31,440 --> 00:21:33,040
Speaker 1: people don't like that white people. I thought it was

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Speaker 1: just white people. And when we found that out, it

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Speaker 1: was like a big sort of galaxy brained thing for me.

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00:21:39,080 --> 00:21:42,000
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that white people could have problems with

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Speaker 1: other white people. That was like a whole um new

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00:21:45,240 --> 00:21:50,240
Speaker 1: understanding of how white people function. For me, it's we're fascinating.

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00:21:50,280 --> 00:21:52,320
Speaker 1: There's this thing going on. I mean it's been going

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00:21:52,359 --> 00:21:55,159
Speaker 1: on for a long time within like Nazi circles, but

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00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:57,840
Speaker 1: it's it's hitting the internet. Nazis now, well, we're like

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00:21:57,880 --> 00:22:00,800
Speaker 1: in depictions of Mussolini, they'll depict him as a black man.

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Speaker 1: And the reason is because there's a chunk of white

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Speaker 1: people who think that Italians are still who still think

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Speaker 1: Italians aren't white. It's it's pretty wide the time. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Uh yeah, that's like the racism equivalent of still using

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Speaker 1: my Space, like like we've moved on having like a

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00:22:22,920 --> 00:22:28,120
Speaker 1: hot mail email. Yeah, yeah, that's hot mail for Nazis

414
00:22:28,240 --> 00:22:35,359
Speaker 1: is calling like Italians non white um so, yeah, yeah,

415
00:22:35,440 --> 00:22:36,879
Speaker 1: Mike killed a lot of people. Mike and has been

416
00:22:36,920 --> 00:22:38,720
Speaker 1: were good enough at killing to ensure that the regime

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00:22:38,720 --> 00:22:42,000
Speaker 1: of Mbuto say Ciccu was established and allowed to persist

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Speaker 1: for thirty brutal years. Mabot spent the time robbing the

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Speaker 1: Congo blind, providing no social services, building no infrastructure, and

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Speaker 1: torturing unknown numbers of Congolese people who complained about any

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00:22:52,160 --> 00:22:54,920
Speaker 1: of this. The CIA was fine with all of it, because, again,

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00:22:55,080 --> 00:22:59,439
Speaker 1: Maboto was not a communist. Now, um Mad Mike's success

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00:22:59,520 --> 00:23:01,440
Speaker 1: made him in to a mini celebrity, and he was

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Speaker 1: indeed a colorful character, and one interview he told a

425
00:23:04,480 --> 00:23:06,760
Speaker 1: Post reporter quote, I think I'd like to have been

426
00:23:06,800 --> 00:23:09,560
Speaker 1: born in the time of Sir Francis Drake. Yes, out sailing,

427
00:23:09,640 --> 00:23:12,120
Speaker 1: robbing the Spaniards, and when you brought the booty back

428
00:23:12,119 --> 00:23:14,240
Speaker 1: to Queen Elizabeth, you knelt before her and she made

429
00:23:14,280 --> 00:23:16,600
Speaker 1: you a night. You were respectable even though you were

430
00:23:16,640 --> 00:23:20,760
Speaker 1: a thief. So yep, yep, that's the guy he is.

431
00:23:20,880 --> 00:23:23,240
Speaker 1: So Unfortunately for Mad Mike, Mike and a lot of

432
00:23:23,280 --> 00:23:25,680
Speaker 1: other people, it turns out that coups are kind of addictive.

433
00:23:25,800 --> 00:23:28,920
Speaker 1: In nearly nineteen eighties, sixty two year old mad Mike

434
00:23:29,000 --> 00:23:31,439
Speaker 1: Hory led forty men in an attempt to overthrow the

435
00:23:31,480 --> 00:23:35,560
Speaker 1: socialist Resume regime of the Seychelles and reinstall an old

436
00:23:35,640 --> 00:23:39,359
Speaker 1: pro capitalist president. The plan was comical. Mike's men dressed

437
00:23:39,359 --> 00:23:42,399
Speaker 1: as rugby players with a drinking club named Ye ancient

438
00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:45,440
Speaker 1: order of froth Blowers. They hid their A K forty

439
00:23:45,520 --> 00:23:49,440
Speaker 1: seven's and fake bottom bags and posed as tourists. Unfortunately,

440
00:23:49,560 --> 00:23:52,400
Speaker 1: they all got fucking drunk his ship on the flight over,

441
00:23:52,680 --> 00:23:54,679
Speaker 1: and so they were really drunk when they arrived at

442
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:57,080
Speaker 1: the harrival arrivals call and they started a fight with

443
00:23:57,160 --> 00:24:00,480
Speaker 1: customs and so the customs guys like said like fuck you,

444
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:02,760
Speaker 1: We're gonna search your bags now. And then they found

445
00:24:02,760 --> 00:24:05,720
Speaker 1: the A K forty seven, which sparked this massive gunfight

446
00:24:05,800 --> 00:24:07,920
Speaker 1: in the customs hall at the airport and say the

447
00:24:08,000 --> 00:24:12,439
Speaker 1: say shells. So again Mike and his men had overwhelming firepower,

448
00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:14,480
Speaker 1: but they were also hammered. So they shot one of

449
00:24:14,480 --> 00:24:16,320
Speaker 1: their own men to death and then killed one of

450
00:24:16,359 --> 00:24:20,040
Speaker 1: the other soldiers. And this like running incompetent running gun

451
00:24:20,040 --> 00:24:25,320
Speaker 1: battle that that ends when they hijack an Air India

452
00:24:25,400 --> 00:24:28,480
Speaker 1: flight and forced the crew at gunpoint to fly them

453
00:24:28,520 --> 00:24:34,200
Speaker 1: to South Africa. Oh my god, I have I part

454
00:24:34,200 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 1: of me a little sympathetic for who among us has

455
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:42,040
Speaker 1: not had big plans because you got too drunk. Right. Look,

456
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:46,520
Speaker 1: look they're they're racists and monsters, but they're still humans,

457
00:24:46,680 --> 00:24:51,840
Speaker 1: right Like, yeah, yes, I I too have had getting

458
00:24:51,920 --> 00:24:54,360
Speaker 1: drunk on a plane interfere with a plan and lead

459
00:24:54,400 --> 00:24:58,440
Speaker 1: to a fight at customs that leads to you killing someone. Yeah.

460
00:24:58,960 --> 00:25:00,760
Speaker 1: I mean if I had an a K forty seven,

461
00:25:00,760 --> 00:25:02,920
Speaker 1: I might have hijacked an Air India flight. Like there's

462
00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:05,719
Speaker 1: no way to know. You know, they don't stop you.

463
00:25:05,760 --> 00:25:08,679
Speaker 1: They never cut you off on Air Emirates when you're drinking.

464
00:25:08,720 --> 00:25:12,560
Speaker 1: So yes, a lot of things can happen. Um, shout out,

465
00:25:13,760 --> 00:25:18,320
Speaker 1: shout out to Air Emirates, shout out the open bar

466
00:25:18,480 --> 00:25:23,119
Speaker 1: in the sky. So um. Yeah. So they were all

467
00:25:23,200 --> 00:25:25,439
Speaker 1: arrested as soon as they landed in South Africa. And

468
00:25:25,440 --> 00:25:29,040
Speaker 1: this is again apartheid. South Africa was like you crossed

469
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:35,280
Speaker 1: a line, Mike. Even we have to arrestue we're doing

470
00:25:35,320 --> 00:25:37,280
Speaker 1: a buck ship to people, but we even we have

471
00:25:37,320 --> 00:25:43,760
Speaker 1: standards like come Jesus, dude. So he gets arrested and

472
00:25:43,880 --> 00:25:47,080
Speaker 1: during his trial Hoary testified that the South African government

473
00:25:47,080 --> 00:25:49,560
Speaker 1: had approved the coup and given him weapons, and this

474
00:25:49,680 --> 00:25:52,520
Speaker 1: was almost certainly true, although the government denied it because

475
00:25:52,560 --> 00:25:56,239
Speaker 1: obviously South Africa fucking loved coups um as long as

476
00:25:56,240 --> 00:26:00,639
Speaker 1: they were, you know, the right kind of coups um. Yeah,

477
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:02,760
Speaker 1: the government denied it though. Mike was sentenced to ten

478
00:26:02,840 --> 00:26:05,360
Speaker 1: years in prison, but he was released after just three.

479
00:26:05,720 --> 00:26:07,840
Speaker 1: After he was freed, a journalist asked him if he

480
00:26:07,880 --> 00:26:10,640
Speaker 1: planned to retire. He responded, this is all the question

481
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:14,879
Speaker 1: of opportunity. Mercenary opportunities now mainly exist in films and books,

482
00:26:15,720 --> 00:26:18,800
Speaker 1: and yeah, as I told you, inconceivably, Mad Mike survived

483
00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:22,120
Speaker 1: until February of this year, um, which is fucking wild

484
00:26:22,800 --> 00:26:25,520
Speaker 1: when you talk to the mercenaries that came after him, though,

485
00:26:25,600 --> 00:26:28,199
Speaker 1: generally say that Mike was one half of a holy

486
00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:31,240
Speaker 1: duo of African mercenaries who kind of like inspired the

487
00:26:31,240 --> 00:26:34,520
Speaker 1: whole modern modern field of mercenary dumb uh and the

488
00:26:34,560 --> 00:26:37,400
Speaker 1: other half. His other half was a guy named Bob Dinnard,

489
00:26:37,520 --> 00:26:39,520
Speaker 1: a French imperialist who did a lot of the same

490
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:42,680
Speaker 1: kind of stuff as Mad Mike, but more quietly, competently

491
00:26:42,720 --> 00:26:45,960
Speaker 1: and on behalf of France. In nineteen seventy seven, Bob

492
00:26:46,000 --> 00:26:48,879
Speaker 1: Dinard led eighty mercenaries in an attempt to overthrow the

493
00:26:48,880 --> 00:26:52,480
Speaker 1: communist government of Benin, which had recently nationalized all of

494
00:26:52,520 --> 00:26:56,720
Speaker 1: their banks and their petroleum industry. Unfortunately, Bob timed things badly.

495
00:26:56,840 --> 00:26:59,639
Speaker 1: The president wasn't home when Dinard's mercenary army reached his

496
00:26:59,680 --> 00:27:03,280
Speaker 1: pal us. A detachment of North Korean military advisors were

497
00:27:03,359 --> 00:27:06,040
Speaker 1: at home, and they had heavy machine guns. So Bob's

498
00:27:06,040 --> 00:27:08,399
Speaker 1: men were forced into a fighting retreat. But as we

499
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:11,159
Speaker 1: saw with Mad Mike Corey, uh, coups are addictive, and

500
00:27:11,200 --> 00:27:13,840
Speaker 1: the very next year Bob Dinard hired another army to

501
00:27:13,920 --> 00:27:16,880
Speaker 1: overthrow the government of the Comoros, a small island nation

502
00:27:16,920 --> 00:27:20,639
Speaker 1: off of Africa's East coast. His fifty men brought brought

503
00:27:20,640 --> 00:27:23,760
Speaker 1: sought off shotguns in a case of dompaign on Champagne.

504
00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:27,080
Speaker 1: They landed on the coast, attacked the president of the palace,

505
00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:29,959
Speaker 1: murdered the president and installed his rival. Then they got

506
00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:34,639
Speaker 1: drunk on Champagne. Uh So, yeah, most of these mercenary

507
00:27:34,720 --> 00:27:36,560
Speaker 1: coups don't work out well, but some of them do,

508
00:27:36,920 --> 00:27:40,000
Speaker 1: and they're very profitable when they do. Also, shout out

509
00:27:40,000 --> 00:27:43,560
Speaker 1: to the to the expensive fancy champagne. I mean these

510
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:46,399
Speaker 1: guys knew how to party. Look yeah, I mean again,

511
00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 1: that is a G move, Like yeah, bringing a case

512
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:54,600
Speaker 1: of champagne with you to the coup is Yeah, that's

513
00:27:54,640 --> 00:27:59,680
Speaker 1: that's a G move. I yep. I don't want to interrupt.

514
00:27:59,760 --> 00:28:01,960
Speaker 1: So I think your dog is like is he Is

515
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:05,479
Speaker 1: she humping something? She she she's not humping up thing.

516
00:28:05,560 --> 00:28:09,000
Speaker 1: She's licking something. And I don't know. And I will

517
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:14,560
Speaker 1: not disrupt her in interactions. Leave her b I'm proud

518
00:28:14,600 --> 00:28:17,480
Speaker 1: of her. I like, what's happening, and it gives you

519
00:28:17,560 --> 00:28:21,720
Speaker 1: a free show while we record this episode. A show

520
00:28:21,760 --> 00:28:25,160
Speaker 1: within a show is a show a show. Yes, Anderson

521
00:28:25,240 --> 00:28:29,520
Speaker 1: has just performed a coup on behind the Bastards, taking

522
00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:34,560
Speaker 1: over attention, uh and spoilers. She also has a case

523
00:28:34,600 --> 00:28:40,120
Speaker 1: of dom pairing on champagne and a sawd off shotgun. Yeah,

524
00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:43,080
Speaker 1: she knows you're talking about her. It's so funny. She's like,

525
00:28:43,160 --> 00:28:46,920
Speaker 1: my brother's talking about me. I hear him. She thinks

526
00:28:46,920 --> 00:28:54,040
Speaker 1: of you as her brother probably yeah, so uh yeah.

527
00:28:54,120 --> 00:28:56,400
Speaker 1: This all builds to the point that there's a long

528
00:28:56,480 --> 00:28:59,959
Speaker 1: history of small groups of mercenaries overthrowing tiny African nations

529
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:02,800
Speaker 1: reinforced in both actual ship that happened and in fiction

530
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:06,360
Speaker 1: like King Solomon's Minds. In the real world cases, western

531
00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:11,000
Speaker 1: governments were generally involved, and almost always the South African government.

532
00:29:11,560 --> 00:29:14,320
Speaker 1: The people who lived in these nations were never ever consulted.

533
00:29:14,840 --> 00:29:18,640
Speaker 1: And all of this background brings me bridget to the

534
00:29:18,680 --> 00:29:21,880
Speaker 1: story of Fernando Po. Have you ever heard of Fernando Po.

535
00:29:22,160 --> 00:29:25,520
Speaker 1: I have not. So It's an island off the west

536
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:28,040
Speaker 1: coast of Africa and it makes up the bulk of

537
00:29:28,080 --> 00:29:32,360
Speaker 1: the nation we now call Equatorial Guinea UM and Fernando

538
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:35,600
Speaker 1: Po was colonized by Spain prior to the Great Scramble

539
00:29:35,680 --> 00:29:38,080
Speaker 1: for Africa, but they never really did anything with it.

540
00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:42,240
Speaker 1: Bastard Pod alumni Henry Morton Stanley called the island the

541
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:44,560
Speaker 1: pearl of the Gulf of Guinea, but stated that he

542
00:29:44,600 --> 00:29:46,520
Speaker 1: would not pay a penny for it as it was

543
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,520
Speaker 1: a jewel which Spain did not polish. So basically the

544
00:29:49,560 --> 00:29:51,720
Speaker 1: Spanish like owned this place, but they never really did

545
00:29:51,720 --> 00:29:53,440
Speaker 1: anything for it because there wasn't really anything to do.

546
00:29:53,760 --> 00:29:56,000
Speaker 1: Like when white people went there, they always died because

547
00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:58,240
Speaker 1: like they didn't have any immunity to the local diseases,

548
00:29:58,600 --> 00:30:01,040
Speaker 1: and there wasn't any gold or anything that was generally

549
00:30:01,040 --> 00:30:03,840
Speaker 1: considered to be super value valuable by white people on

550
00:30:03,840 --> 00:30:07,000
Speaker 1: Fernando Po. So it was kind of like a refueling station,

551
00:30:07,320 --> 00:30:09,800
Speaker 1: but not much more for for Spain for most of

552
00:30:09,800 --> 00:30:13,360
Speaker 1: the time that they controlled it. Um So, I'm gonna

553
00:30:13,400 --> 00:30:15,880
Speaker 1: quote next from a book called The Wonga Coup by

554
00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:18,840
Speaker 1: Adam Roberts for a picture of how Fernando Po fared

555
00:30:18,920 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 1: under colonialism. Quote. In nineteen thirty six, the British novelist

556
00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:25,960
Speaker 1: Graham Green, who was generally fond of West Africa, dismissed

557
00:30:25,960 --> 00:30:29,320
Speaker 1: the dreadful little Spanish island, where there existed a mild

558
00:30:29,360 --> 00:30:32,200
Speaker 1: form of slavery that enabled a man to pawn his children.

559
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:35,000
Speaker 1: Towards the end of its two centuries of rules, Spain

560
00:30:35,000 --> 00:30:37,000
Speaker 1: did little to improve the lives of those it ruled.

561
00:30:37,160 --> 00:30:39,600
Speaker 1: The colonial power set up an economy based on cocoa

562
00:30:39,680 --> 00:30:43,120
Speaker 1: plantations in a reasonable school system. Health campaigns reduced the

563
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:46,360
Speaker 1: impact of tropical diseases, at least on Fernando Po. By

564
00:30:46,360 --> 00:30:49,080
Speaker 1: the second half of the twentieth century, Equatorial Guineas were

565
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:51,719
Speaker 1: less poor than most Africans thanks to exports of cocoa,

566
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 1: but few Spaniards settled, and Native Africans were denied political

567
00:30:55,040 --> 00:30:58,800
Speaker 1: rights and economic chances. When independence loomed, the Spanish organized

568
00:30:58,800 --> 00:31:01,560
Speaker 1: hasty poles to find a new government. Spain under its

569
00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:05,200
Speaker 1: own dictator, General Franco, was hardly qualified to promote democracy,

570
00:31:05,200 --> 00:31:08,479
Speaker 1: and Equatorial Guinea was ill prepared when, in late nineteen

571
00:31:08,560 --> 00:31:11,120
Speaker 1: sixty eight it became the hundred and twenty six member

572
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:14,720
Speaker 1: of the United Nations. After independence, things really went wrong.

573
00:31:14,880 --> 00:31:17,800
Speaker 1: Its citizens were soon desperate to escape. A sleepy eyed

574
00:31:17,840 --> 00:31:22,640
Speaker 1: man mass Nuguema won the elections. The shy son of

575
00:31:22,680 --> 00:31:24,680
Speaker 1: a reverend and a brutal witch doctor known as his

576
00:31:24,760 --> 00:31:27,920
Speaker 1: saintly father, Massias did badly at Catholic mission schools, but

577
00:31:27,960 --> 00:31:30,520
Speaker 1: took up jobs as a junior bureaucrat and a coffee farmer,

578
00:31:30,760 --> 00:31:33,400
Speaker 1: jen then as a court interpreter, and subsequently as mayor

579
00:31:33,400 --> 00:31:35,800
Speaker 1: of a small town. He became an influential leader within

580
00:31:35,840 --> 00:31:38,600
Speaker 1: an important subgroup of the Fang, the country's most populous

581
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 1: ethnic group, and was groomed for office by a few

582
00:31:40,880 --> 00:31:44,880
Speaker 1: Spaniards who believed he would serve their interests. So this

583
00:31:44,920 --> 00:31:48,360
Speaker 1: isn't a great start for independence. For Equatorial Guinea and

584
00:31:48,400 --> 00:31:50,800
Speaker 1: it's it's not going to be a great continuance. So

585
00:31:50,840 --> 00:31:53,720
Speaker 1: I found another book called Double Paradox by Andrew Wedeman

586
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:56,560
Speaker 1: that explains that Macias largely wound up in power due

587
00:31:56,600 --> 00:32:00,160
Speaker 1: to his ability to charm Spanish colonial officers. What him

588
00:32:00,160 --> 00:32:02,440
Speaker 1: in notes that he impressed them with his willingness to

589
00:32:02,480 --> 00:32:05,680
Speaker 1: treat other Guineans with contempt um, which is kind of

590
00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:08,000
Speaker 1: the same story as idi Amine. The British liked him

591
00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:10,800
Speaker 1: because he was good at cracking down on other like

592
00:32:10,920 --> 00:32:14,800
Speaker 1: Africans who tried to get independence from England um, and

593
00:32:14,800 --> 00:32:17,040
Speaker 1: they were like, Okay, this guy we can probably trust.

594
00:32:17,760 --> 00:32:20,160
Speaker 1: But it turns out that macy has hated Spain too

595
00:32:20,280 --> 00:32:22,320
Speaker 1: due to having to lick their boots for years, and

596
00:32:22,360 --> 00:32:24,400
Speaker 1: as soon as he was in power, he like fucked

597
00:32:24,400 --> 00:32:27,240
Speaker 1: them over and took every action he could do uproot

598
00:32:27,320 --> 00:32:31,200
Speaker 1: any uproot any local industry that benefited Spanish companies. Uh.

599
00:32:31,280 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 1: He formed a children's militia and used it to harass

600
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:37,800
Speaker 1: all the remaining white people out of Equatorial Guinea. And

601
00:32:37,840 --> 00:32:40,840
Speaker 1: that doesn't necessarily sound too bad with the exception, but

602
00:32:40,880 --> 00:32:43,800
Speaker 1: the problem is that like again, the whole economy of

603
00:32:43,840 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 1: Equatorial Guinemy had been. Guinea had been based around these

604
00:32:46,520 --> 00:32:49,840
Speaker 1: these cocoa plantations, and he kicks out everyone who knows

605
00:32:49,960 --> 00:32:53,400
Speaker 1: how to operate and run them, um, and he nationalizes them.

606
00:32:53,400 --> 00:32:56,080
Speaker 1: But rather than higher locals to run them, he brings

607
00:32:56,080 --> 00:32:58,760
Speaker 1: in cheaper Nigerian workers to run the fields because he

608
00:32:58,800 --> 00:33:01,000
Speaker 1: wants to make all of the profit it's from them.

609
00:33:01,120 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 1: Um and yeah, so it's like he he completely uproots

610
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:09,040
Speaker 1: the entire economy overnight. Um and that is not a

611
00:33:09,160 --> 00:33:13,000
Speaker 1: great thing to do, uh from an economics point of view.

612
00:33:13,600 --> 00:33:16,720
Speaker 1: H Macy has also ordered the entire nation's retail sectors

613
00:33:16,720 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 1: shut down and replaced it by a new network of

614
00:33:18,960 --> 00:33:22,840
Speaker 1: state run stores. This left another fifteen thousand native retail

615
00:33:22,920 --> 00:33:25,920
Speaker 1: workers out of a job. The country each entered into

616
00:33:25,960 --> 00:33:28,040
Speaker 1: a terrible recession, which was made worse by the fact

617
00:33:28,080 --> 00:33:31,760
Speaker 1: that Macis gave his best friend monopoly on all international trade.

618
00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:34,640
Speaker 1: Prices for food imports stared out of the budgets of

619
00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:38,000
Speaker 1: most actual Guineons. It became impossible to import the spare

620
00:33:38,040 --> 00:33:40,200
Speaker 1: parts for the machinery that made the nation run and

621
00:33:40,200 --> 00:33:43,760
Speaker 1: made its cocoa plantations function. The electrical grid failed and

622
00:33:43,800 --> 00:33:46,440
Speaker 1: the roads were eaten by the jungle, So he just

623
00:33:46,560 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: like what little the Spanish had done to set up

624
00:33:50,080 --> 00:33:54,120
Speaker 1: you know, infrastructure, He just bulldozes and suddenly everyone's out

625
00:33:54,120 --> 00:33:56,360
Speaker 1: of a job. No one has any money and no

626
00:33:56,400 --> 00:33:59,240
Speaker 1: one can buy any food, um, which is not a

627
00:33:59,320 --> 00:34:02,440
Speaker 1: great job. Up, I would say, I don't want to

628
00:34:02,480 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: back seat dictator of Equatorial Guinea here. Yeah, it's bad.

629
00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:09,480
Speaker 1: Do you want to know? Yeah? And I and I

630
00:34:09,560 --> 00:34:11,319
Speaker 1: really need you to take an ad break, But I

631
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 1: don't know how to do a witty transition after that.

632
00:34:13,800 --> 00:34:17,880
Speaker 1: So could you just like do an ad break? You know,

633
00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:21,839
Speaker 1: who won't give their best friend a monopoly on all

634
00:34:21,880 --> 00:34:26,000
Speaker 1: international trade that makes food import impossible and leads to

635
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:32,600
Speaker 1: widespread famine. Yeah, our sponsors won't do that. Maybe, I

636
00:34:32,640 --> 00:34:41,640
Speaker 1: mean historically we should probably just roll the ads. We're

637
00:34:41,680 --> 00:34:45,280
Speaker 1: back uh And and yeah, we're talking about Equatorial Guinea

638
00:34:45,280 --> 00:34:47,960
Speaker 1: and its first few years of independence, which don't go great.

639
00:34:48,440 --> 00:34:51,239
Speaker 1: So the people of Equatorial Guinea could clearly see that

640
00:34:51,280 --> 00:34:53,959
Speaker 1: a calamity had been visited upon them by their new leader,

641
00:34:54,400 --> 00:34:56,600
Speaker 1: and Macy has deflected blame for it by claiming his

642
00:34:56,600 --> 00:34:59,360
Speaker 1: political opponents had attempted a coup. He launched a vicious

643
00:34:59,480 --> 00:35:02,000
Speaker 1: terror camp paying against his own people, which sucked the

644
00:35:02,040 --> 00:35:05,000
Speaker 1: economy up more uh and led to him confiscating the

645
00:35:05,040 --> 00:35:08,040
Speaker 1: property of thousands upon thousands of citizens and putting it

646
00:35:08,080 --> 00:35:11,480
Speaker 1: in the hands of himself. One third of the population

647
00:35:11,640 --> 00:35:14,120
Speaker 1: was killed or fled the country in just a couple

648
00:35:14,120 --> 00:35:20,320
Speaker 1: of years, um, which is a lot of the country. Uh. Yeah,

649
00:35:20,480 --> 00:35:23,520
Speaker 1: so that's not great. Uh. Macy has instituted a new

650
00:35:23,560 --> 00:35:26,280
Speaker 1: set of internal travel restrictions to try and stop people

651
00:35:26,360 --> 00:35:28,480
Speaker 1: from fleeing the country. Um. But the only way you

652
00:35:28,480 --> 00:35:30,040
Speaker 1: can think of to do this was to create a

653
00:35:30,080 --> 00:35:34,240
Speaker 1: massive series of burdensome checkpoints, and this made domestic trade

654
00:35:34,239 --> 00:35:38,520
Speaker 1: impossible within the country itself. Mac has also ordered all

655
00:35:38,719 --> 00:35:41,960
Speaker 1: ordered all ships, boats and canoes impounded, which destroyed the

656
00:35:42,000 --> 00:35:45,840
Speaker 1: fishing industry overnight and ended the population's access to protein.

657
00:35:46,640 --> 00:35:49,400
Speaker 1: Mac has sold fishing rights to the Soviets instead and

658
00:35:49,400 --> 00:35:52,200
Speaker 1: pocketed the money from this while his people starved. By

659
00:35:52,200 --> 00:35:55,320
Speaker 1: the early nineteen seventies, Equatorial Guinea was a failed state

660
00:35:55,360 --> 00:35:58,239
Speaker 1: by any reasonable definition of the term. The people who

661
00:35:58,239 --> 00:36:00,759
Speaker 1: had once enjoyed at least a decent standard of living,

662
00:36:00,960 --> 00:36:05,000
Speaker 1: we're starving and forced into subsistence agriculture. The state bureaucracy collapsed.

663
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:07,279
Speaker 1: Since there was no food to buy, government workers had

664
00:36:07,280 --> 00:36:09,120
Speaker 1: to leave their posts in order to fill their bellies.

665
00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:11,759
Speaker 1: In order to stop the exodus, Macias ordered the only

666
00:36:11,840 --> 00:36:14,839
Speaker 1: road out of the capital. Mind. Yeah, he's not good

667
00:36:14,840 --> 00:36:19,040
Speaker 1: at leading a country. Uh not great. And again this

668
00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 1: is the guy, Like it's one of those things. This

669
00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:24,400
Speaker 1: is the guy who this guy only comes to power

670
00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:27,360
Speaker 1: because Spain puts him in power because they're too lazy

671
00:36:27,480 --> 00:36:30,879
Speaker 1: to like do a proper job of giving up this colony,

672
00:36:30,960 --> 00:36:33,280
Speaker 1: so they just put the guy who's best at kissing

673
00:36:33,280 --> 00:36:35,280
Speaker 1: acid in charge and he turns out to be a monster,

674
00:36:35,680 --> 00:36:40,440
Speaker 1: which happens repeatedly in Africa in the period as colonialism, like,

675
00:36:40,719 --> 00:36:43,160
Speaker 1: uh departs it, Like this is kind of what they

676
00:36:43,160 --> 00:36:46,880
Speaker 1: all did. I have a question, yea, yeah, please, I

677
00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:50,280
Speaker 1: guess I feel like when it comes to dictators people,

678
00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:52,440
Speaker 1: I mean, correct me if I'm wrong. I am not

679
00:36:52,520 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 1: a I'm not a dictatorship expert, but I feel like

680
00:36:56,000 --> 00:36:58,759
Speaker 1: people are more willing to be okay with it if

681
00:36:58,840 --> 00:37:01,880
Speaker 1: like the trains run on time, our roads are we

682
00:37:01,920 --> 00:37:06,080
Speaker 1: have food. It seems like having someone who is this

683
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:10,719
Speaker 1: shitty like being like making these kinds of changes that

684
00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:13,560
Speaker 1: really fuck over the average person like that that that

685
00:37:13,600 --> 00:37:16,719
Speaker 1: seems so different from what I from what I have

686
00:37:16,880 --> 00:37:19,120
Speaker 1: come to, no one loved that dictators I guess I

687
00:37:19,120 --> 00:37:22,000
Speaker 1: feel like my understanding is that, like, oh, when someone's

688
00:37:22,040 --> 00:37:25,000
Speaker 1: a fucking ship head, people are willing to overlook it

689
00:37:25,040 --> 00:37:28,080
Speaker 1: if they if their lives are either made better or

690
00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:30,800
Speaker 1: not significantly changed. And it seems like in this case

691
00:37:30,840 --> 00:37:33,919
Speaker 1: their lives were made much worse. This is what gets

692
00:37:33,960 --> 00:37:36,319
Speaker 1: us into like the truth of that is that in

693
00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:39,040
Speaker 1: almost all dictatorships, you know, you get the odd exception,

694
00:37:39,040 --> 00:37:41,440
Speaker 1: there's guys like Tito who like Tito was a monster.

695
00:37:41,640 --> 00:37:44,840
Speaker 1: But yeah, I've spent a lot of time in former

696
00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:47,640
Speaker 1: Yugoslavia and a lot of old people think back to

697
00:37:47,719 --> 00:37:51,280
Speaker 1: Tito fondly because things went so shitty after his he died.

698
00:37:51,680 --> 00:37:54,600
Speaker 1: But like, as a general rule, particularly when you're talking

699
00:37:54,640 --> 00:37:56,840
Speaker 1: about like dictators who like come into power with a

700
00:37:56,880 --> 00:37:59,640
Speaker 1: lot of popular support, it's popular support from one specific

701
00:37:59,680 --> 00:38:02,399
Speaker 1: group of people, and it's one specific group of people

702
00:38:02,440 --> 00:38:04,759
Speaker 1: who does well. You know, in Germany's case, we all

703
00:38:04,800 --> 00:38:07,960
Speaker 1: know what that specific group of people was, and in

704
00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:10,399
Speaker 1: in in Equatorial Guinea's case, there is a specific group

705
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:12,759
Speaker 1: of people the largest ethnic group in the country are

706
00:38:12,800 --> 00:38:14,759
Speaker 1: the Fang, which is like the same tribe that he

707
00:38:14,880 --> 00:38:17,200
Speaker 1: is a member of, and they do pretty well under

708
00:38:17,239 --> 00:38:21,200
Speaker 1: this um because they get preferential treatment. They're able to

709
00:38:21,800 --> 00:38:24,120
Speaker 1: like they kick out like like he they like he

710
00:38:24,160 --> 00:38:27,040
Speaker 1: executes genocides against like the Igbo and a couple of

711
00:38:27,040 --> 00:38:30,239
Speaker 1: other different tribal people's in Equatorial Guinea, and all of

712
00:38:30,280 --> 00:38:32,760
Speaker 1: their stuff gets given to like members of his tribe.

713
00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:36,400
Speaker 1: So like the largest most Equatorial Guinea ands suffer, but

714
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:39,560
Speaker 1: the largest single group of them does pretty well because

715
00:38:39,560 --> 00:38:41,520
Speaker 1: they're able to take shipped from the other people who

716
00:38:41,560 --> 00:38:44,960
Speaker 1: are suffering. And that's kind of the story of dictatorships.

717
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:47,560
Speaker 1: That's really what happens. And we talk about what people

718
00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:50,000
Speaker 1: talk about things going well, it's more often that like no, no,

719
00:38:50,160 --> 00:38:52,920
Speaker 1: your specific group was the group that things went pretty

720
00:38:52,920 --> 00:38:55,560
Speaker 1: well for because the guy in charge stole things from

721
00:38:55,560 --> 00:39:00,440
Speaker 1: everyone else to give to you, like yeah, um, And

722
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:02,560
Speaker 1: that's kind of what happens in Equatorial Guinea. Is like

723
00:39:02,600 --> 00:39:04,880
Speaker 1: the Fang do all right, at least at first, the

724
00:39:04,880 --> 00:39:07,200
Speaker 1: Fang do all right because he's just taking shipped from

725
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:10,680
Speaker 1: everybody else and giving it to them. One Swedish researcher

726
00:39:10,680 --> 00:39:13,480
Speaker 1: who managed to sneak into Equatorial Guinea during this period

727
00:39:13,520 --> 00:39:17,040
Speaker 1: called it the Dako of Africa. Everyone else just called

728
00:39:17,040 --> 00:39:20,000
Speaker 1: it Death's waiting Room, a name that became more relevant

729
00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:22,840
Speaker 1: when Macias banned Western medicine, leading to a resurgence of

730
00:39:22,920 --> 00:39:27,160
Speaker 1: leprosy among other illnesses. As his nation crumbled, Mass lost

731
00:39:27,200 --> 00:39:29,880
Speaker 1: his mind. He began seeing coup plotters in every corner,

732
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:32,720
Speaker 1: and he executed people almost as random and an attempt

733
00:39:32,719 --> 00:39:36,200
Speaker 1: to keep them at bay. During one Christmas mass execution

734
00:39:36,239 --> 00:39:39,560
Speaker 1: at a sports stadium in the capital, Malabo, Palace, guards

735
00:39:39,600 --> 00:39:41,920
Speaker 1: shot a hundred and fifty people to death while the

736
00:39:41,960 --> 00:39:44,680
Speaker 1: song those were the days my friend played on an

737
00:39:44,760 --> 00:39:49,000
Speaker 1: endless loop, which is one of the most nightmarish things

738
00:39:49,040 --> 00:39:56,880
Speaker 1: I can imagine. Yeah, yeah, yeah um. One survivor of

739
00:39:56,920 --> 00:39:59,240
Speaker 1: the horror later wrote, quote no food in the shops,

740
00:39:59,280 --> 00:40:02,000
Speaker 1: no water, no electricity, no kerosene for the lamps, and

741
00:40:02,160 --> 00:40:04,920
Speaker 1: night we walked in blackness. Yes, for eleven years we

742
00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:08,560
Speaker 1: walked in blackness. Uh. The Wonga cou by Adam Roberts

743
00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:12,320
Speaker 1: goes on to note quote nightclubs include in schools. Closed

744
00:40:12,360 --> 00:40:15,160
Speaker 1: missionaries were chased from the country. Masist like Paul pot

745
00:40:15,160 --> 00:40:18,160
Speaker 1: and Cambodia launched a campaign against the educated, and they

746
00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:21,760
Speaker 1: began to disappear. He banned the word intellectual once finding

747
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:23,920
Speaker 1: a minister who used it at a cabinet meeting. He

748
00:40:23,960 --> 00:40:27,359
Speaker 1: called educated people the greatest problem facing Africa today. They

749
00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:30,520
Speaker 1: are polluting our climate with foreign culture. He declared himself

750
00:40:30,600 --> 00:40:33,040
Speaker 1: President for life, then renamed the island part of the

751
00:40:33,040 --> 00:40:36,719
Speaker 1: country after himself. He adopted new titles, each more eccentric

752
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:39,840
Speaker 1: than the last major General of the armed forces, Great

753
00:40:39,880 --> 00:40:44,000
Speaker 1: Maestro of Popular Education, Science and Traditional Culture, the only

754
00:40:44,120 --> 00:40:48,040
Speaker 1: Miracle of Equatorial Guinea. He ordered teachers and priests to

755
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:51,200
Speaker 1: promote his cult of personality. School Children chanted that Macis

756
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:54,000
Speaker 1: alone had freed the country from imperial Spanish rule. The

757
00:40:54,040 --> 00:40:56,880
Speaker 1: sanctuary of every church was to show his portrait. Priests

758
00:40:56,920 --> 00:41:00,279
Speaker 1: read out messages venerating the insecure. Presidents such as God

759
00:41:00,320 --> 00:41:04,320
Speaker 1: created Equatorial Guinea thanks to Macias. Without Macist, Equatorial Guinea

760
00:41:04,360 --> 00:41:07,760
Speaker 1: would not exist. Some of the people were nominally Christian,

761
00:41:07,840 --> 00:41:12,120
Speaker 1: but he eventually forced church's shut. So he's not not great.

762
00:41:12,680 --> 00:41:16,560
Speaker 1: I keep making that point, right, Like he had kids

763
00:41:16,640 --> 00:41:19,719
Speaker 1: chanting the ship at school. Yeah, it's it's it's bad.

764
00:41:19,760 --> 00:41:22,960
Speaker 1: It goes bad in Equatorial Guinea and Macie for an

765
00:41:22,960 --> 00:41:25,840
Speaker 1: example of how bad it goes Macias was almost certainly

766
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:28,640
Speaker 1: a cannibal. But that's not even really worth talking about

767
00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:30,520
Speaker 1: because the fact that he ate people was like one

768
00:41:30,560 --> 00:41:34,800
Speaker 1: of the least shitty things about him, Like he's he's like, yeah,

769
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:38,240
Speaker 1: you know, is bad, but it's like, well, he eats people,

770
00:41:38,320 --> 00:41:42,320
Speaker 1: but there's so many other things. That's what we have,

771
00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:49,719
Speaker 1: so many other problems. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So he was

772
00:41:49,800 --> 00:41:54,160
Speaker 1: so good at killing basically everyone, um who didn't agree

773
00:41:54,239 --> 00:41:56,799
Speaker 1: with him or like him, that there was basically no

774
00:41:57,040 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 1: organized society and Equatorial guinety Guinea for a rebellion to

775
00:42:00,560 --> 00:42:03,400
Speaker 1: even form. In If there was ever a nation in

776
00:42:03,480 --> 00:42:06,840
Speaker 1: desperate need of a foreign backed coup, it was Equatorial Guinea.

777
00:42:07,120 --> 00:42:09,640
Speaker 1: And unfortunately the coup they got was not the one

778
00:42:09,680 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 1: they deserved. Uh. And again, like if you're talking about, like,

779
00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:16,879
Speaker 1: as I think we've established, it's always problematic to talk

780
00:42:16,920 --> 00:42:19,880
Speaker 1: about foreign coups to overthrow governments, But this is the

781
00:42:19,880 --> 00:42:22,480
Speaker 1: guy who it's like, yeah, if you're gonna justify a coup,

782
00:42:22,520 --> 00:42:25,400
Speaker 1: it's against a guy like this, and it still doesn't

783
00:42:25,400 --> 00:42:28,319
Speaker 1: work out. So the man behind this coup was not

784
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 1: a grizzled mercenary. Instead, it was a former journalist and

785
00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:36,200
Speaker 1: novelist named Frederick Forsyth. Now, Frederick had reported to for

786
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:38,680
Speaker 1: the BBC during the Nigerian Civil War, and he knew

787
00:42:38,680 --> 00:42:40,760
Speaker 1: a number of mercenaries as a result of his reporting

788
00:42:40,760 --> 00:42:44,040
Speaker 1: work in Africa. But the early nineteen seventies he transitioned

789
00:42:44,040 --> 00:42:46,480
Speaker 1: out of journalism and into a very successful career as

790
00:42:46,480 --> 00:42:49,400
Speaker 1: a fiction author. His most famous book was probably The

791
00:42:49,480 --> 00:42:51,839
Speaker 1: Day of the Jackal, which made him wealthy, and there's

792
00:42:51,840 --> 00:42:54,200
Speaker 1: a movie made out of the Day of the Jackal. Um.

793
00:42:54,239 --> 00:42:55,960
Speaker 1: There's a movie's made out of a lot of his books,

794
00:42:56,000 --> 00:42:59,520
Speaker 1: actually flesh with cash. Forsyth looked out at the sad

795
00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:01,799
Speaker 1: case of Tutorial Guinea and decided he was in a

796
00:43:01,840 --> 00:43:04,560
Speaker 1: position to do something about Masias. He sat down with

797
00:43:04,600 --> 00:43:07,520
Speaker 1: a mercenary friend of his and from his flattened Camden,

798
00:43:07,840 --> 00:43:10,560
Speaker 1: the two painstakingly plotted out a coup that would overthrow

799
00:43:10,640 --> 00:43:13,840
Speaker 1: Masias from power. The basic idea was to hire several

800
00:43:13,880 --> 00:43:16,800
Speaker 1: dozen former soldiers from Nigeria and paid them to capture

801
00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:19,080
Speaker 1: or kill the mad dictator and replace him with a

802
00:43:19,120 --> 00:43:22,440
Speaker 1: b Afrian politician who seemed amenable. The whole thing took

803
00:43:22,440 --> 00:43:25,040
Speaker 1: about five months to plan, and the affair was largely

804
00:43:25,080 --> 00:43:27,399
Speaker 1: an excuse for the now wealthy Forsyth to live out

805
00:43:27,440 --> 00:43:30,440
Speaker 1: his fantasies of being an international man of mystery. In

806
00:43:30,480 --> 00:43:33,480
Speaker 1: a later interview with Adam Roberts, he explained, quote, I

807
00:43:33,480 --> 00:43:36,680
Speaker 1: originally postulated a question to myself, would it be possible

808
00:43:36,719 --> 00:43:38,759
Speaker 1: for a group of paid and bought for mercenaries to

809
00:43:38,760 --> 00:43:41,279
Speaker 1: toppal the Republic? I thought, if the republic were weak

810
00:43:41,400 --> 00:43:44,839
Speaker 1: enough and power concentrated in one tyrant, then in theory yes.

811
00:43:45,200 --> 00:43:47,720
Speaker 1: I looked around and saw Fernando po and every story

812
00:43:47,719 --> 00:43:50,240
Speaker 1: about the country was gruesome. I didn't go there myself,

813
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:52,000
Speaker 1: but I met businessmen and others who had been there,

814
00:43:52,000 --> 00:43:53,880
Speaker 1: and they told me this place was weird. So I

815
00:43:53,920 --> 00:43:56,239
Speaker 1: decided it could be done. If you storm the palace. Well,

816
00:43:56,280 --> 00:43:58,080
Speaker 1: it wasn't really a palace. It was the old Spanish

817
00:43:58,080 --> 00:44:01,239
Speaker 1: colonial governor's mansion. Probably by sunrise you could take over,

818
00:44:01,280 --> 00:44:04,000
Speaker 1: provided you have a substitute African president, and announced it

819
00:44:04,040 --> 00:44:07,880
Speaker 1: was an internal coda. I began to and I began

820
00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 1: to explore the world of black market arms. Where do

821
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:12,359
Speaker 1: you get a shipload of black market arms. I knew

822
00:44:12,400 --> 00:44:14,360
Speaker 1: nothing about it, so I dug around. I discovered the

823
00:44:14,360 --> 00:44:17,840
Speaker 1: capital was either Prague, where Omnipole, the communist arms dealer was,

824
00:44:18,120 --> 00:44:20,320
Speaker 1: but for that the client had to be cleared by Moscow.

825
00:44:20,440 --> 00:44:23,120
Speaker 1: Otherwise it was Hamburg. So off I went. I penetrated

826
00:44:23,200 --> 00:44:26,160
Speaker 1: under subterfuge using the South African name and developed my theme.

827
00:44:26,360 --> 00:44:29,680
Speaker 1: I attended conferences of black market freelance criminals and learned

828
00:44:29,719 --> 00:44:32,759
Speaker 1: about the curious end user certificates to identify those who

829
00:44:32,760 --> 00:44:35,240
Speaker 1: are entitled to use and buy weapons how they're forged

830
00:44:35,320 --> 00:44:41,000
Speaker 1: or purchased from corrupt African diplomats. So Forsyth will claim

831
00:44:41,040 --> 00:44:43,719
Speaker 1: to this day usually that he was just writing a

832
00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:46,440
Speaker 1: book about how to carry out a coup, and the

833
00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:49,680
Speaker 1: fact that someone attempted a coup in this country based

834
00:44:49,719 --> 00:44:52,880
Speaker 1: on his book was completely separate from it. But also

835
00:44:53,000 --> 00:44:55,920
Speaker 1: sometimes in interviews he'll admit that, like, oh, yeah, I was. I.

836
00:44:56,080 --> 00:44:57,960
Speaker 1: I was carrying out a coup from the beginning, and

837
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:01,520
Speaker 1: I just wrote a book about it later. Um yeah,

838
00:45:01,719 --> 00:45:04,160
Speaker 1: So let me ask you then, who who is the

839
00:45:04,200 --> 00:45:06,919
Speaker 1: bastard here? If you like, which one of these people

840
00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:11,600
Speaker 1: as the bastard? They're both bastards. I do think in

841
00:45:11,640 --> 00:45:18,680
Speaker 1: a way macis is like it's tough because like obviously

842
00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:21,880
Speaker 1: he's a monster who kills tens of thousands of people.

843
00:45:22,239 --> 00:45:25,200
Speaker 1: But also there's something that's like almost a little bit

844
00:45:25,280 --> 00:45:27,480
Speaker 1: more unsettling to me about a guy who's just like

845
00:45:27,520 --> 00:45:30,200
Speaker 1: a rich novelist being like, my bet, I could overthrow

846
00:45:30,200 --> 00:45:33,520
Speaker 1: this country. It seems easy enough, like like that that's

847
00:45:33,560 --> 00:45:36,520
Speaker 1: his that he's not like they always throw in some

848
00:45:36,600 --> 00:45:39,040
Speaker 1: like little gibe about how, oh, it seems like the

849
00:45:39,040 --> 00:45:41,720
Speaker 1: dictators really bad there, but when you get a chance

850
00:45:41,719 --> 00:45:45,000
Speaker 1: to like read long interviews with them, like that's a sentence,

851
00:45:45,040 --> 00:45:46,440
Speaker 1: and then the rest of it is like, yeah, it

852
00:45:46,520 --> 00:45:48,839
Speaker 1: really seems easy and fun. And I was interested in

853
00:45:48,840 --> 00:45:51,239
Speaker 1: this and this and this, like the whole The fact

854
00:45:51,320 --> 00:45:54,360
Speaker 1: that a terrible dictator was in charge of Equatorial Guinea

855
00:45:54,440 --> 00:45:57,920
Speaker 1: was like three percent of why they did it was

856
00:45:58,160 --> 00:46:03,120
Speaker 1: it seemed fun. So I have one more question in

857
00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:07,279
Speaker 1: your life, in your do you feel like how what

858
00:46:07,520 --> 00:46:10,040
Speaker 1: percentage of ship like that do you feel like comes

859
00:46:10,080 --> 00:46:12,640
Speaker 1: down to, oh, it was it seemed fun. I do

860
00:46:12,760 --> 00:46:15,160
Speaker 1: feel like when you hear about all the terrible ship

861
00:46:15,239 --> 00:46:17,000
Speaker 1: that goes on in our world, so often it comes

862
00:46:17,000 --> 00:46:19,520
Speaker 1: down to like, oh, we wanted, like, yeah, we wanted

863
00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:21,840
Speaker 1: the money, you want to control whatever, whatever, But also

864
00:46:22,200 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 1: wouldn't it be fucking fun? Like I do feel like

865
00:46:24,880 --> 00:46:27,200
Speaker 1: a lot of these guys are are are doing this

866
00:46:27,480 --> 00:46:32,520
Speaker 1: because they want the excitement and the fun. Yeah. No, no, no,

867
00:46:32,560 --> 00:46:35,600
Speaker 1: not at all. And like one of the problems that

868
00:46:35,640 --> 00:46:37,320
Speaker 1: we're gonna have to tackle if we're ever going to

869
00:46:37,400 --> 00:46:41,040
Speaker 1: have a more peaceful society is how to how to

870
00:46:41,080 --> 00:46:44,840
Speaker 1: give young young men in particular and really young white

871
00:46:44,840 --> 00:46:47,560
Speaker 1: men and most particular though it's all young men like

872
00:46:47,840 --> 00:46:52,680
Speaker 1: something to do that is exciting and feels meaningful and

873
00:46:52,760 --> 00:46:55,399
Speaker 1: might kill them, but doesn't involve them fucking up other

874
00:46:55,400 --> 00:46:58,640
Speaker 1: people's lives. Um, because a lot of us need that.

875
00:46:58,760 --> 00:47:00,400
Speaker 1: It's not all of us, but like fun. I mean,

876
00:47:00,440 --> 00:47:03,600
Speaker 1: I I've I've I've bought multiple plane tickets to war

877
00:47:03,680 --> 00:47:05,360
Speaker 1: zones that I would be lying if I said that

878
00:47:05,400 --> 00:47:07,480
Speaker 1: a part of it wasn't Like, yeah, that sounds like fun,

879
00:47:07,960 --> 00:47:10,120
Speaker 1: like like going through that experience. Now, I didn't try

880
00:47:10,160 --> 00:47:13,120
Speaker 1: to overthrow no countries, but it is a thing you

881
00:47:13,200 --> 00:47:16,920
Speaker 1: have to grapple with. Yeah, well, if you lived in Washington,

882
00:47:17,000 --> 00:47:20,160
Speaker 1: d C. There's a very obvious avenue available to you

883
00:47:20,239 --> 00:47:24,239
Speaker 1: and that is join an illegal dirt biking because you

884
00:47:24,280 --> 00:47:26,600
Speaker 1: don't wear a helmet, you don't have insurance. Your head

885
00:47:26,640 --> 00:47:29,920
Speaker 1: is so close to the pavement it's dangerous. But yeah,

886
00:47:30,080 --> 00:47:34,520
Speaker 1: it's not you're not you're not overthrowing anything, you know. Yeah,

887
00:47:34,520 --> 00:47:38,680
Speaker 1: we need to somehow make rugby more high stakes, yeah,

888
00:47:38,840 --> 00:47:42,520
Speaker 1: or have one of those. Yeah, there's there's it's tough.

889
00:47:42,680 --> 00:47:44,800
Speaker 1: Like maybe we could just pick like one of the

890
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:47,279
Speaker 1: states we don't like and let anyone who wants to

891
00:47:47,360 --> 00:47:50,000
Speaker 1: go go fight a war there, like we just declare,

892
00:47:50,200 --> 00:47:56,399
Speaker 1: I don't know, let's say here, um Florida, Iowa, Florida, Florida. Yeah,

893
00:47:56,480 --> 00:48:00,279
Speaker 1: that's the state Florida. Yeah, of course Florida. Florida is

894
00:48:00,320 --> 00:48:02,560
Speaker 1: a war now. And if you really need that in

895
00:48:02,600 --> 00:48:04,359
Speaker 1: your life, you can go to Florida and you can

896
00:48:04,400 --> 00:48:07,120
Speaker 1: have your war in Florida. We'll call it Warida. It'll

897
00:48:07,160 --> 00:48:10,920
Speaker 1: be it'll be fine. Very little will actually change about

898
00:48:11,000 --> 00:48:14,719
Speaker 1: daily life and most of that state. In Iowa. He

899
00:48:14,760 --> 00:48:16,719
Speaker 1: didn't mean it. He didn't mean it Iowa. He he

900
00:48:17,080 --> 00:48:21,480
Speaker 1: meant for I meant it. We love your corn Iowa,

901
00:48:21,680 --> 00:48:24,920
Speaker 1: We love your corn Iowa. We need a war state

902
00:48:25,120 --> 00:48:27,240
Speaker 1: to to get some of this energy out of people.

903
00:48:27,280 --> 00:48:34,480
Speaker 1: Paintball is not doing it for folks. Um. So yeah, yeah,

904
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:39,399
Speaker 1: So this fucking fiction author Frederick Forsyth like starts quote

905
00:48:39,440 --> 00:48:43,080
Speaker 1: unquote researching his book uh and at the same time,

906
00:48:43,520 --> 00:48:46,440
Speaker 1: a group of mercenaries led by his friend that he

907
00:48:46,640 --> 00:48:51,520
Speaker 1: planned this book with, get hired um and like they

908
00:48:51,040 --> 00:48:54,480
Speaker 1: they they charter a boat and they like start sailing

909
00:48:55,080 --> 00:48:58,000
Speaker 1: uh through like to Equatorial Guinea to carry out a coup.

910
00:48:58,000 --> 00:48:59,719
Speaker 1: Now this doesn't work out. They don't even get to

911
00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:03,440
Speaker 1: land end the British intelligence catches onto them and Gibraltar

912
00:49:03,480 --> 00:49:05,680
Speaker 1: and tips off Spanish authorities who arrest them in the

913
00:49:05,719 --> 00:49:09,520
Speaker 1: Canary Islands. The coup gets called off um and it

914
00:49:09,640 --> 00:49:13,360
Speaker 1: never actually happens. But the very next year, Frederick Forsyth

915
00:49:13,440 --> 00:49:16,360
Speaker 1: published another book called The Dogs of War, about a

916
00:49:16,400 --> 00:49:18,960
Speaker 1: group of European mercenaries who carry out a coup against

917
00:49:18,960 --> 00:49:21,760
Speaker 1: a brutal island dictator, and the book bore a striking

918
00:49:21,760 --> 00:49:24,120
Speaker 1: resemblance to all of the planning for the failed nineteen

919
00:49:24,160 --> 00:49:27,520
Speaker 1: seventy three coup, and like very little of the book

920
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:30,360
Speaker 1: actually involved any action or fighting or the coup itself.

921
00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:33,279
Speaker 1: Almost all of it was just a detailed step by

922
00:49:33,320 --> 00:49:36,279
Speaker 1: step guide to how to Like, here's how we go

923
00:49:36,320 --> 00:49:38,640
Speaker 1: about getting end users cer certificates. Here's how we go

924
00:49:38,680 --> 00:49:41,640
Speaker 1: about buying weaponry. Here's how we go about transporting that weaponry.

925
00:49:41,680 --> 00:49:43,880
Speaker 1: Here's how we charted the boat. Here's how we hired

926
00:49:43,880 --> 00:49:47,520
Speaker 1: all these mercenaries. Like it's it's famously still seen today,

927
00:49:47,680 --> 00:49:49,799
Speaker 1: is like a step by step guide for how to

928
00:49:49,880 --> 00:49:53,080
Speaker 1: carry out a coup. Um and rumors began to swirl

929
00:49:53,160 --> 00:49:56,600
Speaker 1: after this that Frederick forsythe Sythe had attempted to overthrow

930
00:49:56,640 --> 00:49:59,239
Speaker 1: the government of Equatorial Guinea and then written a fictionalized

931
00:49:59,239 --> 00:50:03,000
Speaker 1: account of his act Um. In nineteen eighty the book

932
00:50:03,040 --> 00:50:06,720
Speaker 1: was made into a movie with Christopher Walkin. Um Yeah.

933
00:50:08,400 --> 00:50:11,200
Speaker 1: In two thousands six, Frederick Forsyth all but admitted to

934
00:50:11,239 --> 00:50:13,680
Speaker 1: an interviewer that he had in fact planned and failed

935
00:50:13,680 --> 00:50:16,600
Speaker 1: to execute a coup to overthrow Masius. His book became

936
00:50:16,600 --> 00:50:20,120
Speaker 1: a hit among mercenaries, in particular in Bob Denard's successful

937
00:50:20,200 --> 00:50:22,520
Speaker 1: coup off of the coast of East Africa, all of

938
00:50:22,560 --> 00:50:24,880
Speaker 1: the men he's carried into battle had copies of the

939
00:50:24,920 --> 00:50:27,480
Speaker 1: French translation of The Dogs of War in their back pocket.

940
00:50:28,160 --> 00:50:31,440
Speaker 1: Um so again, they're like, that's part of why I

941
00:50:31,440 --> 00:50:33,680
Speaker 1: started this with like King Solomon's Minds is that like

942
00:50:34,480 --> 00:50:37,400
Speaker 1: The Dogs of War is really like the modern retelling

943
00:50:37,440 --> 00:50:39,320
Speaker 1: of that. We're like, okay, we're just gonna make this

944
00:50:39,520 --> 00:50:43,000
Speaker 1: all about the coup um. That's the real money shot.

945
00:50:43,640 --> 00:50:48,760
Speaker 1: So yeah, that's cool, that's cool. Yeah, I think that's

946
00:50:48,760 --> 00:50:51,399
Speaker 1: who I like that. I also think it just goes

947
00:50:51,440 --> 00:50:55,799
Speaker 1: to show you, like what like culture, like books and

948
00:50:55,880 --> 00:50:58,400
Speaker 1: movies and all of that really makes a difference of

949
00:50:58,480 --> 00:51:01,320
Speaker 1: like how things play out. You know. I think you

950
00:51:01,360 --> 00:51:03,240
Speaker 1: could you could easily be like, oh, it's just a book,

951
00:51:03,239 --> 00:51:05,600
Speaker 1: it was just a book, but clearly that's not the case.

952
00:51:05,640 --> 00:51:07,640
Speaker 1: I think that these things really matter and they can

953
00:51:07,680 --> 00:51:11,080
Speaker 1: really make an imprint on how things go down in history. Yeah.

954
00:51:11,280 --> 00:51:13,520
Speaker 1: I think this has inspired me to write a book

955
00:51:13,560 --> 00:51:16,120
Speaker 1: about how a fictional cult fins off the f d

956
00:51:16,239 --> 00:51:18,799
Speaker 1: A and the Mountains of Idaho and use the proceeds

957
00:51:18,800 --> 00:51:20,880
Speaker 1: from that book to buy a compound in the mountains

958
00:51:20,920 --> 00:51:25,360
Speaker 1: of Idaho and then launch a health and beauty network

959
00:51:25,440 --> 00:51:28,520
Speaker 1: that gets the FDA brought down on us. Are you

960
00:51:28,680 --> 00:51:31,600
Speaker 1: currently trying to start a cult that and I misremembering this,

961
00:51:32,000 --> 00:51:38,160
Speaker 1: you know most of the time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, more

962
00:51:38,239 --> 00:51:41,680
Speaker 1: or less, you know, I mean, I told him he could, like,

963
00:51:41,719 --> 00:51:45,719
Speaker 1: it's fine, start a cult. Why not if you sign

964
00:51:45,760 --> 00:51:50,120
Speaker 1: off as long as no dogs are harmed, it's fine

965
00:51:51,560 --> 00:51:55,439
Speaker 1: almost certainly, not probably. And on that note, Robert, it's

966
00:51:55,480 --> 00:52:00,880
Speaker 1: break time. Oh it is. Yeah. Well, speaking of coup's,

967
00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:06,959
Speaker 1: here's a product coup that was not your best work,

968
00:52:07,120 --> 00:52:10,799
Speaker 1: but along with some services. Yeah that wasn't that didn't

969
00:52:10,800 --> 00:52:21,760
Speaker 1: work out. Great, we are back, okay, So yeah. Mass

970
00:52:21,880 --> 00:52:25,799
Speaker 1: Protect remained in power until August of nineteen seventy nine,

971
00:52:25,880 --> 00:52:29,400
Speaker 1: when a coup finally unseated him. No Europeans were involved. Instead,

972
00:52:29,440 --> 00:52:32,399
Speaker 1: the culprit was his nephew, Obiang, who Macias had put

973
00:52:32,400 --> 00:52:35,520
Speaker 1: in charge of notorious Black Beach Prison, where regime enemies

974
00:52:35,560 --> 00:52:39,040
Speaker 1: and random people were tortured to death. Obiang was spurred

975
00:52:39,080 --> 00:52:41,960
Speaker 1: into action when his uncle's mismanagement got so bad that

976
00:52:42,000 --> 00:52:44,920
Speaker 1: the army could no longer pay wages. When representatives of

977
00:52:44,960 --> 00:52:47,640
Speaker 1: the military asked the president for money, Maci has had

978
00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:50,400
Speaker 1: them all executed, including some officers who were members of

979
00:52:50,440 --> 00:52:53,600
Speaker 1: the royal family. This spirit Obiang into action, and a

980
00:52:53,640 --> 00:52:56,480
Speaker 1: brief civil war was the result. Obiang obviously had the

981
00:52:56,520 --> 00:52:59,360
Speaker 1: support of most of the military. His uncle resisted for

982
00:52:59,360 --> 00:53:02,040
Speaker 1: a time than largely largely to Cuban and North Korean

983
00:53:02,040 --> 00:53:04,880
Speaker 1: officers who backed up his forces, but eventually Macias was

984
00:53:04,920 --> 00:53:06,920
Speaker 1: forced out of his palace and into a small jungle

985
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:10,760
Speaker 1: village named Mongomo. There he hid the entire national treasury

986
00:53:10,800 --> 00:53:13,400
Speaker 1: somewhere between sixty and a hundred and fifty million dollars

987
00:53:13,560 --> 00:53:17,320
Speaker 1: in what is generally described as a wooden hut. Obiang attacked,

988
00:53:17,320 --> 00:53:19,000
Speaker 1: and in the battle that followed, the hut was set

989
00:53:19,000 --> 00:53:22,560
Speaker 1: on fire and the entire nation's foreign currency reserves were incinerated.

990
00:53:23,080 --> 00:53:25,680
Speaker 1: Masius fled again, but he was eventually arrested and brought

991
00:53:25,680 --> 00:53:28,359
Speaker 1: back to the capital of Mlabo. Obiang took over from

992
00:53:28,360 --> 00:53:31,000
Speaker 1: his uncle and convened a court in Mlabo's largest building,

993
00:53:31,080 --> 00:53:33,840
Speaker 1: the Old Cinema. The former dictator was hung from a

994
00:53:33,880 --> 00:53:36,000
Speaker 1: cage attached to the ceiling. He and a number of

995
00:53:36,000 --> 00:53:38,840
Speaker 1: flunkeys were charged with genocide, mass murder, treason, and a

996
00:53:38,880 --> 00:53:41,160
Speaker 1: litany of other crimes, and may have been the first

997
00:53:41,160 --> 00:53:43,200
Speaker 1: time in history that a head of state was actually

998
00:53:43,280 --> 00:53:46,960
Speaker 1: charged with genocide anywhere in the world. Macias was quickly

999
00:53:46,960 --> 00:53:50,800
Speaker 1: convicted and executed, and evidence that inconveniently implicated his nephew

1000
00:53:50,800 --> 00:53:53,680
Speaker 1: Obiang and regime crimes was ignored by the court. In

1001
00:53:53,680 --> 00:53:55,239
Speaker 1: a better world, this would have been the start of

1002
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:57,879
Speaker 1: a period of healing for Equatorial Guinea. But we live

1003
00:53:57,920 --> 00:54:00,120
Speaker 1: in this world and things only went from bad is

1004
00:54:00,160 --> 00:54:02,640
Speaker 1: slightly less bad, but still more or less the same.

1005
00:54:03,000 --> 00:54:06,000
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna quote now from the book Double Paradox quote.

1006
00:54:06,680 --> 00:54:09,920
Speaker 1: If anything, the plundering worsened as international aids started to

1007
00:54:09,960 --> 00:54:13,040
Speaker 1: flow in and efforts to rehabilitate the exports sector began.

1008
00:54:13,200 --> 00:54:15,399
Speaker 1: Obiong and his inner circle, most of whom were either

1009
00:54:15,440 --> 00:54:18,600
Speaker 1: members of his immediate family or fellow klansmen, grabbed whatever

1010
00:54:18,640 --> 00:54:22,320
Speaker 1: they could. Companies seeking government contracts and concessions were informed

1011
00:54:22,360 --> 00:54:25,160
Speaker 1: that they had to pay bribes and kickbacks to senior officials.

1012
00:54:25,400 --> 00:54:28,040
Speaker 1: The amounts demanded were often so high that many would

1013
00:54:28,080 --> 00:54:31,680
Speaker 1: be investors quit the country soon after arriving. Obiong privatized

1014
00:54:31,719 --> 00:54:34,520
Speaker 1: Macias estate farms, but then either took them over himself

1015
00:54:34,640 --> 00:54:37,120
Speaker 1: or gave them to his henchman. Petty corruption among street

1016
00:54:37,200 --> 00:54:40,520
Speaker 1: level bureaucrats continued unabated. The one time thugs and killers

1017
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:42,920
Speaker 1: of the Macist era thus morphed into a new regime

1018
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:46,600
Speaker 1: of tropical gangsters, under which the Equatorial guineaon economy remained

1019
00:54:46,600 --> 00:54:49,600
Speaker 1: a ruin. According to one visitor, the economy is dead

1020
00:54:49,640 --> 00:54:53,000
Speaker 1: and corruption is the game. By early n things had

1021
00:54:53,040 --> 00:54:55,319
Speaker 1: become so bad that the I m F announced it

1022
00:54:55,360 --> 00:54:57,640
Speaker 1: was suspending all aid and would lead the cut leave

1023
00:54:57,680 --> 00:55:01,880
Speaker 1: the country to its own crumbling devices. In Equatorial Guinea

1024
00:55:01,960 --> 00:55:04,160
Speaker 1: might have continued to just kind of be a tiny,

1025
00:55:04,200 --> 00:55:08,000
Speaker 1: dirt poor kleptocracy if not for a small Texas based

1026
00:55:08,040 --> 00:55:12,680
Speaker 1: oil and gas company, Walter International. In nineteen ninety one,

1027
00:55:12,760 --> 00:55:15,560
Speaker 1: they stuck. They struck oil off the coast of Equatorial Guinea,

1028
00:55:15,680 --> 00:55:19,279
Speaker 1: revealing a massive field of extremely high quality crude. In

1029
00:55:19,400 --> 00:55:21,920
Speaker 1: short order, the we nation was producing three hundred and

1030
00:55:21,920 --> 00:55:24,600
Speaker 1: fifty thousand barrels of oil a day, worth more than

1031
00:55:24,640 --> 00:55:27,800
Speaker 1: six billion dollars a year. The fields and Equatorial Guinea

1032
00:55:27,840 --> 00:55:30,399
Speaker 1: actually produced enough oil to make it the highest per

1033
00:55:30,440 --> 00:55:33,520
Speaker 1: capita producer of fuel on the planet. And this could

1034
00:55:33,560 --> 00:55:36,399
Speaker 1: have literally made every single person in the tiny country rich.

1035
00:55:36,840 --> 00:55:39,520
Speaker 1: That is, of course, not what happened. Obiang and his

1036
00:55:39,600 --> 00:55:41,719
Speaker 1: family took all the profits they should not have been

1037
00:55:41,760 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 1: able to. The nineteen The nineteen seventy seven four in

1038
00:55:44,680 --> 00:55:47,440
Speaker 1: corrupt Practices Act made it illegal for US companies to

1039
00:55:47,440 --> 00:55:50,200
Speaker 1: make direct payments to foreign officials. Instead, they had to

1040
00:55:50,200 --> 00:55:52,759
Speaker 1: pay royalties to official government accounts so the money could

1041
00:55:52,800 --> 00:55:55,120
Speaker 1: be used for the benefit of the people. Obion got

1042
00:55:55,160 --> 00:55:58,120
Speaker 1: around this by having oil companies like Exxon Mobile deposit

1043
00:55:58,160 --> 00:56:00,400
Speaker 1: their payments in a series of offshore accounts owned by

1044
00:56:00,480 --> 00:56:03,239
Speaker 1: himself and his family members. This was at best on

1045
00:56:03,280 --> 00:56:06,240
Speaker 1: the verge of being illegal, but ex On Mobile, Hess

1046
00:56:06,239 --> 00:56:09,080
Speaker 1: and Marathon were happy to play along and risk Congressional

1047
00:56:09,120 --> 00:56:12,040
Speaker 1: centure for the simple fact that Guineon oil was the

1048
00:56:12,120 --> 00:56:15,480
Speaker 1: cheapest on Earth. Obiang charged them about half of what

1049
00:56:15,560 --> 00:56:17,640
Speaker 1: other governments in the area were paid for their oil.

1050
00:56:18,080 --> 00:56:20,320
Speaker 1: This would have been a terrible deal for the people

1051
00:56:20,360 --> 00:56:22,160
Speaker 1: of his country, but none of the money was going

1052
00:56:22,200 --> 00:56:25,839
Speaker 1: to them anyway. Now On paper, the Guinean economy grew

1053
00:56:25,840 --> 00:56:28,160
Speaker 1: by leaps and bounds in the late nineteen nineties, topping

1054
00:56:28,200 --> 00:56:31,520
Speaker 1: sixty per year, which is almost an impossible rate. Very

1055
00:56:31,560 --> 00:56:33,759
Speaker 1: little of that growth, though, reached the normal people. In

1056
00:56:33,760 --> 00:56:36,760
Speaker 1: two thousand two, Equatorial Guinea spent less money than any

1057
00:56:36,800 --> 00:56:40,040
Speaker 1: other country on Earth, save a rack on healthcare. No

1058
00:56:40,280 --> 00:56:43,279
Speaker 1: country on the planet spent less money on education. The

1059
00:56:43,360 --> 00:56:47,160
Speaker 1: average lifespan, and Equatorial Guinea was fifty years. On paper,

1060
00:56:47,320 --> 00:56:49,720
Speaker 1: Guineans should have been receiving at least about six thousand

1061
00:56:49,719 --> 00:56:51,960
Speaker 1: dollars a year per person and income, which would have

1062
00:56:51,960 --> 00:56:54,160
Speaker 1: put the country in line with Chile, but all of

1063
00:56:54,200 --> 00:56:57,000
Speaker 1: that money went to Obiang and his family instead. A

1064
00:56:57,000 --> 00:56:59,879
Speaker 1: two thousand three radio program declared him the country's god,

1065
00:57:00,200 --> 00:57:02,719
Speaker 1: who can decide to kill anyone without being called to

1066
00:57:02,760 --> 00:57:04,879
Speaker 1: account and without going to hell, because it is God

1067
00:57:04,960 --> 00:57:08,040
Speaker 1: himself with whom he is in permanent contact, who gives

1068
00:57:08,120 --> 00:57:11,920
Speaker 1: him his strength. So this guy is not really a

1069
00:57:11,960 --> 00:57:14,040
Speaker 1: big improvement from macis is kind of the point that

1070
00:57:14,080 --> 00:57:17,440
Speaker 1: I'm making. Yeah, I think that's clear. So by the

1071
00:57:17,480 --> 00:57:20,360
Speaker 1: early two thousands, though, Equatorial Guinea was what you might

1072
00:57:20,440 --> 00:57:24,200
Speaker 1: call a coup plotter's paradise. It has this horrible, unpopular

1073
00:57:24,280 --> 00:57:27,040
Speaker 1: dictator who's a global pariah, and there's a huge amount

1074
00:57:27,040 --> 00:57:30,000
Speaker 1: of oil that's just been discovered there. And best of all,

1075
00:57:30,240 --> 00:57:32,760
Speaker 1: the War on Terror has just started, and the invasion

1076
00:57:32,800 --> 00:57:35,680
Speaker 1: of Iraq has caused a situation whereby it suddenly really

1077
00:57:35,760 --> 00:57:39,040
Speaker 1: really easy to justify overthrowing a foreign dictator in order

1078
00:57:39,080 --> 00:57:42,040
Speaker 1: to get at his oil. The Spanish government very much

1079
00:57:42,040 --> 00:57:45,000
Speaker 1: wanted access to Equatorial guineas fuel because they were piste off.

1080
00:57:45,040 --> 00:57:46,800
Speaker 1: They'd given up this country and not known that it

1081
00:57:46,880 --> 00:57:49,560
Speaker 1: was filled with oil. Uh. And they even had a

1082
00:57:49,640 --> 00:57:52,000
Speaker 1: ringer from Equatorial Guinea who they felt they could trust

1083
00:57:52,000 --> 00:57:55,280
Speaker 1: to replace Obiong and give them access. All that Spain

1084
00:57:55,360 --> 00:57:58,440
Speaker 1: needed was a mercenary ambitious enough to risk torture and

1085
00:57:58,480 --> 00:58:00,720
Speaker 1: execution in Black Beach Prison for a chance at a

1086
00:58:00,760 --> 00:58:03,800
Speaker 1: massive pay day. And in Part two, we're all going

1087
00:58:03,840 --> 00:58:07,320
Speaker 1: to meet this mercenary, South Africa's equivalent of Eric Prince,

1088
00:58:07,560 --> 00:58:13,160
Speaker 1: a fellow named Simon Man. Yeah. Boy, so that's where

1089
00:58:13,160 --> 00:58:17,240
Speaker 1: we end in part one. I can't I'm I'm like

1090
00:58:17,360 --> 00:58:20,439
Speaker 1: Gripps to my seat. I can't wait to to meet

1091
00:58:20,480 --> 00:58:24,240
Speaker 1: this new this new bastard. Yeah, it's gonna be exciting

1092
00:58:24,320 --> 00:58:27,880
Speaker 1: and everybody's gonna have a fun time learning about him. Um,

1093
00:58:27,880 --> 00:58:31,280
Speaker 1: but first people should have a fun time learning about you.

1094
00:58:31,400 --> 00:58:33,920
Speaker 1: Bridget Todd. You have a new podcast, There Are No

1095
00:58:34,040 --> 00:58:36,680
Speaker 1: Girls on the Internet, uh, and that is about to

1096
00:58:36,760 --> 00:58:38,880
Speaker 1: launch on the I Heart Radio network, which which galls

1097
00:58:38,960 --> 00:58:42,760
Speaker 1: dropped day. Oh it is July seven, so please subscribe

1098
00:58:43,680 --> 00:58:47,080
Speaker 1: listen all of that stuff. Can we talk about that

1099
00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:51,760
Speaker 1: transition for a second though it was lawless. I was.

1100
00:58:51,840 --> 00:58:53,920
Speaker 1: I was almost like in awe of it. It was,

1101
00:58:54,200 --> 00:58:57,280
Speaker 1: I really was, Can I say one more thing before

1102
00:58:57,320 --> 00:58:59,480
Speaker 1: we before we move away from that? You can say

1103
00:58:59,520 --> 00:59:02,880
Speaker 1: as many things like I'm gonna say this the things

1104
00:59:03,400 --> 00:59:06,040
Speaker 1: I've spent a lot of time in South Africa, and

1105
00:59:06,120 --> 00:59:09,240
Speaker 1: I will say that like I will never I will

1106
00:59:09,280 --> 00:59:12,160
Speaker 1: never pretend to be an expert on the history or

1107
00:59:12,200 --> 00:59:14,520
Speaker 1: the country or the people. But the one thing that

1108
00:59:14,600 --> 00:59:16,640
Speaker 1: was very clear to me from spending a lot of

1109
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:20,400
Speaker 1: time in South Africa was that I think that like

1110
00:59:20,960 --> 00:59:25,400
Speaker 1: the people there are like traumatized by how shitty all

1111
00:59:25,440 --> 00:59:27,880
Speaker 1: the shitty experiences they've had with a government, and that

1112
00:59:28,280 --> 00:59:31,040
Speaker 1: I think it lasts today. I was very um. It

1113
00:59:31,120 --> 00:59:34,680
Speaker 1: was interesting to see how that ship like doesn't go away.

1114
00:59:34,720 --> 00:59:36,800
Speaker 1: It's just as kind of like passed on the generations.

1115
00:59:36,800 --> 00:59:38,160
Speaker 1: And so as someone who spent a lot of time

1116
00:59:38,160 --> 00:59:40,640
Speaker 1: in South Africa, all this ship you're saying, I'm like,

1117
00:59:40,760 --> 00:59:45,040
Speaker 1: oh ship, Yeah that makes sense. People are fucking traumatized.

1118
00:59:45,120 --> 00:59:48,120
Speaker 1: So yeah, I love I loved my time there, but

1119
00:59:48,160 --> 00:59:51,440
Speaker 1: I just was really um a place where you know,

1120
00:59:51,520 --> 00:59:54,960
Speaker 1: I just feel like even today, I see the reverberations

1121
00:59:54,960 --> 00:59:58,400
Speaker 1: of the people really deserved better. Yeah, Yeah, that's kind

1122
00:59:58,440 --> 01:00:00,640
Speaker 1: of like the only real conclusion. And you can make

1123
01:00:00,680 --> 01:00:02,600
Speaker 1: because both sides in this, if you want to look

1124
01:00:02,640 --> 01:00:04,480
Speaker 1: at them, the sides are just so shitty, Like the

1125
01:00:04,520 --> 01:00:07,560
Speaker 1: dictators of Equatorial Guinea are awful. All the people who

1126
01:00:07,640 --> 01:00:10,000
Speaker 1: try to overthrow them are just trying to get rich

1127
01:00:10,120 --> 01:00:13,960
Speaker 1: and just equally shitty. And there's there's at no point

1128
01:00:14,040 --> 01:00:16,480
Speaker 1: does anyone involved give a shit about the people who

1129
01:00:16,480 --> 01:00:19,000
Speaker 1: live in Equatorial Guinea. And that's like, yeah, it's it's

1130
01:00:19,000 --> 01:00:21,480
Speaker 1: a bummer. That's not good. It's not it's really not

1131
01:00:21,800 --> 01:00:25,200
Speaker 1: bad and not good. So speaking of things that are

1132
01:00:25,200 --> 01:00:28,040
Speaker 1: bad and not good, go back out into the world

1133
01:00:29,360 --> 01:00:34,040
Speaker 1: or coursed inside, and you can go to our website

1134
01:00:34,200 --> 01:00:36,840
Speaker 1: to find our sources, which are under the episode description

1135
01:00:37,600 --> 01:00:40,200
Speaker 1: behind the Bastards dot com where you could follow Robert

1136
01:00:40,200 --> 01:00:42,360
Speaker 1: on Twitter and a right okay, where you could follow

1137
01:00:42,440 --> 01:00:45,520
Speaker 1: us on Twitter and Instagram at Bastard's Pod or you

1138
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:50,200
Speaker 1: could buy a a face mask or a T shirt

1139
01:00:50,320 --> 01:00:54,480
Speaker 1: or a cell phone case or lug or or whatever

1140
01:00:54,560 --> 01:00:57,919
Speaker 1: they've decided to sell on Tea Public today. Yeah, are

1141
01:00:58,240 --> 01:01:01,880
Speaker 1: these face masks cure COVID nineteen face masks are going

1142
01:01:01,960 --> 01:01:05,040
Speaker 1: to be on sale soon. UM, you can help us.

1143
01:01:05,360 --> 01:01:08,640
Speaker 1: F d A approved written right on the front. U.

1144
01:01:09,520 --> 01:01:13,440
Speaker 1: So yeah, help us, help us thumb an eye in

1145
01:01:13,600 --> 01:01:17,080
Speaker 1: the f d a's face, and UM get rated in

1146
01:01:17,160 --> 01:01:21,720
Speaker 1: a mountaintop compound in Idaho. Uh. That's the dream. That's

1147
01:01:21,760 --> 01:01:25,320
Speaker 1: my dream, and it should be your dream too. Is

1148
01:01:25,320 --> 01:01:30,880
Speaker 1: there information about how folks can enjoin the cult? Uh?

1149
01:01:30,960 --> 01:01:33,959
Speaker 1: Not yet. UM. Yeah, the cult is in your heart.

1150
01:01:34,360 --> 01:01:36,480
Speaker 1: The cult is in your heart. You know you'll find

1151
01:01:36,520 --> 01:01:39,920
Speaker 1: it in your heart. Um. As long as you, you know,

1152
01:01:40,200 --> 01:01:42,040
Speaker 1: want to fight the f d A on a mountaintop

1153
01:01:42,080 --> 01:01:45,040
Speaker 1: in Idaho, that's really all it takes. That's the episode.

1154
01:01:45,240 --> 01:01:56,200
Speaker 1: I think that's the episode.