Angry Planet - Google’s Former CEO Is Dancing in Ukraine

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

Earlier this year journalist Ben Makuch caught a glimpse of Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, dancing at a club in Kyiv. It was a surreal moment, a snapshot of a tragic war that the West thinks is defining the future of conflict. Tech executives have flocked to Ukraine, courting the country in an attempt to get at a resource more precious than gold: data. Makuch was just there and has written about what he saw for The New Republic and he’s on the show today to talk about it.Some light smoking banterBen’s timelineGoogle’s CEO dancing in a bar in KyivUkraine as laboratory for war techThe JSOC era is overIn defense of the majestic American turkeyThe great America vs China speculationWar, cheaperOn the actual frontlineWheat fields of fiber optic lineThe buzz of the droneLife in the bloodlandsThe human suffering of living in UkraineFPV-made propaganda“Never underestimate human innovation when it comes to killing other humans.”What’s Erik Prince doing in Ukraine?New York Times on Military ReformThe Medieval—and Highly Effective—Tactics of the Ukrainian ProtestsWho Is St. Javelin and Why Is She a Symbol of the War in Ukraine?‘Cope Cages’ on Busted Tanks Are a Symbol of Russia’s Military Failures‘Unauthorized’ Edit to Ukraine’s Frontline Maps Point to Polymarket’s War BettingSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Love this podcast. Support this show through the ACAST supporter feature. It's up to you how much you give, and there's no regular commitment. Just click the link in the show description to support now. And you do video too, right? No, I'm not going to publish the video. Oh, okay. So yeah, you can do whatever.

You need to vape. You need to, you know, whatever needs to happen. Oh, I'm a real cigarette guy, and I can't, I can't, I can't go. go back. What's your, what's your brand? Oh, man, Marley Lights. Really? Wow, that is so, like, I can't, I can't do my, uh, I mean, I haven't smoked in a long time. I miss it every day. Oh, I know, man, me too. I do like every once in a while, like, well, with friends, like if you're, if I'm drinking or something, but I mean, I used to be like, wake up smoke. Like, like a pack of day. God, the, the best one. My favorite one was, I would get on my

porch and I'd have my cup of coffee. Exactly. Oh, God. Camels. I like to camels. Camel blues. I like a camel blue. Yeah, good camel blue.

Oh, God, yeah. I remember I talked to a reporter who had quit for 30 years, an old timer. And I was like, do you miss it? And he literally looked at me. He's like, every fucking day. And I was like, wow, it doesn't bode well. It's been more than 10 years for me.

And it's still. haunts you i still i still i still haunts me if i watch like if i watch like madman or something oh god yeah i like destroys me i want it so bad you know the one i can't watch and even though it's like kind of supposed to not look cool but it does it's true detective oh yeah oh because they just oh he's just loving them oh my yeah and just he's he's about his business with the cigarettes oh he's one of the one of the all-time best smokers on camera it's like him and deniro i have to say yeah Yeah, when he's, when he's looking at that phone and just, like, inhaling, oh, my God. The meme, it's such a good meme.

It's beautiful. All right. Now I want a cigarette. I know. Just two addicts, talking each other into it. Hello and welcome to another conversation about conflict on an angry planet. I am here with Ben. It's Macu, right?

Yeah, Ben Macu. Yeah. Ben Maku, who just wrote something I want to talk about for the New Republic. But first, I want to say, do you ever have, like, a memory that haunt you and you can't shake? We were just talking about cigarettes, so I know that you do. Yeah. I keep, like, you and I used to work together. Yeah.

And I wasn't in the office very much, if ever. And one of the last times I was in the office, you were one of the only people that was nice to me. Like, you walked up and said, like, oh, hello, you know, it's good to see you. And even though I had met you several times and he had. had been like in these kinds of podcasts with you before yeah i had no idea who you were and oh that's so funny so terrible yeah uh i do not take that kind of stuff pure personally whatsoever because i am a truly one of the one of the all-time goaded i don't remember your face people okay you got the face blindness i do i don't know how as well like i'm usually pretty good about like memory anyway

but yeah so no no hate so yeah a reader reached out and said like you should talk to this guy. And I was like, I know Ben. I've got to apologize to him before we get into it. Oh, that's so funny. So you wrote this piece for the New Republic. I did, yes. The horrifying AI enhanced future of war is here. It was about one of your recent trips to Ukraine. When was the last time you were you were there? September. So it's been a while. Yeah, I was not, sorry, it has not been that long ago. I was there from basically most, or all of August to into September. I was mostly in Kiev, but I was there for those, for what I think now it still stands as the biggest aerial assaults of Kiev to date, which were both pretty terrifying. Right. One of them kind of bookends

the piece. Yes. It's kind of the thing that sees you out. It's all about drones. But I really want to focus on this image up at the top that is so fascinating and I think really speaks to what you've written about here. Can you tell me about going to the dive bar? Can you tell me about going to the dive and seeing the American dancing and who the American was? 100% can tell you about this. It stuck out in my brain for a long time. It's also one of those moments I think I'm sure you've had as a reporter where you're really like, this does feel like a movie and it shouldn't.

Like this is reality. It's almost worse. It really did feel like some sort of cut scene from Lord of War. But I was showing up, I was probably nine or ten hours out of being on a front line and outside of Harkeve, which was, just hell on earth being around and just seeing sort of the devastation and the fear of drones there was just so palpable and I showed up to what I thought was a dive bar that ended up being a kind of chic posh club and I walked in and was a little bit kind of taken aback by the scene

of it itself just that alone and I looked over at this dance floor and I was like I know that guy and it was this guy kind of awkwardly dancing middle to you know I want to say upper age, whatever that range would be, and was thinking, that guy looks very American. I turned to one of my friends and said, I know that guy. And he's like, yep, you do. I was like, that's Eric Schmidt, former Google CEO and billionaire. Why the hell is Eric Schmidt dancing in a club in Ukraine? Well, as I put it in the piece, he wasn't there for the martinis, as far as I know, he was

there for drones. He was at that time, I think, laying the groundwork for what would be a drone company. And he's now self-styled himself, his words, not mine, an arms dealer. And he's created an organization called White Stork, not to be confused with a charitable program in Ukraine called White Stork that predates his company. It's a company that is seeking to create hyper-advanced military drones loaded with artificial intelligence for what will be the future cataclysmic war that the United States will face off in, I'm sure. So there's so much going on in this piece that really speaks to the kind of this moment we're in. How did it really feels like we had this tech space where Silicon Valley 10 years ago, maybe even more recent, was very,

American Silicon Valley was very reluctant to get involved in the war business. If it happened, their employees would revolt. Google said, you know, we won't be evil, et cetera, et cetera. And now it is just, it is, there's a gold rush on arms and they're all going to make their money, right? What is it, did the war in Ukraine really present that unique an opportunity and that unique a marketplace? Absolutely. It has done so since 2014, but it was obviously supercharged by the full-scale invasion in 2022. I mean, you're quite the student of modern warfare yourself, and I think you understand just how much technologies have to be tested and, you know, workshopped in these laboratories.

And for a long time, like the drone itself, the greatest laboratory was the occupied territories in Gaza by Israeli, these Israeli defense forces. And really, in fact, I think that's actually where the predator drones and kind of these tools of the GWAT, the global war and terrorism that we know it now, came from. But obviously, that war, and even the one that's just taken place in terms of the genocide in Gaza, as much as it was a military confrontation between Israel and Hamas at times, it's not the laboratory that Ukraine is because Ukraine are two near-peer powers facing off with a considerable amount of industrial and economic power against each other.

And they're also in some, I mean, Ukraine certainly is, I would say Russia is as well, or Russia says they're not, but they pretty much are, in states of total war. So there's a mass casualties, so huge swaths of men are trying to kill each other with modern technology the best, cheapest way possible. So that's what the war in Ukraine is. You know, I mentioned the piece, but it is a sort of parallel to the Spanish Civil War, which is a place where Stuccas were tested, all sorts of Soviet bombers, Soviet fighter jets, American fighter jets, British, German, all that stuff.

I mean, and it goes beyond even that. And that's what Ukraine has become. It really has become sort of this testing ground. And because it has the data that people are after in order to. to test out all these different things. And drones happen to be, you know, the obvious weapon of choice of today, or at least the most trailblazing one that's changing things. And that's why it's become this sort of image of the conflict itself.

I think, yeah, I mean, all of that is completely spot on. I was really struck reading this. Did you happen to see the thing the New York Times editorial board put out? I did. It came out not long after my piece. You know, what I love about that editorial board, or it's now a series, right? It's a series of editorials.

I'm not sure how it's been landing, but it sort of pronounces what everyone's always known, and there's been kind of these successive regimes, including sort of the reporting that surrounds it from the New York Times and different establishment media players that have kind of ignored this and have seen, you know, have not seen the growth in the way wars are fought in any other paradigm other than these sort of small forces

of hyper-technological special forces, like that G-WAT kind of bullshit that I think is sort of perforated across our understanding of Western hegemony in many ways, right? Let J-Soc run everything. Let J-Soc run everything. And we know now that that's not at all what's happening. I mean, like, Ukraine as much as drones are kind of the name of the game,

there are still, there has been human waves on both sides. It's mostly Russian, but there have, I've heard, Ukrainian waves as well. So, you know, you still need manpower, but you also just need tons of explosive cheap things, not like some catch-all, Swiss Army night, $40 billion platform. Yeah, you don't need an F-35. You don't need an F-35, which is like, I remember the best description I ever heard of the F-35 is that it was a turkey. Explain that. Well, I just didn't really do anything quite all that well, but it did everything enough to stay alive. Belittling the majestic American turkey.

Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. But I've never seen a turkey. You're like, yeah, it kind of makes sense. I mean, I don't know. I think they're aggressive land animals that can be very cruel when they hunt and packs together. Yeah, yeah, that's true. But no, I mean, I follow, but I do follow the metaphor. And I think, you know, for a long time, it was certainly like this in like the early days of me reporting on this stuff.

I always saw these, like the F-35 specifically as there are jobs programs for states that they're in. They're very expensive. And they make the U.S. a lot of money and strengthen ties between countries because we sell them to everyone. We sell them to Turkey. We sell them to Israel. But that works really well as long as there's not actually a hot war, right? And I, the thing that I think that everyone is learning and the thing they always learn when stuff like this crops up is like the guy that you talked to, is it Yaffy. Yeah. You know, all of this stuff will tell you very quickly what you're doing is if what you're doing is working or if it's not working.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And I think actually one thing I want to make sure to point out that that was a good point of yours is that specific factories and specific areas where there are jobs programs. But if you look at it post-Cold War, that's what it was. For specific areas, all of the industrial capacity for making armaments was completely hollowed out and destroyed. And now what we have is a complete and utter lack of that infrastructure. And, you know, you look at the estimates of how long it would take for these factories to sort of kick up and suddenly start producing thousands and thousands.

thousands, equaling millions of drones like China has, and it would take a year of mass industrialization for that even to happen in and of itself. So the West is sorely lacking because we have so clearly kind of tried to tailor to these massive arms manufacturers, and have taken her eye completely off the ball of what you need if you ever, if you, if you are going to go to a state of total war. And it's, it's, it totally. It totally skirts the idea that, you know, obviously during World War II, in order for all those sides to be six of the ones that were, they had a massive industrial capacity. We've hollowed it out. There's nothing. There's no jobs. There's no nothing except for in these sort of, you know, how much can I swear in this, by the way? You can swear as much as you want. These blow jobs to certain districts that congressmen will get or congresspeople will get in order to state kind of the Republican base, most of the Republican base. There's also. some Democratic districts as well, but, you know, and we completely hollowed out the ability

to make arms. And now, like, China is way, way, way, way, ad. And this includes drones. Right. It's this, you know, we have what one factory that makes tanks in Ohio somewhere. The F-35, everyone has, like, every state has a little piece of it, but they're just making, like, one widget. And then it gets assembled, I think, in Fort Worth. Which is already like a security issue of itself. Yeah, I mean, but like, are we going to fight with F-35s or are we going to fight with quadcopter drones? Well, the thing was, yeah, if we even fight.

If we even fight. I mean, I think, you know, you've been covering this beat pretty closely as well. But, I mean, everybody I talked to you in some of these circles have kind of made it seem like the great conflict is inevitable at this point. So if it does happen, whew, I mean, you've seen the sort of the war games. they don't look pretty. Yeah, but the, I guess I just challenge, in my mind, so they think the conflict isn't it, you say the conflict isn't inevitable, and I agree that that's like what everyone says.

Yeah. The conventional wisdom is that America and China will come to blows, right? Yeah. Probably over, there will be some sort of action in the South China Sea or Taiwan, and like we will have to, America will have to decide if it promises me in anything. Yeah, exactly, which we know. they occasionally do but mostly don't

yes so I don't I just don't I don't see I don't know for some reason I don't see the play on either China's side

or America's side for there to actually be a knock down dragout war outside of some unforeseen circumstance that we don't know anything about like some sort of new resources

discovered somewhere or a new pocket of something that we both have a claim on and then we actually go to war or there's a major shakeup of the leadership of one side or the other. But I mean, that is certainly what everyone, like, that is certainly what all the smart people and the people that kind of know are saying, though, and that's what they constantly want to prepare for, and then they get dragged back into the Middle East in America. And then also, the other thing, too, is I think sometimes you have these moments in history

where it's really what empires think of themselves. And if, in this case, it's America, you have the sort of the insurgent power that is China. If America thinks that it can only fight China fair and square at a certain point, and if they don't fight them, they will be the ones that are kind of sliding down the scale, you might have enough sociopaths in an administration to think, bam, we have to do this, which is a scary concept that's been kind of put to me.

But the other one, too, is, you know, the unchecked Russian aggression in Ukraine, however you want to feel about, you know, NATO in Europe, or even the war in Ukraine itself, if Russia attacks Europe, like another NATO country, and America doesn't do anything, it's either going to be a major European war that will then drag in America, or America will America will do something, and then will that force China? And I think that's really the scarier, to me, sort of hair trigger that we're looking at,

because this war in Ukraine, as we were discussing, has become this sort of arms race, as much as it's become a geopolitical squabble. and you make weapons like Russia has you have got to use them you know that's kind of the conventional wisdom right I mean that's why the Kinjolls are flying yeah and you know like all of that kind of stuff

and they're testing hypersonics in a way that the US hasn't I'm not so like the hypersonic thing is another thing that I'm not super worried about I feel like that one might be the one where they might be hoarding what they got you think so possibly because it's kind of like that

you know the the the I remember the reports of the the Chinese aircraft carry that sunk. How did it sink, you know? I don't, I don't remember. No, I don't, I don't think anyone really knows. Oh, no one knows. Yeah, and I think like, you know, there's a lot of things that in the U.S., not to be conspiracy there, so I think this is actually just war.

A lot of things I think the U.S. are capable of that they haven't sort of tipped their hats to. And I think, let's not forget the U.S. is this kind of super advanced military still. But I think the thing that they're bad at is, is, you know, the rugged and cheap aspect of things right now. They've become a little too Gucci. Yeah, but I mean, and I don't think that that will change unless it is, unless it comes to a hot conflict. Yes, correct. I think that, like, that's what both Russia and Ukraine are learning right now and why everyone's eyes are on it is because it is a hot conflict. It's a major land war in Europe.

And there's a lot of data to be pulled. Tons of data. It's crazy. I think that was the one thing about that experience of pursuing that story in particular, where, you know, a lot of my meetings were with a lot of people on background and a lot of sort of senior officers and different kind of Likari characters who I was speaking to. And the thing was, was, you know, Ukraine is in possession as well as Russia, but I think even Ukraine even more so because they're defending against it, which even gives you more data. but they are kind of in possession of this massive data set of how this war actually looks like of what modern war looks like and they're protecting it they're they're essentially hoarding it in case they can use it as sort of this bargaining chip with the U.S. military with the U.S. Empire

in and of itself and it's like the way it was put to me was and I did write this down in the story was if you want to learn how to hit an artillery cannon you need to get video of hitting it at every single angle at every single time of day, at every single weather pattern, at every single temperature. You know, like all of these things. And the Ukrainians have that in, you know, they're extremely wealthy in this data. So thinking about that and then, you know, you're, you've been a technology reporter for a long time. Just think of, you know, how much data and how whatever data comes out of that is going to be even crazier 10 years from now. And what does that inspire, you know?

Yeah, and if you're Anderol or Palantir, you want that data set because it's the, it's a rare data set that only exists in one place. Yeah. And actually, I think the scarier thing is you have, you have like these smaller contractors now that I think of some of them have sort of been under the radar. And they're the ones, you know, creating advanced optics for drones that can kind of control themselves autonomously. or by that I mean if they go if they if they get signal jammed they can still figure out where their target is yeah yeah they've got like a local thing that they're running on yeah and I think stuff like that these types of companies are going to get bought up by the big the big boys like the Raytheons you know the Albert systems the the Lockheed Martins and then these things will be produced at scale because I think you know I can't remember what the actual prices but the price of like the official US infantry FPV drone is like 60, thousand dollars which is crazy that's so stupid it's so stupid but this is the way contracting works right it's like everything else it's like everything else in this like totally overly bloated overly capitalists you know late stage capitalist bureaucracy that we found ourselves in it's just as stupid as like the consultants class that's just suck billions of dollars from public coffers to figure

out what kind of like garbage canned new york city should have whereas you know it's the same thing in military contracting you're using something that you can buy at home depo for fucking and, you know, $150, I mean, I'm obviously underselling it. But not very much money, and it's, you know, 60 to 70 times at the price, just because the military is buying it. So tell me about what does the front line look like? I mean, the front line now is, it has been probably since about 23, I think, I mean, it's always been a vile, scary place.

But I think that's when it really, the drone thing really started to take off. because I think both sides had kind of gotten their act together in terms of how to mass produce these things. So now, like, we have, like, you know, there's several secret, I've been to a couple, several secret underground drone factories all across the country of Ukraine that are, like, guarded. You know, Russia's trying to hit them all the time with, with, with missiles. So from that point on, about 2023 to now, I mean, it's, you literally have fields covered in fiber optic. cables for fiber optic drones to the uninitiated it's these sort of drones controlled by fishing lines almost that can kind of evade signal jamming and you look at some farmer's fields

and they are covered in them like covered in them to highways that are just enmeshed in netting to protect it from FPV attacks or these slow down FPV attacks so logistics lines can be somewhat productive you have cages on every version of tank you can think of. Most advances now come in the form of motorcycle brigades. So it's literally like some Immortal Joe brigade of, you know, battle-hardened, messed up Russian forces, just like if you see these images of them sometimes coming across areas of Bacrofts, which is one of the most, you know, it is this sieged city. It's terrifying. The buzzing, I think, is what I think is the sound that scares the quadcopters buzzing of the quadcopters buzzing of the

shah heads the buzz is just I think it's now kind of overtaken the the fear of a sniper the shahed sounds like it's like a um uh a lawnmower right is yeah you know what it kind of sounds like it's a lawnmower mixed with a commercial small sessna okay it's bizarre. It's a very bizarre sound and it's even more I think terrifying and ominous when you hear them crisscrossing. Well, and

it's important to note that like you make this distinction in the article which I thought was good is that like we call a lot of this stuff drones but a lot of it really in effect are missiles of various types. The Shah Heads especially like those are

missiles essentially. It's like a slow moving missile. But if you shoot enough of them in the sky, you have to shoot them down. And when you have a persistent aerial barrages across the country, how do you, the amount of resources you have to expend to shoot the stuff down is its own war, let alone the one on the ground. And then the decoys, I mean, they have tons of decoys. Russia has been using, increasingly using decoys to so that the Ukrainians, you know, waste some of their big ticket stuff on it. The fire a Patriot at something and then like $100,000 gone, whatever those things cost per shot. Yeah.

And now most of the time, a lot of anti-aircraft, any drone stuff are 50 Cal teams on the back of trucks. Cheaper. It's cheaper. And like once they become in range, you can shoot them down. But it's still like that still requires you to be in a mostly rural or mostly urban area. getting close or in a rural area which you know you're prone to all sorts of things going wrong this has been I mean obviously like you said this has been happening since 2014 but it was mostly restricted to the those three eastern provinces

this has been a hot war now that's been grinding on for a while what's what's the mood in the cities like are people still resolved are they tired of this do they want it over I know that it's going to be all over the place. I think there's a couple things going on. You know, I think that unquestionably, there's a lot of, there's fractures happening in terms of support for the war and people are tired, obviously. This is almost, I think it's going to be four years now, but this has been going on. I remember being there at the dawn of it in February 22 and talking to some young kids

who were asking me about it. And I said, listen, this is probably going to be a few years. And they both gasped. And I said, listen, one thing I was. will say is I thought the Iraq war would never end and it did so war is end how they end let's see but the the the mood is not good I think I think people are losing a little bit of resolve and I think just from the kind of the ceaselessness of the attacks and all of that but I still think if you were to pull Ukrainians you know eight to nine out of ten would say we do not want to be a part of a Russian imperial

state, regardless of their politics, right? Like, nobody wants to be part of Russia because they know what that entails. So I think what you're seeing is, yes, there is definitely, you know, a fracturing support for the war, but there's also a, at the same time, this absolute resistance to Russian overlordship, really, when you think about it. And I think, you know, it says a lot when the Russian troops that came into Ukraine and 22, You know, one of the first things they did was, like, rated, like, food markets and, like, ATMs, because, you know, in Russia, and I've been to Russia a lot. I've been there several times. I've been all over. I've been to Siberia. A few times. I've been to St. Petersburg, Moscow, Izhevsk, Velikiluki, you know, all over the place.

Outside of St. Petersburg, Moscow, this is not, that is not a very prosperous country. It's not a country where people have great access to health care, great access to resources. So I think people in Ukraine are very resistance to that. And I don't blame them. There's one of those enduring images from the early days of the hot war where it's like a Russian soldier going back to the front line with a washing machine. Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like that kind of thing. Yeah. So, yeah, I think Ukraine, they see what it's like for their neighbors outside of the major population centers.

And they remember what the last 100 years were like. Yeah. Right? Absolutely. Not good to be in Ukraine. No, it's not good. And I think people forget that, you know, especially when it comes to sort of Ukraine's World War II actions, or at least some of the population, their involvement with the Third Reich, Ukraine had experienced, you know, this insane genocide. And to the point where people were eating each other.

I mean, it's well documented. So the country's really been under immense amounts of pressure. and there was a lot of like imperialism that went on there as well a lot of russification of those areas so there is this very historical resistance to to sort of Russian imperialism regardless if it was the Soviet czarist or you know now the present Russian Federation regime there is just an inherent resistance to it because I think just read a history book and you'll see why yeah I mean both Germany and Russia wanted to liquidate the people that were there and then use that land as kind of like an American West.

Yeah, it was Leibn's Round for the Third Reich. I think they said they wanted to keep some of the like the peoples in the East that seem to them to be Germanic to some extent, just like in Poland. Right. And full disclosure, I'm a Polish citizen. So I'm very aware of this like genocidal war that was that was being, it's been drilled into my head for years. And I think like the Ukrainians, I mean, when we.

can do an entire podcast on this, but like the Nazi allegations, I think, you know, they stem from the fact that I think some of the Ukrainians, when the war, when the invasion happened, kind of saw the Germans as a liberating force after, you know, a decade of this genocide. So it's a very complicated place, but I think the one thing I've always understood is they really just want to have self-determination. And I think that that's the thing where this gets really mixed up in whether it's a pro-NATO war or an anti-NATO war or pro-Nazi war or pro-Nazi war. or, you know, people on the ground do not want to be part of an imperial power. And I think that that's, I think the sheer horror of it is what I was trying to kind of convey to people.

Because I think that's been really lost to a lot of, I think, American readers and American, both in the right and the left. This is which I find Ukraine is such a bizarre issue is that I can't really tell if there's anybody who understands, like, the human suffering of it. You know, it's sort of like, it's become so politicized, whether it's like, either it's, like a Biden like, uh, imperial war or it's like they're Nazis or it's, uh, you know, it's just a, it's a, it's a, it's a witch hunt against Trump. Like, it's always these things, but really at the end of the day, there are like college age kids I've talked to who said that they've never been able to go party at night in Kiev ever in their entire lives because it's always just been a curfew, you know, like they can't live regular lives. Five year old kids

are, know how to instinctively go to hallways and cover themselves in pillows. when they hear the sirens go off, which happened nightly. So it's, and this, this goes beyond sort of the graphic murder that happens across the front lines. And,

you know, and definitely in cities as well, they get struck. Like, it's just, it's very terrifying. It's very sad. And I also think it's,

I make the point at the end, like, of the piece, like, Kiv, Kiv is Keeve and we don't have to deal with it here. But I think that's the one thing about it that will shock people, is that,

and you hear people, propagandize it as well, right? Like, you always see the right-wing commentators, like, say that, look at Ukraine. They're doing fine. They're partying. It's like, no, they're not. And also, these people are, yeah, Ukraine, your Kiev is a beautiful city still. And people are going about their lives because they're trying to maintain their sanity.

But there is a psychic pain that's going on there. And I think, like, it's just, come on. It's such a deep, like, I hate to use it. I hate to phrase it this way. But it's like, but it is such a deep well of privilege. Yeah. To not understand like what people have to do to survive psychologically in a war zone. Yeah.

Right. Absolutely. You know, yeah, you're going to, you've got to cut loose or you go crazy. You can't be in a state of like high tension all the time. No. And not only that, it's like, oh, God, it's, I always say this to people like, you know, when you're at a bar talking about it, people ask you or whatever. But it's always the real tough talking.

who'd be the first to shit their pants when the shaheads start coming up like you know you hear you'd hear like a lot of this sort of bravado from the trump administration and you're like none of these guys are the guys who would be or have their kids in the front lines you know like that's going to be the working class proletarian that's going to be forced to go and and sacrifice themselves like you'll be able to take your soft hands and like push the paper but when the when the body start dropping if you were there you'd understand how terrifying it was you know like and I think in Ukraine, it's just, it really is, as someone has been going there for 10 years and seen it sort of a road, it's super sad.

And there were, you know, there was already warnings of it. Like, I remember being on top of a building in, uh, of Divka in 2016, and looking at a, stadium from afar and seeing the entire sky kind of light up with drones. And I was like, this is crazy. and now look at it, you know. There's a moment in, it was like maybe, it was a couple years before the war broke out. It was described in this book.

Do you know who Peter Pomerantsev is? Yeah. He was in, he was in Denedsk, and he talks about, like, going on a night raid with some guys and, like, looking up and seeing all of the quadcopters just, like, hovering. Yeah. And they're just there, they're running for both sides, and they're just there to, like, basically make telegram video.

that was the whole thing and I'm wondering if you can talk about this actually because I think this is a huge component about it especially some sickos like me have consumed this stuff on Reddit on telegram and other places FPV it's not just about munitions it's also about propaganda

yeah oh god definitely I mean there's super cuts on both sides I've mainly only seen the Russian ones, but the super cuts of like FPV flying into faces of Russian soldiers just before they explode. It's pretty brutal. I mean, and then you see other ones where it's just like the, the view of the kind of, the God view of an FPV hitting a group of soldiers

and seeing all the limbs kind of explode everywhere. It's, it's pretty, insane that we have it is now i think probably the most documented war it used to be we used to think that you know the you can just go on i mean there's like there's jokes about it where you can just go on youtube and watch the entire iraq war well you can go on telegram and watch the war in ukraine right now yeah you can follow like an individual unit and like check out what they're doing and watch the videos that they produce every day yeah every day it's like it's the carnage is like almost it's absurd.

I reread some like Spanish Civil War stuff recently just because I was sort of thinking about Ukraine a lot and and it's wild how much the carnage of that war and sort of this this the ways all political sides during that conflict were using human life in this kind of like very disposable way and testing weapons out and all this stuff and it's like you know you scale it up and now this is Ukraine and it's the same kind of like. level of of inhumanity to it and I think

the drone has made that so so visceral it's it's really you know I always think of World War I and how you know people were using like medieval hand-to-hand combat

like literally weapons from medieval hand-to-hand combat that they were like using that were in like you know museums or different places they ended up being like perfect if you were in a trench, in a trench. But then at the same time, they're using those, for the first time in history, they're using, you know, airplanes. And just to think of how discombobulating that must have been for some guy who, like, you know, was a peasant in, like, southern France to see that.

And I think now you kind of have a similar thing where soldiers are trained to be soldiers, but not to do with drones in the way that they are now. Like, it's, you can really kind of see in those videos how shocked soldiers are dealing with that. Well, and you have equipment from World War I on the battlefield in Ukraine as well. Yes, that's effective, like an artillery. Yeah, the artillery and Maxim guns. Maxim guns, yeah, they're the dung-ups of those, yeah, yeah.

I mean, even just like the entire World War II arsenal that the Russians have kind of used. And I've seen Maxim guns hooked up to a steam deck. Yeah. And, you know, like a controller. So, like, it's even, the, it even gets, like, more granular where you're connecting this brand new technology to this ancient, like to this 100-year-old gun, right? Yeah. It's crazy. Does, is Ukraine aware broadly that they are a test ground that the world is watching and maybe not in, like, a sympathetic way, but more in a, hey, we can make some money and learn some things here?

Yes. I think they are. I think they, some aspects of it hate it. Some aspects of the society hate that. I think others are seeing it as an opportunity to get weapons contracts, to get like more to sort of entrench Western aid, which I think is smart if you're them because you're trying to make sure that this doesn't end. You know, I think it's, I think it is one of the one of the backroom sort of pawns that the Ukrainians have used in terms of keeping Trump around. because I think the one thing that has sort of you've seen snippets of it reported out but like Trump has sort of understood that they're making money off this he said that a couple times we're making money off Ukraine and I think it's like I think the weapons companies that he's that he's sort of backing which he has you know in the past are going to be making money off this and need to need to be a part of this this war or if they're going to remain relevant so I think that there's a bit of a mixed bag there as well in terms of where Ukrainians are okay with that, I think that also makes some people realize that this is why

the war will continue and everyone kind of has an interest in keeping it going. Do the Ukrainians credit, outside of like the big systems like Patriot missiles and things like, and you know, javelins, things like this, I remember talking to another reporter about some of this stuff like a year ago who was doing some reporting there and he kind of said that Ukrainians would rather have their own domestic drone manufacturing, and that's mostly what they use. And a lot of these AI systems that are kind of being pitched to them from the West aren't super useful or interesting to them. Do you have any sense of that? Yeah.

So I've heard that a lot of the systems in the West suck. They're not usable. I have heard that White Store, for example, is producing some pretty interesting stuff that is useful. But also at the same time, I've heard from Ukrainian military sources who know the war very well that have told me that this thing fucking changes so fast that something that was useful three months ago is no longer useful now for a variety of reasons, right? It could be that the Russians figured out that hitting or using Shahids at a certain altitude works better because they can jam a certain type of drone.

You know, it could be so many factors. but also, you know, just to think about, like I watched, and I encourage everyone to watch it that is interested in the war in Ukraine, the 2,000 meters to Andrievka, the same guys that did that Oscar winning doc about, was the siege of Maripal. Got a follow up, and it's incredible. I watched it. It's about, I think, the summer fall of 2023. And the one thing I realized about it. And it's really horrific. gives you an example of what those areas look like and how terrifying they are. But I was watching it and I was like, damn, the war has already changed at a degree that is just unfathomable. Yeah, because if you think about it, it was the... Since then, you know?

Well, and if you go all the way back to like Midon Square, they would, like, talk about medieval, like, military techniques. Yeah. The blockade and the siege of that stuff, they were busted. out a lot of a lot of medieval like siege techniques right and then you like throw snipers on top of that yeah

fast forward to now and yeah you've got you have tell me about the the the cyberpunk symbol of this war which I think you said is not a cossack not a bearded cossack but is instead a teenager

yeah controlling controlling an FPV drone right sitting in it sitting in a squat position with a you know the the goggles on controlling FPV drone you know it's it's not the sort of the cossack on the steep on the horse holding the saber it's now the drone you know like st javelin i'm sure many of your listeners are aware of it it's sort of that brand that that that came out because of the javelin missile system the shoulder fire javelin missile system that was this incredibly well used uh weapon

that destroyed Russian tank columns and led a not large part, but certainly contributed to the defense of Kiev and the first sort of repelling of the major invasion. And now the javelin's been completely forgotten. It's the drone. Yeah, and it's so interesting to think about, like, St. Javelin and the other early image of the war are the cages, which, you know, at the time, like I certainly called them this, because it was funny, cope cages, like, how sad is this? But the truth is, like, it's not a bad reaction to what they're dealing with.

No, and if you've seen the pictures of the tank since, it's even crazier. They look like, there's like complete nests on them. It looks like the cages have been kind of rotting and something, something from hell sort of grew up top of it. It's like, yeah, but if you can put, you spend $100,000 to put a bunch of, of like high explosive reactive armor on there or I can put a bird's nest on top of it for a thousand dollars what are you going to do exactly exactly I mean I said this in another interview about this exact story and I'm going to say it again because I think it's like true and I didn't make this up somebody else told me and I was like damn that's a great line I'm stealing

it but never underestimate never underestimate human innovation when it comes to wanting to kill other humans and they will do it as you know in the in military contracting it's all about rugged ability is it rugged does it work is it cheap you know and i think that's the thing about drones that we're figuring out is that you know tanks for example these they're incredibly expensive to make and now something that's a hundred bucks or a hundred dollar explosive on a maximum five hundred drone can destroy a tank or at least take it out. What's Eric Prince doing

knocking around? Oh man. That's another thing I... Always seems to show up like a bad penny. Oh, really, he does. He's in, you know, he's kind of like one of the horsemen if you have a war. If he comes to your country,

you might be in trouble. So I was hearing from several people that he was circling the drone industry in the summer was actually there courting people to try to find a way in to buy into this this drone sphere because I think he he knows that it's sort of the next thing that the United States needs to know but he also thinks he sees he can make some money off it we know that he's already in Haiti he's he's been involved in some of these drone operations to try to take out some of the the drug cartels that are there or the gangs the street gangs

which I think has been pretty controversial in terms of how successful that's been. But yes, he's been there, along with, you know, David Petraeus was also there. So just get this sort of smorgas board of G-Wat, you know, celebrities that have made an appearance there. Guys who I think are safe to say I have pretty checkered reputations from these American adventures. Well, even just it's, it's, it's. It's funny because, like, I think I would be, I'm not offended by them being there. That's the wrong word. But like I would can't, I would, my eyebrow would raise less if I felt like they were successful at what they do.

You know what I mean? 100%. I think, I think the bigger suspicion are sort of, I think probably what you're responding to is, I feel bad for the Ukrainians because they didn't help the American. cause when they were involved. I mean, arguably Petraeus did, but also, you know, he was involved with the surge in Iraq that has a lot of question marks to it in terms of death squads and war crimes and different allegations of who the U.S. forces were sort of backing. These are kind of, I want to say, disgraced figures and they're going to Ukraine as if they're the ones that are going to have the answers. And I think to get back to one of your early questions, like, how do the Ukrainians feel

about being used as a laboratory? I think one of the things they're genuinely sick of is being told by the West how to fight this war when they're the ones that are fighting it. And listen, there's a lot of corruption. There's a lot of problems in the front lines. Like, I think that's well documented. But the Ukrainians know how to fight this war. They're the ones that I understand how to fight it. And I think if this ends tomorrow and the Ukrainians get to keep their army, they will be the best army in Europe. Be the most prepared. Yeah, it's so funny because

Prince and Petraeus are good at, like, overseeing a prolonged conflict. Yeah. You want to say they're good at it. But, like, that's what their skill was in. Yeah. It's kind of like...

Forever war. A forever war, keeping a thing churning. And, like, that is not... That was a very weird thing that we did for 20 years. Yeah. And look where those guys... And look where those guys come from.

Those guys are both from wealthy, wealthy families. Yeah, strange. It's almost as if... Yeah, they're not the ones doing the killing and doing the dying. Yeah. Very, very, very, very odd. It's almost as if there's money to be made here if the, if they keep shooting each other. Yeah.

Absolutely. It's just like, maybe that's why both of our sputty senses went up when we saw that. It's just like, what are you doing here? Get out of here. Yeah, like, well, if Eric Prince shows up anywhere, it's always a bad time. Yeah, dude, yeah. Don't like that. No, I don't.

It's, it's, it's, it's, the one thing, I, I wrote a profile of him for the baffler in the, in the, in the summer. And I, when I was writing, because they, they, they asked me, can do you can do something on Prince? And I was like, yeah, I can. And it kind of caused me to then go and actually examine him. And I think that there was this like real image of this guy being this shadowy, terrifying bond villain. And I think it's some.

ways he is, but he's like, kind of like this caricatured joker as well. Like, he's never been successful at almost anything he's done. And anybody who knows him and is a bad, a quote-of-a-bid guy in that space thinks he's a joke. Yeah, I remember talking to a guy, uh, former special operations forces guy who like auditioned. Yeah. Like went out to the great dismal swamp like during those days and was, it was like on that compound. And told me about, like, you know, you go to the range, and then they take you through the gift shop. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they're showing you like, all right, well, here's all of the Blackwater stuff, merchandise that you could purchase.

Do you want to, do you want a backpack while you're here? Yeah. It's like, that's a little odd if you're building a mercenary force and even driving a mercenary force in the swall. But I think he, A, named the company, great name. Blackwater is. Incredible branding. Yeah. Branding is incredible.

But I think he's kind of savvy, right? I think he's a savvy guy. I think he knows the media. I think there was even a moment where he was thinking of getting into media, if I remember correctly. I think it was Robert Young Pelton. I think that was a Peltin thing. A Peltin thing, right? Yeah.

There's like a whole, there's like a whole bunch of drama between Peltin and him. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. A lawsuit and like a comic book that wasn't paid for. Yes, yes. It's a whole rabbit hole. Yeah, yeah. I remember reading about that and wondering.

Yeah, I mean, I think like, It makes sense that Prince would want to have done that. And then also it makes sense to think that the business deal has gone wrong because it seems like a lot of his business deals have gone wrong. It's very interesting that in American culture we've created these sort of people, you know, that really when you actually measure them out, they don't really do very much. No, there's nothing under the surface. Nothing.

I mean, that's kind of like speaks to you. the moment that we're in in general, I think, in this country. A lot of stuff is just performance. Oh, God, no kidding. And there's nothing under the surface. Nothing, and I think the military has become that. No, and I mean, like, with Hexseth in charge, it absolutely is. It's just about, it's about signaling. Yeah. It's not really about policy, which is why

you've got this daily deluge of videos of them seizing an oil tanker, them killing Venezuelan fishermen. Yeah. like that it's about it's about the signal yeah i mean even even even even the attack on on on on trans soldiers for example what a performance because we know that if you're a soldier and it this is very well established even like problems and questions of race are erased in american platoons a country that's just rife with a history of racism even when you're you know look when the shit hits the fan if the person next to i

identifies as trans, but is an effective soldier that saves your life. You don't give a shit about who's next to you. But of course, Hegset makes it out to be this idea that this is something that's destroying the force. And it's like, no, it's not. Like, it's not at all. But it's, like you said, it's performance. And it's, it is destroying the military.

It's performance for a domestic audience that's not in the military or involved in the military. Exactly. Right. Yeah. Absolutely. That's what's like, that's one of the things that's, fucked up about it is that it is for a civilian population that has no idea what's going on

or what the or what the military does. And I think that that's part of like sort of the hoodwink of the whole thing, right? I think that's that's sort of why I like to get back to the point of the war in Ukraine not getting attention and not people not understanding the the suffering of it. I think sort of the performance of what we think is war nowadays and what isn't. I mean, it obviously comes down to so many bigoted consequences. but also it really is like in whatever sphere you're in is what you what you believe in right like whether you're getting your information from you know the the the the the magescape or whether if you're getting it from sort of this like like neoliberal MSNPC crowd as well right like

there's there's this kind of like derision of reality I find really troubling like and especially it's willful and like I think being a reporter that covers the war and Ukraine for no other reason that I think it's a human tragedy. It's tough to explain to people sometimes that it is a human tragedy because it's just been so overtly politicized in this insane way. You know, and I think it's it's super, yeah, it's dark. I mean, it, it, we obviously saw shades of it in the early goings of the genocide in Gaza, but I think as time went on, I think anyways it seems to me that people have finally

woken up to the reality of what's actually gone on there and I just go ahead The Gaza thing is a super interesting point because I like the counter argument that I keep seeing now that some of the American side has come to is

you know Clinton said this the other day it's like well they're just everyone they're just seeing the wrong videos oh yeah yeah only they weren't on TikTok If only they didn't, they didn't see what's happening, then, you know, they would all be on Israel's side. It's like, that is a pretty shabby offense of what's happening, of the way that Israel has conducted this war. Correct. I remember when I was, I heard the, I'd just come back from Ukraine and I'd heard the, it was like one of the very first hospital bombings that had happened in Gaza.

I remember the video on the sound of it, and they were saying that it was rockets. and I remember being like, I was just under sustained Russian missile fire and heard missiles a lot and I heard rockets too. It didn't sound like a rocket. Yeah, and I think if that's the kind of argument

you're having about... Yeah, I remember thinking like, you can't even have an honest... Yeah. You like, you know... Yeah. It's like, why... But also I remember just thinking

from a practical standpoint, why would you really think that Hamas being you know, this local force really as much as it's a designated global terrorist organization. It's a local force, right? Like, you think they want to kill the people in the hospital

that are made of their friends and family, you know, to make a point? I don't know. Is it a hard sell for you? I feel like that's, uh, it kind of evades like, uh, logic. But of course, you know, I think this stuff is being now finally being

being, some of it anyways. I don't want to hold my breath, but some of it's been kind of properly exposed. But I think that Ukraine really hasn't had its moment like that. It's still kind of stuck in this sort of gummed up in, you know, the politics of American gladiatorial combat, which is now Hollywood, D.C. It's frustrating, too, because so much of it is so well documented. Yeah. Right? Like, the photos of Buka, like, exists.

Yeah. you know like that's that is horrifying and you can see it now the the the reports of like what happened like all the kidnapped children oh god it is not like the information isn't out there right no no and and like heads on spikes uh castrations on video yeah again posted to telegram posted to telegram yeah like beheadings they do be headings there it's like and proudly it's not like Yeah, like, that's the thing, Rusik, Rusik. This, like, that's why I remember, again, I've done so much work on the Nazis over there. Like, I've exposed it. But it always blew my mind when people said, oh, the Ukrainians have neo-Nazis in their ranks. And you're like, then the Russians have a thing called Wagner. Do you know why it's called Wagner? Let's look at the tattoos on the founder's chest. Yeah. Who is Hitler's favorite? composer it's just you know and then Rusik now

is a massive part of the Russian military and they're like expressing neo-Nazis and they're putting bounties out on Ukrainian

captives gives them to us and we'll perform these pagan rituals where we burn them to death and cut their heads off or such and such

well that's the kind of horrifying note that I like to end to show on perfect me too I'm always the sunshine candidate

when I come in Ben, thank you so much for coming on to Angry Planet. What's next? Where can people find your work? What's next? Please keep following me on Instagram and X. I hate both, but unfortunately, that's just the way it is, isn't it? At some point, I'm going to have to start a substack or something or other.

But you can find my regular byline on Guardian where I do a lot of national security work, a lot of stuff looking at the base and other designated terrorist organizations. and I will be back in Ukraine in 2026. I'm just sorting out the details of that. Excellent. Because this war is not going to an end. No. No,

no, it is not. It keeps grinding on. Well, we'd love to have you back when you've got some more stuff. I would also, it's been a while since we've done anything about the base or any of the American domestic. Oh, man.

It's kicking off again, too. It is. And in Canada, too. Yeah. Quite a bit. So, yeah, I would love to have you back on to talk about some of that. Man, we didn't even talk about your story that I loved about, I didn't realize it was you until I saw the 404.

Oh, is it a Pollymarket thing? Dude, that story was, that was awesome. I sent us some people in Ukraine, I knew. I was like, have you seen this? They, um, they fired somebody. ISW did. Did they? They did.

They fired somebody. And they've kind of disappeared them from the website. Huh. Yeah, I'm pretty sure I think, I think I know who it is. Really? I don't know how much money they made Oh my God I don't think it was very much

I sent that to people Of being like we live in hell It is no that's awful Well I guess we'll If you have a minute I guess we'll get into it Sure yeah yeah let's do it I'd love to

It's funny because I thought about asking you about this But I was like no I'm not gonna ask him about something You should have asked me I could have asked some people for you So Polymarkets this website where you can bet on the outcomes of binary things. So, like, will Trump win an election yes or no?

So there's a whole bunch of markets on there that are completely centered around, like, the granular individual battles in the war in Ukraine. So psychotic. Which is, like, so... If there's ever reason why this betting shit has just gotten so fundamentally out of control, it's just like, oh, my God. This is, like, a black meat. episode. It's awful. We do. This is like all of the gambling stuff that's around me

all of the time now. Oh, I don't do it. I stay away. It's so fucked up. It's awful. Yeah. Anyway, so the way that Polymarket decides if somebody wins or loses an individual battle is

they wait for the Institute of the ISW to update its live map of the conflict. Just like, Institute for the Study of War It's also an amazing map It's one of the most trustworthy ones To be honest with you

And they've been Because like the Deep State Live map Has like connections to the Ukraine MOD It's like it's pretty good But like do you really want them Truly I think it's the it's the one I trust Whenever I look at it

I use it all the time To like make sure like backtrack work I've done Like where was I was that close What was happening? But you know what I mean It's really it's very useful They've been doing it for 20 years They're some of the best

The ISW does an incredible job Yeah And so the polymarket uses it to resolve the bets. Yeah. So what happens is they have a bet up and I can't, my, I'm not going to say the word right. It's Mornyard. Is that right? Mirriad.

Thank you. I can't do, like, my, I can't do Slavic words at all. It's bad. Yeah, yeah, fair. So the bet was, will this, will Russia take this town, this town? and it's looking at an individual square before November 15th. Yeah.

Well, right before the bet resolves at around like 5.30 in the morning, someone with edit access on ISW goes and changes the map. And the bet resolves, the money's paid out, and then wouldn't you know it, that edit disappears

and then suddenly it's that doesn't look like Russia has taken it at all. Oh my God. So, and like, it's weird because usually they update the, they do small updates, but usually like the big update is like 1.30 p.m. Eastern. 5.30 a.m.

is like a real weird time for the map to be edited. Yeah. Yeah. And ISW. I talked to them a little bit and they had a public statement where they acknowledged that an edit had been done and that it had been reverted and that it was an unauthorized edit.

And it appears that someone has been fired over this. So yeah, the implication being that someone laid a bet down on Polymarket, they had edit access to this thing, and then changed it. Yeah. So they could win a couple grand

betting on the war in Ukraine. Yeah. Just like... Incredible story, by the way. Thank you. Thank you. It's like honestly one of my favorite types of stories. I love it. I mean, I don't love it, but I love the story. I'm like, that you got,

you've caught that. Like, just because it mixes, you know, the real apocalypticism of this late stage capitalism this like horrific grinding war that we're not caring about and like what you didn't make 500 bucks

yeah and again I encourage everyone to watch 2,000 meters to Indrieveka because that war that little battle for that little town that you were that you're mentioning on the ground it is just it is like

Beelzebub came in and took a shit like it's terrifying I think that that's really important to remember because like I think about, there's a website called the Pentagon Pizza Index. They have a they've taken the deep state

live map and they've rolled it over like an interactive globe and then you can go down to Ukraine and like zoom in and look at the individual streets and it will populate with the polymarket bets. You can go link directly to them and place your bet.

And I just think about like how detached we are. If you're doing that, like you're so detached from the reality of the war and the human suffering and what it looks like and what it means to be alive in that place and to survive it and to struggle in it

and then you're going to lay 500 bucks on a website called using a website called the Pentagon Pizza Index. It's just... But it's also just like, you know, just imagine if like there was some sort of effect of it like if Russians

saw it and like sent more men in or versus vice versa not that like any human loss of life there is a tragedy Russian or Ukrainian right like

if you're meddling with that in any way it's dark like that is dark it's a stain on your soul like 100% it's awful it's not a good you are a bad person like what's going on

like we're I don't know man we're dude it's just like this is the times where I'm like I really you know vice was a just disaster, who was run by a pack of gremlins, I'll never

forgive. Oh, God, yeah. It's like a whole other story. Yeah, yeah, but like, man, that newsroom would have been doing some great stuff in the last year. Yeah, but they obliterate it and cast us to the winds.

Did they ever? And didn't pay me my severance. Oh, man, I got screwed too. You got screwed? You were part of that as well, the same year? Yeah, I got, um, they, it was so fucked up. Because I was paying, because I lived out of state the whole time. And even for like several years, I was paying like New York City taxes while not living there because they'd,

anyway. And then they, at the end of it, they screwed me out of a portion of a severance that I was supposed to get. So good times. Yeah. I got laid off in that, the one,

the big blood bath, like, right before the bankruptcy because they wanted to get rid of people they were going to owe like a lot of money to because I'd been there for so long. Yep. And I remember being like, I guess I won't let the door hit me on the way out. Like, holy shit.

I know. Then you find out that, like, there was those reports of some of the vice people, like, trying to make deals with Saudi Arabia to save the company, and that's why they kind of done the bankruptcy that way. And you're just like, oh, God. These people that, like, probably paid more in drinks one night than what I needed to live. Paying themselves out those half a million-dollar retention. Oh, that was despicable.

That was like, I couldn't, I was like, this is why all this is going to shit. Yeah, because if you'd invested that in the people and in the company itself, you'd probably be okay, but. Yeah. And then it was also, like, you look at the number and it was like a staggering amount of money. I think it was $2 million all told. I think that they had, they knew the bankruptcy is coming and then they paid themselves out. Oh, no, dude, it was they, I was laid off along with like other like people had been there for, 10 years, on the April 27th, they paid that out on April 26th, I believe. I might be off by

a day here or there, but that was what it was. And I remember being like, I cannot believe that I, like, wow, there are no, there's truly no honor among thieves. No, I'm glad they got theirs and they keep failing their way up the corporate ladder. Good for them. I know. I know. Well, on that note, we've constructed it even more depressing end. Yeah, exactly. episode. Weiss. Thank you for coming on and reminiscing

what I'm talking about me. Thanks for having me. Yeah, absolutely. That's all. week angry planet listeners as always angry planet is me matthew gulp jason fields and kevin odell was credited by myself and jason fields angry planet pod dot com early access to mainline episodes and they're all commercial free go over there and sign up we will be back again soon with

another conversation about conflict on an angry planet stay safe until then