Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - Episode 402 - Operation Barras

Episode Date: February 23, 2026

SUPPORT THE SHOW ON PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys A Sierra Leonean rebel group modeled after American West Side Gangsters and ripped out of their minds on drugs, kidnaps a patrol of British soldiers, sparking a rescue mission. Sources: Fowler, William (2004). Operation Barras: The SAS Rescue Mission: Sierra Leone 2000 Fremont-Barnes, Gregory (2009). Who Dares Wins: The SAS and the Iranian Embassy Siege 1980 Utas, Mats; Jörgel, Magnus (2008). "The West Side Boys: military navigation in the Sierra Leone civil war". Journal of Modern African Studies. Reno, William (February 2003), Political Networks in a Failing State The Roots and Future of Violent Conflict in Sierra Leone

Hey everyone, it's Joe. If you like what we do here on the show, consider supporting us on Patreon. Just $5 a month gets you access to our entire bonus episode catalog, as well as every regular episode, one full week early. Access to all of our side series that are currently ongoing and our back catalog of those as well. Gets you e-books, audiobooks, first dibs on live show tickets and merchandise when they're available, and also gets you access to our Discord, which has turned into a lovely little community. So go to patreon.com slash lions led by donkeys and join the Legion of the Old Crow today. Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Lions led by donkeys podcast, the only military history podcast on the entire internet.

I'm Joe. With me is Tom and Nate. Fellas, how are we all doing today? I'm doing good. Everywhere else in Europe is apparently balls cold. It's decently warm here, a little rainy, but it's supposed to stop raining. So I guess I have, though, for the one time, I get to be like stunting on everyone for having good weather. And you guys are just like, you're basically in the kingdom of cold. What was it? Was it cold miser, whatever his name was in, in the, that fucking weird claimation movie from the 70s?

Remember? No idea what you're talking about. We're off to a good start. Heat miser, cold miser. I'm Mr. Heat my. I'm Mr. Snow. Whatever the fuck that movie was. I have no idea.

Am I tripping? Like, do I just, I'm just like inventing fake movies? I know I'm not. You're now starting to see the solom. fines, Nate. Yeah. I have no weather report to give. I don't think anybody wants to hear about Dutch weather, but I will say, Nate, you're talking to someone that lives in the UK and someone that lives in the Netherlands. Anybody on Earth can stunt on us about weather. We have the worst weather on Earth. Yep, that is true. I'm experiencing the wonderful planned obsoles

of roadworks in London in that every year in March they repave parts of the road outside my house. And by February, it's just all falling apart. There's like 50 potholes. just like on the street outside my house. So when I cycle to the gym at like half six in the morning, it's like, oh, I'm playing Mario card on a line bike. I'm happy to see that all the former Michiganer road workers have found a job somewhere else because that's the quality of our roads back home is always mysteriously crumbling for no discernible reason. It's because all of the roads in the UK are built for like the asphalt paving is only rated for that three-wheeled car from only fools and horses. And so like modern cars just destroy the shit out of it. It's like putting a

Sherman tank on like a dirt path. It's going to lead damage. It's like driving over someone's gravel driveway with, I don't know, a car, some kind of vehicle that's incredibly hot and then being surprised when it melts all the electric lines. A thing that's happened before. I remember a story. I can't believe the House of Lords only approved London's roads for the Homer. Yeah, I mean, Joe, you talk about potentially moving to the UK. If you drive in the UK, you will understand very quickly. Like the roads are designed by absolute psychopaths. I could never drive in the UK. Dude, it's horrifying.

I've accepted that. Not because of like London traffic situation, but because of having to switch how I drive, I'll fucking kill myself. It's not hard to switch sides. It's not hard to switch to driving left side. What's hard is like none of the traffic things make sense. Like,

why on earth would you have like a figure eight roundabout? Or like these weird kind of smushed together roads or like tiny ass roads and way too big cars and every road is two way and every road has parking on both sides. So it just becomes like fucking like high noon at the okay corral between two range rovers all the time. I'm having a fucking panic attack every time I drive in that country. It's similar here, but with like a whole bunch of assholes in Teslas and BMWs. At least you can be happy knowing like the Teslas don't have the self-driving capability in the EU. They're not allowed to have that. But the Tesla drivers make up for that by all driving,

like their auties in America because like, you know, like Audi drivers in the US are kind of known for driving like assholes. In the Netherlands, it's all Tesla drivers. And don't worry, BMW drivers are still there too. Like, yeah. They have a mark to keep. It's wild how much BMW and Audi drivers. Like in the US, whatever, like rich guy basically, someone who thinks they're rich. But like, in Europe, it's such a car you drive to be a dickhead. Like, I used to say that like now that I had escaped the military, was no longer worried about

getting deployed or jumping out of planes, statistically speaking, the most likely way that I was going to die was getting obliterated on New Road or Valance Road and Whitechapel by a guy driving like a seven series, a hundred miles an hour, like between two red lights that are like 30 meters apart. Like, it's just, yeah, something about BMWs. It's just, it's like stepping into an Eva, but the Eva is be a cunt. Yeah, no, you can definitely tell Joe, you will possibly experience the phenomenon of cuntz driving least cars.

So it'll be a 25 year old in like a least Mercedes doing a hundred miles an hour down, like the single straightaway outside my house. Yeah. So it's like there is cars parked either side. And this dude does not care. because he pays $300 quid a month for this fucking car. I mean, before they instituted the ULES, it was really funny because you could absolutely buy a car

for like 300 pounds on Facebook. There's so, so many cars for like 300, 400, 500 pounds. I'm just like, in America, if you buy a $500 car, like, you're like, oh, right. So this was at the crime scene when the fucking murder, suicide happened. Well, that's where you get your crown vick from the police auction, like how my mom got my first car.

Oh, right. Yeah, the Flintstone's car. Yeah. I forgot about that. And weirdly, speaking of weird dudes from the UK that is on topic for today. Okay. Because we're going to talk about a period of time we rarely talk about here.

Not antiquity, not the Middle Ages, not World War II, but rather something that happened while we were all alive. And I don't just mean Nate and I this time. Okay. Oh. All right. Our story takes us to the year 2000. So let's all log into our MySpace accounts, lace up our chucks, and talk about the time

the British Special Air Service conducted a hostage rescue mission in Sierra Leone against a rebel group that modeled itself after Tupac Shakur. Because this ain't a scene. It's a goddamn peacekeeping mission. I don't think MySpace was around in 2000. Shut up, Nate. You ruined my bit. Yeah, it was in 2003, bitch. Guess what? Guess what? I was there, fucker. I was actually a teenager. You were still in grade school. So you know what? No, if we even on MySpace, we wouldn't have to be on fucking Radiohead.com arguing about like, is it okay if your girlfriend doesn't like Radiohead? I was going to say, it's like Nate was there. Nate was arguing on MSN Messenger

about the second a neutral milk hotel album. I didn't know it existed. I was listening. I was like, man, I'm having all these feelings. Have you ever heard a band called Coldplay? God. But before we talk about Operation Barris, we have to talk about special air context. You're welcome, Tom. I fucking hate every time you do that.

You'll be broken upon the wheel of context. Sierra Leone at Civil Wars have been a topic on show before and will be again in the future. I've said that I plan on making a series on the Revolutionary United Front at some point, a little peek behind the curtain. That's the first I've ever pitched a series and Nate just said, no. But it's going to happen anyway. But to make our job easier here, we're going to cover some Sierra Leonean history leading up to 2000. But again, this is not an exhaustive series or history, so bear with me. Sierra Leone was surprise, a British colony, eventually becoming independent in 1961. I should pause here and talk about

the sources I used for this episode, but not to highlight them. For the first time, I think ever, I'm instead going to pause to insult one of them. Uh, every once we'll have to take off my funny internet man hat and put on my angry historian hat. We're talking about the SAS today. So as you can imagine a lot of the sources that float around regarding Operation Baris are, let's say, very nice to the British and especially the SAS. I mean, being nice to the SAS or the Green Berets or even the Navy SEALs in books about something that happened before the global war on terror, isn't that surprising? It's not surprising now either.

But this one kind of goes above and beyond. It's a book called Operation Barris by a guy named William. William Fowler, and it might just be the most pro-British history book I've ever stumbled upon in nearly eight years of doing this show, which is really saying something. I'm not going to make this a thing, and I only use this book mostly for operational notes, once I figured out how bad it was, but it is so bad, we do have to laugh about it a little. This book makes sure to point out that, like in all other British African colonies, the crown left behind a perfectly functioning

administration and government as well as infrastructure, which is just funny on its own. But the real gem here is apropos of nothing. Fowler goes and says that Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate leader and founder of the

KKK, was in fact dashing. This is not something you ever have to do, but especially in the context of an African Civil War taking place in the 1990s, it's just shocking how he managed to shoehorned in there. You can call these, the term

I used for these books is a one-handed books because you can tell that the person who wrote it wrote it one-handed while absolutely rubbing themselves raw with the other one. He says a lot of offensive shit about Africans in general, namely that

corruption just naturally seems to be endemic to African states. Making no connection to the tendrils of imperialism. that created these systems and perpetuate them. Rather, it just seems to happen. He doesn't bother explain why Sierra Leone has a lot of problems in the beginning. For example, five years after independence, Sierra Leone is already struggling.

He just kind of says, that's what happens in Africa. It's really weird. I really didn't need to put this in the episode, but I did it as a treat for us. But like I said, I made sure once I realized how fucked the source was, to really only use it for operational notes regarding SAS formations and whatnot, not for anything to do Sierra Leone history. But this is not the episode to wade into the heady waters of 1960s Sierra Leonean politics. That will come.

But anyway, Sierra Leone becomes independent. A guy named Albert Margui becomes Prime Minister, because his half-brother. Also, the Prime Minister dies and leaves the office to him. That's generally not how that's supposed to work. but, you know, corruption and nepotism is already really taking hold here. Maragi is often framed as an authoritarian. I'm not here to debate that because he certainly was one. But one of the things that he was trying to do was dismantle,

a lot of the old colonial power structures that remained thanks to the British, which to Margui, you know, they were meant to take hold as a way for the Brits divide and conquer and made running a modern nation state virtually impossible. He also radically diversified the Sierra Leonean Civil Service. For example, he was appointing positions to non-Creeal people for the first time, with the Sierra Leonean Creole population being the Brits' favored group within the country during colonialism. We've talked about this a thousand times about how colonialism creates in groups and outgroups. We don't really talk about it again.

But in the case of Sierra Leone, those were the Creole people. Eventually, Margui loses his position as prime minister in a free and fair election, only for the military to coup, Syka Stevens, the guy who won. Then there's a counter coup, the leader of that coup, General Andrew Juxon Smith takes power. This leads to several different coups, uprising, protests, movements, and just general destabilization. But by 1968, Stevens takes power in yet a different coup and rapidly becomes his own iron-fisted asshole, leading a one-party state via his all-people's congress. It was during this time, Stephen's time and power that the seeds for the coming Civil War

are really planted. This included purges, for example, executing the head of the army, which caused mutinies from the soldiers who liked him. One of them was a young corporal named Fodei Sanko, who, if you know anything about Sierra Leone in history, he's about to spend about seven years in prison and then form the Revolutionary United Front when he gets out. But like I said, more of that in the future. This is also when Valentin Straser and his NPRC military coup takes power. We did an episode on that a while ago. He's like a dude in his mid-20s

who is suddenly given command of a country. It doesn't go great. The civil war in Sierra Leone largely begins enrages as it does thanks to Liberian Civil War kicking off next door and its eventual victor, noted psychopath Charles Taylor, and his idiot son. The war that grips Sierra Leone for over a decade is one of the most horrific things human beings have ever done to one another.

and certainly one I've ever read about. Between 1991 and 2002, nobody's entirely sure how many are killed, brutalized, or wounded, but it's thought to be at minimum, 100,000, but is probably far more, millions more displaced, and Sierra Leone is dealing with these shadows to this very day. But by 1999, after a Nigerian-led peacekeeping mission and more than one mercenary group being paid in diamonds, the Lomé Peace Accords are signed by,

various different parties involved in the war. There's a lot to the accords, namely the Sierra Leonean present, Ahmad Kaba, wanted peace and was willing to back down a little bit to the RUF, while Fodei Sanko and his RUF were more than willing to continue committing horrific crimes as much as they needed to to secure the blood diamond bag and maybe even power. The peace agreement might be one the biggest poison pills any nation has ever had to swallow. It doesn't really stick, though, so it's kind of forgotten. Sanko is a horrific war criminal. Everybody knows it.

But now, after these accords, he's effectively vice president. He's put in charge of managing the country's diamond mines, the same mines he had previously taken over and killed thousands of people while running as a rebel leader. It's also, I suppose, worth pointing out, like, how much of a, like, geopolitical, like, power point that diamond mines in Sierra Leone were in terms of, like, not just power within the country, but, like, you can. embezzled, steel, fucking do get so much money

if this is the position that you are in control of within Sierra Leone? Oh, God, yeah. I mean, famously, the blood diamonds cycling into Liberia, because eventually a really weak ban is put on trading in Sierra Leonean diamonds. So they're then shipped over the border of Liberia.

Liberia sells them saying they're Liberian diamonds. Liberia famously does not have diamonds. Everybody turns a blind eye. that allows the RUF to do what it's doing for as long as it does. Every large power in the world and countless corporations are involved famously De Beers. Yep. They fuel the RUF to a crazy amount. Like the RUF eventually it's helicopters and shit.

You know, there's a reason why they're able to pay for everything. Yeah, part of it is that like diamonds are forever. Yeah, they're forever, but they're like a really valuable commodity in terms of like, if you were trying to illegally trade for stuff on the black market, because like, it's much easier to launder diamonds than it is like fucking balefuls of cash. Yeah, there's, there's a lot of shit in the diamond trade famously, Victor Boot pops up in this story. Well, there's, I mean, when you think about the value, the size, sort of value density there and the fact, like you said, Tom, there's a lot of gray market shadiness involved. Like, before there was cryptocurrency,

uh, there were diamonds, I guess. Except crypto is far more traceable than, most people realize. All goes back to mining as well. Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah. And much like, you know, NFTs or crypto, diamonds are not worth anything. Yep. Yeah, they were, there were something because we've decided they're worth something in the same way that at one point, people decided that weird cartoons of monkeys were going to be worth something.

Yep. We will talk about more about the blood diamond trade when we do our series on the RUF. The two are inseparable. But yeah. And now Fodaisanko for a period of time is officially in charge. of the mines. However, for a country destroyed by so much war, people agreed that if it stopped the killing, anything was worth it. And you know what? Fair enough. But not everyone agreed with the terms of the deal. Factions either in or allied with the RUF because like any other civil war, there is a massive spider web of different factions at play here. Some of them begin breaking away. The most important one being Sam Bocchery, second command of the RUF. And, you know, not only is the

second command of the RUF. He's really good friends with Charles Taylor and Victor Boot because of course he is. Of course. We love to see recurring characters Victor Boot and Charles Taylor popping up in the story. Everyone's going to be really happy by the end. Yeah. Now Victor Boot, a good friend of Alex Jones these days. Think how many diamonds you can fit on one of Victor Boots planes. That's right. That brings us to one of the subjects of today's episode. One of those breakaway groups. The rebel group, the Westside Boys, sometimes known as the West Side N-Words. But, you know, we're going to stick with boys on this one for obvious reasons. Fun fact, they never called themselves the West Side Boys. They called themselves the other thing, but they began

going by West Side Boys when they became well known for what we're going to talk about, of course, because they realized that the BBC would not be able to say their name on TV. Yeah. Now, the WSB, as we'll call them, were formed sometime in 1998, with virtually all of its early leadership coming from Wilberforce Village, a military town slapped up next to the local army barracks. Almost all of its leadership were the sons of soldiers. They grew up on base. These kids interned joined the Sierra Leonean Army.

I say the founding of the WSB was 1998 because that's mostly a guess. At this point, they're not a defined faction, really. Though it's mostly agreed upon by historians of the matter. And again, check our show notes for the non-insane historical accounting of the Sierra Leonean Civil War. And an in-depth study of the West Side Boys. Easily one of the most interesting things I've read in a long time. going to say, William Fowler has like an incredible bibliography of

a book about Operation Barris, a book about Burma, and then he wrote a book about Robert Matthews called A Mouse with a house. Fuck off. You had me and then I realize I'd been had.

One of the young NCOs on the base, the wonderfully named Junior Lion, I should point out that none of these are these guys' real names. The Sierra Lonian Civil War is really well known for code names and they're all great. Now Junior Lion led the Dark Angels

Company of this year Leonian Army. Oh yes, I'm so in. I am locked in right now for this. Yeah, I'm doing my best not to make 40K jokes, but God damn. Now, Junior Lion, not a huge fan of 40K, but was a massive

fan of Tupac Shakur. This is not the history of rat music podcast, but I assume most people listen thing, or at least vaguely aware of the East Coast West Coast rap war of the 90s. Tupac being West Side would constantly rap about, you guessed it, how great the West Side was. Lion, being a military commander station, the west side of Freetown, thought, you know what? This shit slaps.

And you know what? I'm not going to say a lot that I agree with in the West Side Boys, but they are correct about that. Tupac is great. He was listening to it. I'm thinking he just like me for real. Yeah, kind of. We talked about this on other episodes.

about Sierra Leone, but the government army by the late 90s was not a professional force. It was hardly considered an army anymore. They weren't wearing uniforms, really. They just kind of acted and looked exactly like all the other rebel groups. Lion and people like him are at best early 20s, but most of them are teenagers. And I do mean at best teenagers. So according to a different commander within the Dark Angels, after drinking, doing a fuckload of drugs,

and just generally being young men left with guns and a responsibility to commit violence. And Tupac always in the CD player, they began to model themselves as the West Side gangsters, like the gangsters that Tupac is rapping about. They eventually leave their camp because they catch charges from the Sierra Leonean government for aiding at a coup.

Whoops. Yeah, Tupac doesn't know anything about that. You know, even he would be like, damn, that's impressive. They abandoned all hints of being members of the official army and instead established a new camp in the Akra Hills, with their main base being the town of Magbany. They openly begin calling themselves the West Side Boys, but, you know, the other thing.

And in general, ran themselves in a way they believed West Side Gangsters would. But remember, theirs is a reality of grinding, Civil War and paramilitaries, not like being Compton or whatever. They have no idea what the bloods actually are other than what the music is telling them. This is where I should pause for a second and talk about what side of the war the WSB kind of falls on. It's often said they're allies of the RUF, which is true, kind of. The WSB, once formed, were always on the side of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council, or AFRC, led by a guy named Johnny Paul Karoma. He was a former army officer who led a coup back in 97. Once in power,

very briefly, Karoma demanded that the Nigerian peacekeepers released Fodei Sanko, who was temporary detained. Sanko allied himself with the AFRC. They kind of formed like an RUF, AFRC military government, but then they're promptly kicked from power by the peacekeepers a few months after that. Almost as soon as AFRC and RUF shipping lost power, they fractured. The The RUF goes back to being the RUF that everybody knows, and the AFRC just kept pretending they're like they're the legitimate government in the country, but really they fractured into nothingness. People still said they were in the AFRC, but as a group, the AFRC was pretty much done for. So kind of in the RUF, kind of not.

And that weird gray zone will become even grayer later on. They're kind of working for themselves. That isn't to say that the WSB were chaotic or random. As admittedly, when you think of a militia full of literal children doing Tupac cosplay, probably sounds like they would be. That brings us to the kids. We should probably talk about the kids. It's pretty important here.

The WSB leadership were almost all former soldiers, but virtually everyone under them were children, child soldiers. And that isn't something I should be missed here. The WSB was almost entirely child soldiers. from the very beginning, and some of these kids were kidnapped. That's without a doubt. In other cases, it's not so clear cut. Commanders and soldiers, if you want to call them that, of the West Side Boys who were interviewed said that many of the kids join their own free will.

Though, I know when it comes to the concept of child soldiers, this is always wrong. The concepts of free will and children are very debatable. And when a state and society collapse and war has been going on for so long, it's Legitimately, all these kids know, those moral and ethical boundaries tend to break away quite quickly. In the case of the WSB, they operated in an at-best gray area of both coercive and voluntary child recruitment. And what I mean by that is they were perfectly fine with a child walking up and joining them willingly. They were also perfectly fine with forcing child conscription. Ooh, not good.

Yeah, Jesus Christ. Less than ideal. Or from a very, very good. journal article called the West Side Boys military navigation in the Sierra Leone and Civil War, quote, this case clearly points to some complexities in the recruitment of child soldiers, taking us beyond the force, no force distinction. It also demonstrates that the WSB were present in the area, but not simply as a brutal intruder. Like they were, I don't want to call them Robin Hood in a lot of cases because Robin Hood steals from the rich. The WSB would just steal from

people and if you happen to be from an area under their control, they gave you stuff. And in a place where the government did not function, they were the closest thing to the government. So it creates this weird relationship between the two of them. And kids, growing up, seeing people not that much older than themselves, kind of earning money, it looks appealing. And this is not to make the WSP sound like good guys if somehow you've ended up there. They're monsters. They commit war crimes.

They're not the RUF who do unspeakable things. We will speak on them at some point in the future. But like, yeah, they're also kidnapping kids. Yeah. It's a kind of strange situation, particularly when you have countries that are like kind of post-colonial states or in broiled and like a civil war either between like fighting political factions or military factions is what you have as like you'll have these like little wells. of power come up from the ground of like anyone who has a supremacy of like resources or violence. So like people who

have, we have the most weapons or we have the most resources. It will attract people in because they're like, oh, it's some sort of authority and some sort of stability. So that's how you Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's how you get groups like this somehow becoming like controlling this little small geographic area.

And not to mention, think of the societal breakdowns and, you know, in war war is always a humanitarian, crisis first among anything else. And when society begins to break down, you know, without those concepts of normalcy, people will seek it out. What's the first thing anybody looks for? Safety.

Someone to provide them with things. They don't care if they're dressed up like Tupac or not. Yeah. Yeah. Like don't look a gift pock in the mouth. God damn it, Joe. The veterans of the WSB said they joined because unlike other militias, is the WSB wasn't pretending to be an army and said they kind of operated like a football team,

and I know this sounds weird, but this is from the same article I mentioned before. Quote, significantly, the WSP social structure is discussed in terms of extended family or relatedness based on being marginalized from society, contained in the expression, youth. The WSB viewed themselves as part of a youth revolution, where they fought to take power from an old and entrenched patronage-based elite. As such, the WSP goal was to be free from age-based inequity. And so they organized their relative equality of a football team. Youth status and the alternative youthful father figure they called Cochi coincided with that of their commander, while the power structure was modeled on military rank obtained through skill rather than age. So they

created the world's most fucked up meritocracy. The meritocracy street gang. Yeah. The Tupac and Westside gangster aesthetic was another part of this. Other than obviously just loving their music, it gave their militia a unifying mythos that much like Tupac, it was them versus the world. And this is what we wear and we do it. Yeah.

And it's also kind of like replicating the, I suppose the structure of like a military group as well that like, oh, there's like rank and structure in terms of like, oh, you know, your skill, but it's also like, oh, this is what we're about now. And it's very similar to street gang culture where, yes, there are soldiers, etc., etc., but socially it's framed as like a community family, like an adopted second family. Also the sports, the youth sports comparison here is, I think, pretty useful too, because I mean, there have been studies that have shown that in places in the world where, for example, like, because of austerity, budget cuts and just like general societal decline when youth sports and youth programming,

organizations, et cetera, get axed. Like a lot of the kids who are involved in that stuff wind up becoming combatants, you know, militants in some cases, far right, you know, hoodlums, soccer hooligan, stuff like that. Yeah. Like youth sports and youth organizing stuff in general can often be like a means of redirecting that energy towards a positive goal, or at least a neutral goal as opposed to, you know. And so in a way, it's like, you see, like your immediate response is to think, okay, like street gang. But there's a kind of a blurred line here, you know, or there's some overlap, rather. that like youth gang also military organization also youth sports team.

And it's like there's enough similarities where you can see like, okay, it's how do you organize something with a constituency with a group of people who are that age. Yeah. Kind of winds up looking like one of those. And like think we were all shithead little kids at one point. What is one thing that kids, you know, who are maybe a little bit fucked up? But what's one thing we're all looking for is acceptance and community? And again, this isn't discounting the fact that some of these.

kids were fucking kidnapped. Yeah. Well, did you did sports too, Joe. I mean, like, it's a thing. It gravitated towards it because it was like you're part of a thing. And it's like if this is an option to be a part of a thing, especially when you have the money incentive, never mind the fact like you said that people were forced at gunpoint and kidnapped. Like you understand why it's going to have

purchase with, I mean, with young men, you know, basically young men, boys, etc. Like it's, it's both like there's like push and pull factors, if that makes sense. Before long, this kind of weird, egalitarian gang militia began to speak to a lot of the very disenfranchised youth of Freetown, as well as soldiers that were pissed they had

lost a government paycheck thanks to the new government cutting out a lot of the soldiers involved in previous coup attempts. But probably the most impactful of this group where its senior leadership are not always the founders necessarily. These were bodyguards tasked with protecting Valentin Strasser when he was in charge, and men trained by executive outcomes. A mercenary group that been hired to defeat the RUF and were arguably quite successful. Once their factions broke apart or were destroyed or they lost their jobs or whatever that ended with them out on their ass, the WSB waiting for them with, as Creed would say, arms wide open.

And with their professional military training, they moved up the ranks quite quickly. These new recruits generally moved into the West Side Boys camp and brought their entire extended families with them. So it kind of added to the hate saying these were family atmosphere. of this weird gang militia. It's about family. Thank you, Dominic. The WSP also became a landing place

for dudes who could never rejoin society. Like convicts who broke out of the nearby jail, bandits who had left other militia groups, other criminals of various different shades. They were a landing spot for anybody. The WSP never turned anybody away, as long as you could fall into their culture, cultural norms that they had created, you're more than welcome.

So you're probably asking, how did such a weird collection of different people, different ages, mostly children, gel into a group? I'm going to guess that they didn't really do that. Wrong. Huh. Okay. I'm pleasantly surprised. Well, as any good boy from the Midwest could tell you,

nothing brings a desperate group of people together quite like doing piles of drugs. Hell yeah. They were always ripped out of their minds. They drank homemade palm wine like it was water. They smoked weed around the clock. They smoked crack. They dropped diazepam met in a fedra mixed together at a cocktail. They called a top-up.

And they were banging so much heroin into their bodies. My dad would rise from the grave and jealousy. Your dad's going out of the ground like Bella Lagosie. Give me the heroin. But this was recreation for them. The stereotype of the drugged up militia charging into battle was 100% true for a lot of factions of the Sierra Leonean Civil War and other Civil Wars, but not necessarily the West Side Boys, who for a while rightfully figured that dudes jacked out of their minds on uppers and downers and alcohol at the same time, probably can't fight all that good, so they had rules against fighting while high.

The only drug that didn't count for that, however, was weed. Because it wasn't considered a drug and they smoked it like it was cigarettes. Like they were just going through like his tobacco. And I'm really happy to see that the West Side Boys had my mother have something in common. Jesus Christ. RIP, big homie. Man, I'd be smoking weed and I'm getting scared in my own home. I couldn't imagine being this high.

Yeah, you can't have anxiety at the West Side Boys camp because in between, smoking just like a hog's leg of weed. They're smoking crack and firing AKs in the air. Hang him with the West Side boys and I'm just like getting real paranoid because my left shoe fits weird. And some of the boys did their best to dress like, you know, Tupac, dress like how he looked in music videos and stuff. Most of them didn't because it's not like they could go down to a store and like buy

it. Making your own a visu jeans. They did have to do some DIY stuff. And admittedly, let's just say there's more misses than hits. For example, it was not uncommon to see them wearing clown wigs, flip-flops, football jerseys. But, you know, with like a blood's-like red bandana tied around one of their arms. I never saw Tupac rep in the clown wig in a music video. But that would be sick.

This is a thing where I've seen footage from not Sierra Leone, but from Liberia that's similar. Yep. It was pretty common to look outlandish. Yeah. Because if you looked like that in the context of their war, it meant that you were fearless. Yeah. Like, the more ridiculous you looked, like, they knew they looked that way. There was footage from the Liberian Civil War of like dudes wearing women's clothes, like dresses and clown with expiring RPG sevens.

It's like, yeah. And that's not a statement of identity or sexuality or gender. It's just, it's like, have you ever seen a dude and a dress fucking blow your ass up with an anti-tank? tank round, like that level of just, I'm going to be as crazy as I can be. Well, yeah, part of it was, you know, looking outlandish as possible. The enemy is going to see you looking that way. They want you to see them that way. So you can know how fearless I am.

Do it up, I guess. It's, you know, I think that some camouflage would probably be better for that. But I'm not going to judge their game. It's not what I'm here for. There's an extent to which it doesn't make sense militarily, but culturally it makes sense. And like, I don't want to make like pat or facile comparisons because, it's like, this is a really, this is a humanitarian catastrophe. This is, this is a really, really bad situation.

But when you think about, like, the level of kind of, like, bravado and involved with, like, incredibly young dudes fighting each other in, like, a paramilitary slash, like, militia slash, like, not regimented military way, you can see how this is going to, like, it's just one-up in ship, you know, to be, as, like, you said, outlandish and, like, conspicuous and frightening in a way. I mean, like, basically, like, the reversal. of expectations, the reversal of norms kind of thing. And that's to say nothing about like general butt naked. That was the first I came up to. It's like, what's more outlandish than showing up to

battle naked? You know what I mean? A lot of this makes a lot more sense when you realize these dudes are just ripping tons of crack. Well, yeah, 100%. A hundred percent. And, you know, like you said, it's a lot of bravado and a lot of very young boys. Like, I don't even want to call them men. And you could see how they could hype each other up into doing this. I remember reading a story from a photographer. I think it was Portuguese. Do you see Portuguese or Brazilians? Sebastian Salgado. He lost his legs in Iraq. He was doing in the 90s and I think it was in Sierra Leone. And one of his stories involved being held up by kids and none of them was over 15. And he noticed that like the youngest ones were really goofy. He realized they had popsicles and they were lemonade with gin on

popsicles and they were just basically sucking gin like kids snacks, but with alcohol and like, and smoking weed and all the more carrying, you know, pistols, rifles, assault rifles, that kind of thing, like, you know, comically oversized on their bodies. And it's like, they'll absolutely kill you. They've killed people. Like, you at a checkpoint, this is incredibly dangerous. Some of them are fucked up because they're coming down. You know what I mean? And you realize, like, they are children, but also like, this is such a humanitarian disaster in every sense. Oh, that's horrible. And, you know, if you ever go to a checkpoint in a war-torn place, make sure it's manned by the children on heroin because they'll be sleepy.

If you want, like, a really good idea of why it was like, look up, um, Raphaelis, Ciriello, um, his postcards from Hell series where he was in Sierra Leone in like 1990 to 2001. And it's just like, oh, here's kids playing football. And then it's the exact same kids in the next photo, just like arming a checkpoint. It is shocking. Yeah. And, and actually speaking of those checkpoints, That's one of the main ways that the WSB made money.

Thanks to the position in the Acre Hills, they could freely loot and rob passing cars, whether they be civilian just trying to get on with their life. They could be aid convoys. They could be anything. And it meant that the boys were never wanting for anything. And in a country, going through something like this, again, you could see how joining them would be appealing

because they would then take the best for themselves, of course, and then they would spread the things they didn't want, over areas they control. They're also smart enough to work with peacekeeping forces from both the UN, eventually, and the economic community of the West African States monitoring group, or ECOMUG. The Akra Hills also happened to be placed between Sierra Lonian government forces and the RUF. That meant that WSP was working each side, stealing and buying from one group and selling to the others, including a detachment of Nigerian ecomog soldiers.

In another case, they sold drugs to Nigerian-ecomog soldiers. EcoMogg soldier for Intel an Amalian group of ECOMG soldiers raided their base, stole their shit, and sold it to the RUF. They made sure to steal radios from the Ecomog troops so they could track EcoMogg movement, knowing that

they're so badly run that they never bothered to encrypt their radios or change procedures when one went missing. They had so many people in their pockets, one way or another, when a international mission was spun up and attempt to get rid of them or push them off the road so they could stop robbing people,

they were oftentimes given a heads up by their local contacts in these armies. There was an even worse report that UN soldiers were working side by side with the West Side Boys, manning checkpoints, and watching from afar as the boys robbed people at gunpoint and did nothing about it. This will not be the only type the UN probably pisses you off during this episode. By the time the Lomé Peace Accords were signed, the AFRC was a non-factor. Neither they nor the West Side Boys are even mentioned by name in the document, and this gave the boys a reason to reject the agreement. They were not given any guarantees that the RUF had been given, and since they're not named in it, they decided it didn't involve them.

Their war continued. So using their commanding presence in the Acra Hills, they began taking hostages as something of a warning shot to the government and EcoMogg, showing them how much of a pain in the ass they could be if they were not allowed to join in the negotiations. or give something, give them a reason to put down their weapons. Because it's not like these guys wanted the war to go on forever. They wanted a reason to put their weapons down, the same reason that the RUF was given. And with that stage set, we now have to turn to the Brits. Fun, our favorite guy showing up.

I'm sure this is going to go well. Tom, I get to tell you your favorite people in the British Army are going to show up. Oh, all of them. The SAS, the paratrooper. Lord Mountbatten Secret third thing Oh fuck In 1999

The UN's Yanamsil Peacekeeping Mission took over for the EcoMogg mission In supporting Kaba's government And ensuring everyone kept To the Accords The mission, like all UN missions

Was a mix of soldiers From around the world Of wildly different varying degrees of competency Political infighting And just all around Willingness For example,

its first commander, an Indian general, largely failed and was fired, not necessarily because he wasn't good at his job, but because his deputy commanders refused to do their jobs and instead took bribes from the RUF to, let's say, look the other way in the form of baggies full of diamonds, so they wouldn't report on the RUF breaking their side of the agreement. An important part of the peacekeeping mission was disarming the RUF, which went well, until it didn't, when a group of RUF men kidnapped the British Major, who was able to outsmart his captors by kindly asking if he could go into a local Indian Army base and take a shower and then wouldn't come out afterwards. Defeated by needing to wash my ass.

All right. All right. This spiraled wildly out of control. The RUF besieged the Indian Army base. But after this, it was like a full on return to how things had been. The RUF begins writing supply convoys. They besiege refugee camps. They cut off a road leading to the airport.

They separate the airport in Freetown, and soon the RUF and Allied fighters are advancing on the capital once again, as other UN troops surrender rather than fight. Things got so bad that in May of 2000, the UK launched Operation Palliser. They deployed a task force made up of men from the paras, the SAS, the SBS, mostly to evacuate British civilians from the country. This was the UK's largest deployment of special forces since the first Gulf War, and Palliser was quite successful. In the wake of Palliser, the UN and the Sierra Leonean forces were bolstered. The West Side boys ended up defending Free Town from the RUF, and we're called heroes. Things get weird. Yeah, just everyone's playing every side all at once, and it just creates just strange bedfellows.

Yep. Then we get a classic case of what we love to call mission creep. While Operation Palliser was ongoing, back in London, the various security institutions of the UK weren't really sure what the end of the operation looked like because they never planned on one. Thankfully, the UK will never go through this again. If only they could have deployed Rory Stewart and he got to sort it all out. Rory Stewart would have armed their Westside boys even more. Let's be real. Tom, hold that thought. Oh, fuck you.

Some said that the entire operation should just be about the evacuation. Afterwards, we can fuck off, right? While others said, well, if we leave, violence will just return. The RUF will also help the capital again and will be right back at square one. The UN insisted that the British mission integrate with their own, while the British commanders had zero confidence in the UN due to all of its previous failures. I never thought I'd find myself saying this, but the British are wrong. right on this. While the Brits simultaneously didn't want to deploy the amount of troops required to

simply take over the UN mission. So the mission transformed into a kind of middle area. Troops would continue the evacuation, but now they'd remain to make sure the airport remained open. They'd patrol free town until the UN could send in reinforcements, and they would take over and train and support the Sierra Leonean Army, or SLA. And like in most cases of mission creep, this was quite successful at first. Rebel groups, including the West Side Boys, were now friends of the UN and the government. And so, they ended up getting training and weapons from the British military. And the army used them against the RUF. The leader of the RUF, Fodaisanko is captured, leading to a massive power vacuum in a weakening of what was left of the organizations.

And in this continued fighting, we get very strange scenes, like British soldiers fighting side by side with the West Side Boys. And in one case, an SAS officer leading them on an attack. Okay. Just like a British Army captain looking over his shoulder at the West Side Boys, like, boys, like, boys, we keep going through changes. That was a Tupac reference. Chalk went up for Joe. I get zero recognition for my bars here. I guess for a second I was confused because it kind of implies that the British guy is a Tupac fan. And to me, when he said changes,

I thought, well, surely he would be citing David Bowie and not Tupac. But maybe he's, I don't know, maybe he's in a Maribu. He's a weeb for America who's in the SAS in the 90s. He went through like a cultural education course before he is deployed. And like, you know, his West Sideboy liaison made him sit down and listen to the entire

Tupac discography up to that point so he could better understand the militia. But I mean, like, if it's, you know, at the period, any British rap fan would be like a US hip hop head. To be honest with you, I have no idea what it was like at the time in the UK, because I mean, I was in high school in America. They were all rapping in American accents. Like Roots Meneuveh hadn't released Witness to Fitness yet. So you know, I don't know very much about UK rap other than stuff that was coming out when I lived in the UK. So that's actually really

funny. I had no idea. Are you a soldier in the British Army circa the 2000s? Did you listen to Tupac with the West Side Boys right into the show. They did karaoke and were singing, Is this the way to Amarillo over and over and over again? The training mission was eventually dubbed Operation Basilica, taking place in the town of Waterloo, because of course it did. More and Morris Sierra Leone and soldiers are fed through this training program, and the fighting, the splintering groups of RUF men was increasingly left to the government army and the UN, while the main threat to British troops shifted from gunfire

to malaria. And a lot of dudes caught malaria here. I read this very in-depth study on it. I really cannot find a way to shoehorn it into this episode. But it turned out at first the British soldiers deployed to Sierra Lo and just weren't given mosquito nets.

Don't need them. And then they issued them and didn't tell men how to use them so they were using them incorrectly. Yeah. By the time they finally finally, figured out how to not have the mosquitoes kill you, a lot of dudes were very sick. That's unpleasant. Yeah. Mosquito nets, I mean, I'm not exactly an expert, but like, you kind of have to use them to make like a tent on your bed to sleep at night.

Otherwise, you get eaten alive. Yeah, that's my understanding of them. Yeah. I mean, I would certainly get malaria. I'd. I slept in mosquito netting in Honduras and in Thailand. And yeah, like, it's useful to have someone who, like, a soldier from the Honduran military or the Thai military, explained it to you. And if you're, and if you're aren't doing that, you're like, oh, cool, what is this? Like a, I don't know, it looks like a tea towel or a tea strainer cloth, cheese cloth, a weird towel that's not absorbent. Okay, cool, whatever. And then, then you get, uh, then you get, you know, the swamp plague. One of my favorite mosquito-based fun facts about this region is during the Liberian Civil War, there was a commander called Commander Mosquito because everybody knows how deadly mosquitoes are. And then someone in a different group called himself Commander Mosquito Spray because he was going to kill the mosquitoes.

I know there was a Commander AIDS too. Like this was just a friend. Yes, there was. Yes. I remember hearing the story. Commander AIDS sounds like a band from Montreal in the 2000s that sucked. There was literally a band called AIDS Wolf. That's the joke. Oh, really? Yes. Man. Yes. We finally found the band with the worst named the penis fly trap. The men running the training were eventually rotated out as this becomes a normal mission. And by July 2000, Tom, your favorite boys, the first Royal Irish Regiment show up. For people who don't know, the Royal Irish Regiment is recruited from Northern Ireland. They're mostly Protestant.

And there's a small addendum here. Other people of Irish descent, but mostly people from Northern Ireland. Yeah, I mean, like, look, you know, they're probably good at a, you know, fighting paramilitaries, considering most of them were probably in one at one stage. In the meantime, the West Side Boys had once again broken away from the government, refusing integration into the army. And a big part of that was the SLA was never going to be big enough to absorb everyone from every group. And even for the men who had a spot in it, the pay was never going to be as good as being,

well, an armed bandit. So the boys were once again running checkpoints, taking money, goods, and occasionally people. Once in command of villages, they stole everything they could. of course, committed war crimes, in one case executing six, sometimes seven women, as the story goes, accusing them of witchcraft. Again, these things make a lot more sense when you're on a lot of fucking crack. Though, like every other rebel group in the history of human existence, the boys were no longer unified.

The whole family aspect had really begun to break down at this point. Some guys were deciding they've had enough of this shit, they're handing in their weapons and going over to the UN, at which point they would be put into like reintegration camps, especially for these kids. A lot of it was like traumatic therapy, learning how to reintegrate it to society. I know the term integration camp generally means something very, very bad, but in this case, it's actually good. This was news that a patrol of men from the Royal Irish learned on August 25th during a routine meetup with their counterparts from the Jordanian battalion of the UN mission. Most of the time in history, they're known as Jordbat, because

UN missions tend to have stupid names like that. Yeah, they love names like that. Yeah, Dutch Bat's another one. No need to look into Dutchbat if my neighbors are asking. Don't worry. We'll have a series on that someday in the future. And they met in the town of Maasika. The commander of the British patrol, Major Alan Marshall, decided that it'd be a good idea to hop in their land rovers and drive over to the nearby town of Mag Benny to confirm these reports that the West Side Boys were handing over their weapons because Meg Benny had been a West Side Boy Stronghold. Now, I say Land Rovers and, you know, due

to our jokes in the beginning of this, these are military land rovers. They are armed with belt-fed machine guns, though they are completely unarmored. Essentially, just got the top chopped off them, and then it's like, here's a gun on it. We have, like, made our own technical. Yeah, and they just spray

paint them brown. Yeah. And I should point out here that despite everyone involved being heavily armed and 50% very intoxicated, incidental, but peaceful, between the Brits, the UN, and pretty much every single rebel group at play were completely normal at this point. Rarely did this ever blow up into violence or anything more than a bunch of dudes mean mugging each other. So nothing was really thought of this. However, something that

is important to know is that Marshall did not reach out to either his own command, nor the UN, to tell him that he was doing this. I mean, to be fair, like they, the West Side Boys at this point have reached a perfect drug equilibrium only ever achieved at this time by M&M of like the perfect balance of uppers and downers. Yeah, the West Side Boys are about to release relapse and it's going to suck. Call it the level of frankness about the effects of drugs on your life in songs like Purple Pills will in fact do probably apply here. Yeah. Yeah, sometimes the radio edit Purple Hills. Purple Hills are a tactical position that you cannot be on the purple pills in or to obtain.

It is also quite difficult to watch your fields of fire if the trees just start moving. It's hard to get the high ground if you're just really tired. Also, a crazy clown shows up to your birthday party. Start smashing everything. It's pretty fucked up. When the Brits drove over to Magbeni, they were surprised to see an armed group of Westside boys hanging out, just kind of chilling. According to the boys themselves, of which there's been multiple interviews of,

they were shocked to see a group of Brits roll in, too. But everything was cool. According to the commander of the West Side Boys Patrol that was there, a guy named Ibrahim Karoma, not related to the other Karoma. They all just kind of hung out and made small talk. Again, these guys saw each other pretty frequently. Marshall asked to talk to their commander, a guy named Fodekele. He was away in a different village. Karoma said, sure, let me give him a call and see if he'll come down.

In the meantime, literally everyone was chilling and talking. Like, stories of asking for cigarettes, how you doing? What kind of gun is that child carrying? Things of that nature. You know? But Calais arrives a short time later and everything changes. He is very pissed off. He's definitely pissed that the Brits rolled into town without calling him first,

which was something of like procedure. Like you gave the local rebel commander a call like, hey, you mind if we come by. He was also probably quite pissed that a growing number of his men were handing their weapons over to the UN. He was losing control. His unit was shrinking by the gun. day. So he ordered his boys to pull up a technical, which was a stolen SLA vehicle armed with

an ZSU anti-aircraft gun. Oh, hell yeah. And he ordered it to block the road, trapping the British patrol inside the village. Not good. The 11 Brits were now outnumbered. Their unarmed land rovers, though like I said, they're armed, would have been eaten alive by the anti-aircraft gun. And they're smart enough to know this. They realize that fighting out of this is not possible. So they try to deescalate. They're like, hey, bro, we'll leave. It's cool. Like, we're not here to fight, right?

Marshall tries to talk to Calais. Someone reaches for Marshall's rifle. He pushes him away. And then Marshall gets the shit kicked out of him while his soldiers watch. Which I have to say as an enlisted guy is probably at least for a split second. Pretty funny to watch, right?

I mean, I don't know. My experience is like, more like, as the officers, it's more, no, man, only we get to hate our officers, not you, fuck you. You know what I mean? It depends. I don't know Marshall as a guy. It depends on how shitty they are. That's true.

Yeah, that is, that is true. That is true. Soon the other soldiers were jumped too. Everyone was disarmed. They were stripped down to their underwear. Allegedly, Calais collected their wedding rings. Put them all on and then just kind of walked around doing jazz hands at them to like flash his new wedding rings at the soldiers.

I'm bringing them back up again. it's Trinidad James time you busted asses got zero wedding rings I got nine now man I feel like an asshole these guys literally

have in fact popped a Molly and are sweating these guys Trinidad James Kirsten cinema Pop to Molly I'm sweating

who shouts out to them freshmen on Instagram straight flexing Pop's Molly I'm sweating who The most

2010's rap song ever Imagine you're a soldier just like, you just got this shit beaten out of you, your weapons been taken. And there's a dude with like pupils, the signs of like needle pricks, flash at all your wedding rings in his face. Eyes bloodshot as fuck from the mountain of drugs he's been doing. It's like, man, you can keep it. I'll just leave. I got my underwear.

I still got my boots. Could I go? Yeah. You guys keep making comparisons to stuff about like, yeah, like Trinidad James, all gold, everything. And to me, it's like, yes, I can see that as the aesthetics. but like spiritually in terms of how it actually feel to experience it, I'm thinking of the lyrics with the Blood Brothers song, Huge Gold, AK-47,

which tends to add with dress it and drag and piss on every inch. And it's like, don't do that to me, please. Do that to Major Marshall, not me. I'm just fucking... I'm just a guy. I'm just a guy. Thankfully, I was one of the unmarried ones, so you didn't steal my wedding ring.

I have this nice necklace you could have. I'm fascinated with like the root of like, Because these guys are definitely listening to stuff on like CD. It's like, definitely. Like the two-pack CD from probably Europe or the US to Sierra Leone. Imagine them trying to listen to it on a walk man. It just keeps skipping every time they're stolen land rover hits a bump.

They found the one computer with Limewire. I think also a lot of it would be on tape decks too. Yeah. True. At that time, like there weren't a lot of consumer electronics like had very, very, very small, if any, presence is in anywhere on the African continent besides Egypt and South Africa. Maybe someone made the West Side boys like a really loving mix tape.

So the stuff that people were buying, like, so much of it was either like gray market imported or like secondhand resale stuff. So like to me is like there's this weird, the weird kind of provenance of, yeah, getting killed while somebody is basically playing like a taped off the radio cassette of American rap music on a boombox that was at one point owned by a dude in France. sold to a dude in Algeria and then sold to a dude in, I don't know, in Sierra Leone or in the Ivory Coast or in, um, in Liberia, in Senegal. You know what I mean? Like, it's, it's wild. These dudes put in so much work to love Tupac. It's almost admirable if they weren't assholes. The degree to which,

like, so much of this is like the downstream culture. You know what I mean? Like in a strange way, and like a really kind of like unsettling way. Imagine if Tupac was still alive to see it. There's the, It's not apocryphal. It's a real story. It's a positive one about the story about the shipping container full of like mid-level synthesizer keyboards that washed up in, I believe, Nigeria. And that like, basically these things hit the market and like a ton of like pop music and traditional music from that part of West Africa was like getting done with synthesizers because like suddenly this is a thing that probably wasn't ever even going to be sold in that

market. But then it's like, then you have a war zone. And then you have like all like the fourth world craziness of a war zone. And somehow it comes out with, yeah, like stuff that culturally has no connection to like how, I don't know, people think of themselves as being, like, intimidating fighters in a war in, you know, our culture and Anglophone world, et cetera, mixed with like pop culture from the Anglophone world. It's like if you saw like that photo of the guy using the iPad to fucking check the elevation on a mortar tube in Syria in 2011, but the iPad was playing poker face by Lady Gaga at the same time, like that's kind of how it feels.

And the iPad was stolen or like, you know, it had a bunch of cracks and it had been stolen from someone's suitcase in, I don't know, like. fucking connecting through the Cairo airport and somehow wound up there. Watching footage from some war on the other side of the world and someone's charging towards the machine gun screber, I'm Pickle Rick! I mean, yes, like, that's kind of what it feels like. It's wild. Yeah, it's a mind melting. 100%. It's like a guy firing an SPG 9 at you and he's dressed like wacko from the animaniac. Like, it's fascinating, but like nine like a, oh, isn't that nifty kind of way, but more like,

there's just something so unsettling about it. Yeah. The sort of like annihilation of all the things we would hope for in a human society, but being done in the midst of like an aesthetic of like waste dumps and castoffs from pop culture from the developed world. It's really interesting like the comparison between like this group of people like really identifying with Tupac and kind of like incorporating it into this kind of group culture. And then over the border you had Chucky Taylor trying to.

trying to do that himself. Yeah, but doing it from a place of immense wealth and privilege and being just a massive fucking door. The worst Nepo baby ever. I will say that Chuckie Taylor did make a couple of mixtapes that I still can't. We have not been able to find them. I still can't find one. Yeah.

It's one of those things where you realize the impact of pop culture things around the world. And it's like, you know, in the sort of water wars of the 2040s, like, are you going to see kids like, you know, they've got like, you know, they've got like, someone has managed to save an old tablet that's got, you know, bootlegged copies of Jojo's bizarre adventures. And that's what they're taking the, their fucking, their cues from as far as aesthetics go. Like, it's just odd to me. The Black Parade Liberation Army. But, you know, um, afterwards, they disarm the soldiers, like I said, they transport them to the town of Gabri Bona, which is Calais's personal headquarters. They make sure to take with them a radio from one of the

Land Rover's so they could talk to the British. And soon, Word gets back to them that 11 British soldiers and one SLA soldier had been kidnapped, detained, whatever it is you want to call them, captured. This goes public very quickly. And weirdly, the UN at first denies it happened. It's commander, General Muhammad Garba, said that if the Brits were captured at all, it's because they traveled outside the secured area and had never contacted the UN whatsoever, which is true. But part of that is not true. The Brits had just just been with the Jordanians, who were a battalion within the UN command. The Jordanians also decided they didn't need to tell anybody that the Brits were going into the town. It's just a

catastrophic series of failures. It had also been a longstanding accusation by the Brits and several other world powers that the UN peacekeepers and peacekeeper commanders had just been lying about how well things were going in Sierra Leone in order to make themselves in their mission look better. That is also pretty true. The reason why I bring this up is because both the UN and the Brits tend to point fingers at one another over who is at fault here, without either side acknowledging that they were working with the West Side boys not that long ago, which in turn obviously impacted how willing the boys would have been to turn over their guns and stop doing what they're doing

and how much territory they're able to control. So you could really see how literally everybody is at fault for this very stupid situation. This did not have to happen. The British government immediately reaches out to conduct the negotiations and free the soldiers. The first thing that comes to their mind is not like, we have to kill these guys and save them. They had been doing dealings with the West Side Boys for like a year at this point. They figure they could do it again.

But negotiations are not something soldiers are good at nor are they trained in. So they bring in hostage negotiators from the Met Police to talk to the West Side Boys. The meetings begin within a. a few days. On April 27th, the boys give the Brits their demands. Free Fodei Sanko, the leader of the RUF, give them food and medical supplies, and allow them into the government. Fodecalae was brought to the military base at Ma Saika to, you know, with further negotiations in order to prove good faith and show that they're taking care of the soldiers. They brought one of the captives with him to meet the British delegation. This soldier shook the hand of

Colonel Simon Fordham, and while doing so secretly passed a drug. drawing of the West Side Boys camp, including unit shrink, defensive positions, stuff like that. But what's missing was the camp's exact location because the soldier didn't actually know where it was. After this, five soldiers were released to the British in exchange for a satellite phone, which they were then going to be able to contact them over because the batteries in the radio were dying. The other seven men were to be held until Fodei Sanko was released. the West Side Boys calling into Hot 97 on the satellite phone

Play that two pack Hold that thought Fuck you No, fuck off They don't call in to make music suggestions But they do use that phone To call somebody

And it's not the British commanders It's Tim Westwood They do call BBC Westwood baby I've got the Westside boys on the phone Straight from Sierra Leone The real shit On Westwood TV

The situation for the mid in captivity Had been going quite well Like the West Side boys and the Brits Even in captivity Were just chilling with one another Despite the fact they're being held against their will It's not like they were fighting Arguing or even trying to escape

According to one boy who went by the Awesome name Corporal Blood Said that they would They would chill They make small talks One British guy Occasionally led them singing And Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

Yeah like they It all seemed quite calm. However, Calais was losing his mind. Corporal Blood's theory is that he was simply doing way too much cocaine at the time, which is something I assume a bunch of dudes serving in the British Army were very familiar with. Kellea would randomly barge into the room where they were being held and threatened to kill them. At one point, he has them all taken outside, tied to someone's stakes and holds a mock execution. And all this seems incredibly out of the blue.

Some West Side Boys did get really high and beat up this Sierra Leonean soldier, but this seems to be more of an isolated incident. It does seem that the drugs are truly starting to take hold. And I don't know how much cocaine a guy has to do for someone on the West Side Boys to be like, you have done too much cocaine, but it has to be a lot. You're on Tommy Robinson levels of coke. Instead of escaping to Cyprus, you just capture British soldiers. I mean, to be fair, it is the most on-brand British things.

It's like, oh, we need to adopt their culture in order to capture them. Let's get absolutely all for no. Get exuded in a combat zone to make friends. The soldiers are tied to the stakes. They're just throwing pint glasses at them. Kelle and others in the group also watched and listened to British media. And suddenly found out that their little group was the lead story in every arm of British media, but especially the BBC. So, using their satellite phone, they began to call in and talk to the BBC, with their main media liaison being two men, Colonel Cambodia, and his friend Colonel Terminator.

Oh, so fucking good. So good. Occasionally they spoke to a third man, Colonel Savage. Like, they could have de-escalated this maybe if it had been a few years later by like just giving these guys, uh, SM7Bs and a focus, right? like it's like look you you aren't destined for this life let's make a hot mix tape cracked version of FL studio a focus right and like a think pad yeah I see you want Fodei Sanko release from captivity the best I could do for you is a cracked version of fruity loops yeah if you can get Anthony Fentano to give it like a soft seven you'll get him out of prison okay and you might be wondering how Colonel Cambodia got his name you have to remember that these guys all gave themselves like a terrifying nickname.

And he chose Cambodia because the Cambodian genocide, which is just insane to me. Oh, fuck me. Colonel Cambodia used his satellite phone to call in regularly to BBC.

In those calls, he says they took the hostages to force President Kaba into reorganizing the boys as a political party and a political actor and allow them into the new government. But that is more of a distilled motivation because most of the calls with the BBC

were incredibly long, rambling, and made very little sense, you know, on account of being zooted. That brings us to another problem with these negotiations and why negotiating with the West Side Boys became very, very hard. Remember, these guys are always high.

Their previous regulations about not being high in combat had fallen away since the group began to splinter and whatnot. and for the British negotiators, it meant that every time they talked, they found themselves having to repeat themselves over shit they talked about the day before because the negotiator was so high they'd forgotten already. So eventually they come to the conclusion that these guys really can't be negotiated with.

It's impossible. It's clear to the Brits that negotiations were going nowhere, and nobody was willing to release Fodei Sanko. But thanks to the satellite phone and Colonel Cambodia's willingness to do a mountain of coke and jabber to the BBC concert, British intelligence was able to intercept the signal and pinpoint exactly where the hostages were being held in two different locations. They should have sent in like a bar manager from Shortage to negotiate with these guys because like that's the most qualified person to negotiate with a group of like 300 people on Coke. I love the idea that it's like, yeah, we did LVI on your satellite phone and the way we did it was getting you to call in leading Britain's conversation and just complain about the bin men nonstop.

We're readying the fucking tactical strike. We are going to sit in negotiators. They're going to build the perfect replica of a British pub and toilet. And in the back, you're going to be a negotiator slash Coke dealer. A 300-person toilet cubicle. As the Brits got more and more information, it became clear that while they assumed that any rescue mission would involve the SAS, there's so many moving parts to this in two different locations.

The operation would actually have to be much larger than the SAS could handle. Therefore, they called up Tom's second favorite group of British soldiers, the paras, to be ready as well. Yes. How do you fight one paramilitary group off their nut on Coke? Send in another one. The first Irish people in existence to be rescued by the paris. I remember going to the fucking Tommy Robinson unite the fucking kingdom march in September, because I was like, I'm going to take photos of these freaks, I don't think there's going to be any photographers who are going to be like get in among them in marriage with them. And I was like at Waterloo

and there's like a pub that's underneath the train station. I was just standing there having a cigarette. And there was a guy in a Paris beret and then two like drunk, best way I can describe them as like evolutionary detritus came out of the pub and saluted him. And I was like, what are we doing, man? Fucking losers. The reason why this company from the first paris was selected wasn't because they were like the best of the best or anything.

They had just gotten done doing a training mission in Jamaica. So they had some fresh training. As much as the Brits and other people really like to show the paris as some like elite force, they're not. And this company was definitely not. that was mostly full of brand new soldiers who had just completed basic training three weeks before. And the only real training under their belt was that mission in Jamaica. But by September 3rd, the soldiers needed for this future rescue mission should be necessary, because they're not entirely sure yet.

We're moved from around the world and stationed in Senegal to further plan and to make last minute adjustments. Because if they moved them to Sierra Leone, they're worried that word would get out about the sudden buildup. and then the West Side Boys would start shooting people because they had began to threaten that. Yeah, we need to tactically deploy, you know, Essex bars who speaks like Chet Hanks to Sierra Leone to free our lads. Tettical Chet Hanks.

Yeah. What a horrible idea. Chet Hanks wearing fucking like an operator of high cut helmet, plate carrying vest, throat and face tattoos, looking like little peep. Nate was shaking his head at the idea of,

a paratrooper from Essex who speaks like Jet Hanks. I was thinking of an acronym which is a PMCS, Preventative Maintenance, Chets and Services. Oh, I hate that. I thought you would. Folks, don't forget to do preventive maintenance on your Chets at home. Chet canopy again, canopy control. And in order to make any decision to launch

a rescue mission be much faster because they thought that if they were going to launch it, it was going to be because like the West Side Boys are going to give them an ultimatum like, you have 48 hours or we're going to start shooting people. London and the Prime Minister gave full authorization for launching the mission over to the British Commissioner in Sierra Leone. So it was going to be launched completely independent from the actual government in London. If you fuck up, it's not our fault.

Yes, that is correct. That way like Tony Blair could be like, well, it wasn't me. Then a group of SAS men were inserted into the West Side Boys territory, via small boats from these special boat services to scout them out. As time passed, more and more SAS patrols were inserted into the bush around the West Side Boys as the Brits built up their forces. Negotiations continued, but really went absolutely nowhere. And they tried surprisingly a lot.

Maybe it's just like a differences of the times or something, but this really surprised me how far they went to try to solve this peacefully. And I'm not handing it to the British government here. wrong, but they had Johnny Caroma, the imprisoned leader of the West Side Boys, call them and be like, hey, release the hostages. Like, why are you doing? This is going to get us nowhere. They had members of the West Side Boys family go over to them, like, please release the hostages. This is going to end badly. This didn't go anywhere. And eventually, the operation was ordered to begin. On September 10th, 2000, at around 6 a.m., S.S. men loaded into several Chinook helicopters, and

they were supported by Link's gunships. The gunships targeted the West Side Boys heavy weapons first because they did have heavy weapons. Multiple cruiser of machine guns. We already talked about the anti-aircraft system they had slapped on the back of a truck. According to Corporal Blood, he tried to fire his RPG at the helicopters twice and missed. I assume because hitting a moving target while on more coke than God is pretty fucking hard. Yeah, I was simply vibrating so hard.

I couldn't fire my rocket, right? It's also very fun to have these interviews to lean on. They are wonderful. Yeah, it's not very good for like combat effectiveness being on the world's strongest April. Yeah, it really doesn't help you aim. As the boys rushed out to fight, they ran into SAS ground teams. As other SAS men repelled down from the helicopters and made for the houses where the hostages

were. Just so people understand how this operation is moving, the SAS are doing the rescuing. The paras are kind of doing the fighting. The paras, being carried by Chinooks, rushed forward as well as gunfire came from all over. Outside of one house, Fote A Calais's wife, known only as Mama Calais, fought it out with the soldiers until she was killed. It was somewhere around this point that the Brits took their only fatality of the operation. A trooper named Bradley Tinian was shot and fatally wounded, though he was evacuated to a hospital ship. He died later. The Britson rushed into one of the other house.

houses and found Fodecale hiding under his bed and still wearing all of the wedding rings that he stole. Okay. I like that Fodekele has the same tactic that I used to run away from my nightmares as a child. I will simply hide under my bed and they can't find me. The attacks on the two targets happened at virtually the same time and they pretty much looked the exact same. So it's kind of pointless to break them down location by location for the sake of our episode. but I will point out one serious fuck up that could have gone very badly.

As the soldiers were being rescued, another group of paris were inserted into a landing zone that had previously been scattered out by the SAS, because that was most of what the SAS's preparations were. Unbeknownst to the SAS, what they thought was a flattened open landing zone was actually a swamp. Yes, we were returning to the swamp. But they couldn't tell because they'd only scouted it out in the dark. So Paris jumped off the helicopter and sank directly into a chest deep bog, all while the boys

opened fire on them. The only thing that saved the Paris for being slaughtered is either the boys really not wanting to stand and fight due to all of the incoming gunship rounds, or they were just so fucking high they couldn't aim. The Paris had to slog through this shit for 150 meters until they got to dry land. Most of the West Side Boys had been broken up or killed by the helicopter attacks, but as the Peras fought through the swamp, they linked up with other platoons that carried the attack forward. One boy lobbed an RPG at them and barely missed, but exploded right in front of them and wounded seven men.

The worst of the wounded were quickly evacuated, but the attack continued. Though Peras found this fighting way harder than it needed to be, thanks to the pure essence of bog that had seeped into their weapons. And mind you, they're already carrying the true king of shitty weapons at the time, the infamous S.A. 80, which is a horrible piece of shit. We'll eventually do an episode about at some point, because my God. But even the reliable F.N. light machine guns they were carrying were reduced down to bolt action weapons because you really shouldn't get swamp all up in your guts, human or firearm. By 8 a.m., the mission was pretty much over. The boys had been chased off or killed, and all the hostages had been rescued.

The soldiers remained in the area blowing up the boys' weapons and vehicles, but made sure to recover the stolen land rovers, and then slingload them under the Sheducks and haul them away. By 2 p.m., they had pulled out of the area. The mission was complete. Airlifting the whip. I mean, this is standing and why for weird military aviation stuff, man. Like, how many times have you seen trucks just flying through the sky? Joe. Every time I see it, I always like that, that one's going to come off. It's always funny. There's

something funny about sling loading. It's something really, really like inherently comical about it. Extracting the prisoners using the MGS volume folding system. I really liked seeing a donkey get sling loaded once. That was fun. I've never seen that. I, I, I, had donkey was proud. Imagine the thoughts going through that donkey's head at that moment. Like, I have become donkey. I was going to say, exactly. Yeah, yeah. A level of consciousness, it's unwise to awaken in donkeys. achieve this state. God knows. Now it has been woken.

It could not be stopped. I mean, there was a story in Afghanistan in 2003 as a side note just because to close out my parentheses here where a CH 47 had to do a combat landing on a, it was, and they didn't want to leave it like a serious engine trouble. They were going to crash if they didn't land. In order to get it out, they actually had to contract like a mining company's, um, my 26 heavy lift helicopter from like Girgistan to come and get it. And they broke down basically took all the blades off, got it packed up and slung load a or

sling loaded a Chinook. under an MI 26. And I've seen the photo of it happening. And the best way I can describe it is, do not talk to me or my son ever. In the end, one British soldier was killed and another 12 were wounded. Since the government didn't acknowledge that the SAS were involved,

Tinian was reported to have died while serving in the Royal Marine Commando Artillery. Though it was really not hard to figure out that he was at the SAS. And Tinian was killed on his very first mission with them. Westside boys casualties are pretty much impossible to gauge as thought to be somewhere between 20 and 80 killed or wounded but the operation functionally destroyed the West Side Boys faced with the suddenly high casualties because yeah the West Side Boys were used to combat

but small unit combat in the context of Sierra Leone and Civil War rarely had high casualties. The high casualties were civilians. Most of their weapons were also destroyed. their commanders were arrested or killed. Many of the boys simply dropped their weapons and walked into UN reintegration camps. A lot of those boys would end up joining the SLA and a lot of survivors from their side of Operation Barris would eventually go on to get trained by the British military,

which that must have been an awkward smoke area meeting. The British military eventually investigated the patrol that led to this whole thing and found that Major Marshall had fucked up. This was his fault. And that is pretty fair. all things considered. Again, remember, he did this without any authorization, without telling anybody. It just didn't need to happen. This operation didn't end this year, Leonian Civil War, not by a long shot. It would grind on for another two years. But arguably, it was, along with countless other things,

one of a million steps that were needed to be taken in the right direction to finally bring the war to an end in 2002. The end. And I know there's probably a lot of stuff in there people really wanted me to talk about in regards to the RUF, blood diamonds, the war in general, politics, the UN, ecomog. I promise, and we do RUF series, that is the place for that. I know. Sorry. But that is Operation Barris and how the SAS destroyed the West Side boys. All right.

That was depressing. Funny times, but in a dark way. You're welcome. That's the lines of by donkeys guaranteed. Wow, I'm sad, but I laughed twice. But fellas, we do a thing on this show called Questions from the Legion. If you'd like to ask us a question, you could support the show on Patreon. $5 gets you absolutely everything to include Discord access, which you can then use to ask us a question.

And today's question is honestly laser targeted from something that just happened to us. You often talk about having to cut things from episodes. I know some of these things you probably cannot talk about. But what is your favorite thing that you've cut from an episode? Oh yeah. Yeah. I think all three of us are in agreement with a very recent episode where we had to coach Joe of how to say something correctly. All right. So Joe couldn't pronounce the word bishopric. He pronounced it like bosphoric. And I was like when you're describing about like the sort of political organization of the Catholic Church at the time, you know, talking about the battle of Lake Pebas. We, I was like, I realized what you were saying. And I was like, Joe, Joe, it's it's it's bishop. It's Bishop Rick. I said spell it and you spelled it out.

And I was like, no, that's Bishop Rick. And then the next couple times it happened, Joe couldn't. I just got stuck in my head and I couldn't say it. And that happens sometimes. It'll be like a word when I'm reading the script that for some reason, I know how to say it correctly. And my brain just tells me no. Well, basically this kept happening over over again.

Then Tom was like, no, it's like, it's like a bishop named Rick. It's Bishop Rick. And then we both happened upon my Bishop Rick. Morty. You ever seen a Bishop? You ever seen a Bishop Robs? I Bishop Rick, Morty. we got to reunite the church, Morty.

We're part of the archdiocese Morty. And then we laughed for at least 15 minutes. Because then I couldn't say it because I was laughing too fucking hard. I was stupid that is. That was a good one. That's probably my favorite one too. Because I don't think I've ever had like a favorite bit cut from an episode. I mean like,

peek behind the curtain most of the time stuff that gets caught is just stuff that just doesn't work as a joke. Whereas like this was something that was so funny, but it was so incongruent because it was based on fucking up that like it just had to go. Yeah. Or actionable threats. Actionable threats like we realize after the fact completely wrong information,

sometimes like technical things. Most of the cuts are either going to be. Slander. Or yes, Sleader. Most of the cuts we make are either technical things like need line retakes or like someone's alarm goes off or if it's do something in the middle of the episode. You're going to leave that in.

And, uh, but oftentimes it's, there are things too where we realize, like it's not either like an episode might be too long or you think you think twice about something after the fact like yeah maybe that's probably not a good thing to have said like not like slurs chat but just like it probably doesn't fit the tone of the episode something just isn't funny enough

yeah yeah that's true yeah so in case you're wondering yes this is the best version of us on bishop break people have asked before about like you know why did tom and Nate intentionally bother Joe when he's put so much work in and it's like because we have a plan in advance of how we're going to record an episode and like yeah they're not bothering me. Their goals to make me laugh. That's the point.

Especially if it's an episode where the script, you know, the script is oftentimes the story might be short on details because there's not a lot of sources available. We'll fill it out by by digressions and interruptions and things like that. But yeah, I mean, I've been doing this for shit 10 years now. And so there's definitely been things that are, that were really funny that had to go just because like they were either like,

it was the thing that was going to be too mean or it just wasn't worth the the potential heat. like if you see, especially when people are like, like litigious in a sort of like just trying to mess with you kind of way, like in Britain in particular, like you make a joke. Yeah, we've gotten a few cease and desist orders over the years and it's not something. I'm not trying to get a high score on that. Yeah. Um, because I can't afford the court costs. I mean, one to, you know, I don't live in the United States anymore. Things are a little bit more restrictive. Not that. Not as bad as the UK, but we tread carefully. We don't want to have to pay any more lawyers and we absolutely have to. I mean, I remember like there was some sort of thing about. a British right-wing columnist commentator or something about like I'm tired of, you know, like every day I feel like I've got something new, you know, that's just getting forced down my throat basically about wokeness or whatever. And we made a joke on TF and it was sort of like, right, which is just, I feel like she probably should concern less about what's, what's going

down or threat more what's going, uh, going up her nose. And the joke being like, oh, she sounds like she's on Coke. And we thought at first, we could just beep that. We beeped it. And then we realized it sounded like upper ass. It was even worse. So they're looking at emergency edit and go in and fucking take the whole thing out. So, I mean, like, it's weird that that is kind of a behind the curtain thing where sometimes you realize after the fact, like, oh, wait, oh, no, this, either just because of the tone or like because of the way it's edited, this comes across a very different way. So we do have to leave some stuff out, but most of it stays in.

Most of it stays in, yeah. The Bishop Rick part is definitely, I think, the funniest extended gag we've ever done that only was for us. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And because, again, I'm dumb and can't read sometimes. A common question I get is, like, do you guys have the jokes written out? No. No, we're not comedians, if you haven't noticed.

If the jokes are written out, they'd be a lot fucking smarter. The jokes that are written out are... Arguably, I don't think they'd be as good because, like, I've been on shows. I've guessed it on shows where everything is plotted out to include the jokes. And I got to tell you, my laughs were not as authentic. I mean, the cold opens are written, but you guys don't... We, the recipients, we, the listeners of the cast don't know them in advance. And so we're reacting for the first time.

That's kind of the scripted jokes. Whereas like, everything else is on the flight. That's probably the reason why we never remember them. Yeah. Fans, and this isn't a criticism, but fans will be like, oh, this thing was so funny. I'd be like, what the fuck are you talking about? Nobody could pre-write a joke as good as dumb bitch Cooper. I mean, or Nate as a plane.

Nate is a plane. Robert Matthews living in a shoe. I'm sick of all these motherfucking nates on this motherfucking plane. The horse, the horse religion. Oh, you some horsodoxy. I had the moon Turk. The moon Turk isn't even us. That shoutouts to the Anna Baptist for coming up with our own bit.

They would have loved podcasting. There was one where like, and this isn't a criticism of you, Tom. Just don't know if it landed immediately. And so you didn't react the way you would have. Like if it had been a joke where it was an immediate fucking recognition, where you were talking about the big John and the other YouTuber guy, you said the, who says Bosch and that you said there's positive and neutral inside you are two Bosch men. And I said, inside you are two Bosch men sounds like what Wilford Owen wanted most in

this world. Like that was a line that I was really proud of. And I was like, you were like, you were like, you were disappointed in me. And I was just like, God damn it. I loved, I love telling a joke that I could visibly see you guys disappointed me in. That's like, like, there's two good receptions that I can have. And this counts for live shows too. Is that if I make you to laugh, When we're recording, I'm like, yes. But if I make you both grown just as good. And if we're doing a live show and I get like a good pop from the crowd, nothing makes me feel better.

But if I can make everybody go, oh, I'm like, yes, yes. I feel as though it is very, very funny sometimes doing live shows because I'll tell a joke and maybe it lands with everyone and, you know, fucking applause break. That's always cool. That's like, like, ultra combo and fucking. killer instinct. Sometimes you guys laugh. Normally it gets a laugh,

polite laugh, whatever. Every now and again, I'm not saying it's good, but it's funny. This happens. I'll make a joke. You guys will chuckle politely. The crowd might chuckle politely. One or two people in the audience who actually get it lose their fucking minds. And I'm like, yeah, that's why you're here. That's why you're here because you're on that level. This is for you, buddy. You're on that level.

Thanks, Steve. You can't be all things to all man. No. No, you can't. But fellas, I do believe we've casted a pod. but you cast other pods. Plug those other pods. So Trashutcher, what a hell of way to dad. Kill James Bond. No gods, no mayors. I am involved in some capacity.

And I am in a band called Second Homes that is putting out an album called Find a Way to Hate It coming out in the spring at some point. I'm going to the UK next week at the time of this recording to mix the record and then next steps will start happening. So we'll see. Maybe we'll play live. I'd like to, but life scheduling means it's going to have to be planned out

pretty far in advance. So we'll find out. Looking forward to the first band slash podcast show live show I've ever been a part of. Yeah, that's great. It's be like, like, hey, we brought these two crowds of people together, Celtic and Rangers. They love each other. Listen to beneath skin show about the history of everything told to the history of tattoos. And listen to Bloodwork a show about the economy of violence at the time of recording.

We're releasing an episode later today about a neo-Nazi wizard. And I mean those words quite literally. I will not name him because he's a notorious name searcher, and I do not want to deal with that. But if you want to hear about a neo-Nazi wizard who joined up with some football hooligans, listen to Blood War. Outstanding.

I've already plugged this show. It's the only thing I got to plug. So consider it. Until next time, put on Tupac and don't kidnap any British soldiers. I don't think I can finish that joke the way I want to for legality reasons. Bye. Bye.

Bye.