Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - Episode 118 - Silvercorp USA and the Dumbest Coup Ever

Episode Date: August 24, 2020

Once upon a time a group of idiots with an airsoft rifle attempted to invade a country. Hilarity (and prison sentences) ensued. Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys Sources: https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-53557235 https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/05/05/the-invasion-of-venezuela-brought-to-you-by-silvercorp-usa/ https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/mind-blowing-story-ex-green-beret-who-tried-oust-venezuela-n1201981

Hey everybody, Joe here from the Lions Led by Donkeys podcast. If you enjoy what we do here on the show and you think it's worth your hard-earned money, you can support the show via Patreon. Just a $1 donation gets you access to bonus episodes, our Discord, and regular episodes before everybody else. If you donate at an elevated level, you get even more bonus content. A digital copy of my book, The Hooligans of Kandahar, and a sticker from our Teespring store. Our show will always be ad-free and is totally supporter-driven. We use that money to pay our bills, buy research materials that make this show possible, and support charities like the Kurdish Red Crescent, the Flint Water Fund, and the Halo Trust. Consider joining the

Legion of the Old Crow by Donkeys podcast. I'm Joe, and with me, as mostly always, is Nick. What's up, man? Oh, yeah. Returning champion. Returning the great and powerful Nicholas. How are you doing in the land of Washington? Eh, pretty good. You know, today's actually extremely hot.

98. Jesus. God. Yeah, it's not even that hot here. Though it is incredibly hot, and I tempered the heat by eating a breakfast burrito the size of my fucking face. Nice. So, yeah, I recommend doing that.

It's really good. Had one yesterday. Couldn't complain one bit about it. And I am no longer sunburned. That took three weeks, but I have achieved, I've returned back to my natural whiteness, which is nearly translucent. You look like a person who got shot 30 minutes ago and you're just slowly bleeding out

I look like a corpse my aesthetic is corpses that has been left outside for just a little bit too long so Nick I have a treat for us today and that is do you remember that time where a whole bunch of fucking mercenaries got

shoved down into puddles of their own piss by Venezuelan fishermen? Yeah, I do remember that. They called it Operation Gideon. And it is as dumb as everybody thinks it is, but dumber. And we, that's what we're talking about today.

Have you, have you figured out or learned much about silver core usa's one time riding into the sunset to get owned by some fishermen no i i honestly enjoyed the memes more than anything i didn't read up into it at all this might be the only mercenary group that is legitimately just a meme um because it's it like it's weird because like the guy who runs this guy named jordan goudreau which we'll talk about in depth a little bit later on was like this weird epic bacon veteran q and unbelieving vet bro um who wanted like he quite honestly wanted to be

eric prince but was not smart enough somehow and er Eric Prince is a fucking moron. But this guy was, I don't know, for the greater war criminals here, he's like a D grade Eric Prince because he could only get two Americans that actually believe in what he was doing while Eric Prince had an entire industry. Oh, yeah.

And I was on the fence of covering this for a really long time because a lot of other shows have talked about this to include like hell of a way to die I believe Robert Evans has talked about it and I was trying really hard to wait until more information came out personally because you know we're a history show sometimes not always and I try to make sure that what we talk about is like relevant is detailed. Like I try not to write, like re or talk about things that just fucking happened because a lot of stuff can come out.

Right. Um, and thankfully the BBC did a really good job, uh, researching silver core USA for me, uh, which is great. Cause I don't think Jordan will talk to me. Um, because he's not talking to anybody anymore. Nobody knows where he is, but we'll talk about that later yeah the dude has fucking disappeared uh which i guess i would do as well if i broke i don't know a hundred fucking different international laws and attempted to kill the president of a country you need to send jesse ventura after him yeah he'd just be looking for

the venezuelan shooter uh the fucking grassy knoll yeah um now before we get to just how the hell did this weird group of mercenaries and venezuelan expats take part in when the status regime change attempts in all time we do get to talk about wait for it american venezuelan history and relations because i know that's what you were waiting for right yeah yes that's that's great uh because i know that's what you were waiting for, right? Yeah, yes. That's great, because I know you're pumped about geopolitics. But it is kind of important here, because it's dumb, and it directly tracks into how the fuck someone like Jordan Goudreau

ended up thinking this was a good idea. And I'll do my best to not trash talk our current administration, because that's illegal for you. I understand that. But they are connected. I will ask you simply, do not comment for your job's sake.

Now, traditionally, America and Venezuela were normal countries. They had normal relations as much as we do with anybody else. That was until 1999 when a guy named Hugo Chavez harnessed the electoral power of the Venezuelan poor and disenfranchised middle class and won the country's presidency with about 56% of the vote.

And there is a decent argument that could be made that that is the last free and fair election that Venezuela has had. Good percentage. Yeah. A lot can be said about Chavez's time in power. I'm not a political scientist, and Chavez is not a really big power player in this episode. But it can fairly be surmised as both very, very good and very, very bad. But what can definitely be said is that he pissed off a lot of fucking people very quickly. But it didn't really matter too much, as the people who originally voted for him loved him and continued to do so and largely still do

they won him a second term as president in 2001 and unfortunately for chavez or fortunately depending on what side the fence you fall on he was two things that the u.s absolutely hated he was a socialist and he was someone that spoke spanish so you know it comes next in 2002 a coup was launched against him and but chavez was warned ahead of time by the OPEC General Secretary Ali Rodriguez. OPEC is a cartel that manages the distribution and price of oil producing countries around the world, in case anybody was unaware. Chavez that OPEC had learned that Arab countries were agitating for an oil embargo against the United States in response to the Bush administration's agitation towards war against Iraq. This is 2002, so recent-ish history. I know I remember it because I'm old, but some people don't. And they were also angry at the US's stance following Israel's incursion into the

Palestinian territories. I understand that I have to be very specific about which one of those times I'm talking about. But yeah, Rodriguez warned Chavez that if an oil embargo was to happen, the Bush administration would not tolerate Mr. Chavez being in control of Venezuela's oil production. Even though up until this point, Chavez had been not the Chavez that people remember. People remember him openly calling George W. Bush the devil, which was hilarious. Nice. He took the floor at the UN after George W. Bush and said, I still smell sulfur because the devil was just here. This is before all that. He was, by all means, an agreeable person to work with.

Sounds like a pretty outstanding guy. You know, I would not call Hugo Chavez an outstanding guy. Just a guy you'd want to go hang out with. Maybe go to the brewery with. I would have a beer with Hugo Chavez. That's fair. Unfortunately, he died of cancer,

but, um, which if you believe, uh, Nicholas Maduro, we gave him cancer. Uh, probably not,

but you know, the CIA cancer gun or whatever. Cancer gun. Yep. I'm calling it cancer gun. Cancer gun. Oh, do you think it'd be like Judge Dredd's gun where you could pick the cancer by just selling the gun? Testicular cancer.

It's like a Russian roulette where you just spin the wheel, but it's just all different kinds of cancer. Yeah. roulette where you just spin the wheel but it's just all different kinds of cancer yeah um but chavez was pretty open about the fact that he didn't want to take part in any oil embargo mostly because that uh that is and to this day that's largely correct all of the venezuelan economy um he would be like i don't know like shitting in his own face to own america and america wouldn't notice like they would have no fucking money he was no there's no way he was going to tank his own economy to do this um now none of this is proven uh though in a bbc interview with rodriguez uh

rodriguez openly said yes he definitely told chavez about this and the coup that was definitely coming um and the coup was launched april 12 2002 uh by a guy named pedro carmona who's largely unimportant other than this but it occurred only four days after iraq still then controlled by saddam hussein institute a ban on oil exports so do the math uh it's not great no also this would explain why chavez replaced several units of the presidential guard that was like his you know by definition his personal bodyguard uh two units that he knew was loyal because he had been in the military and largely had military loyalty but there was some disloyalty in the ranks but he replaced a whole bunch of people only about 36 hours before

it all started oh wow yeah so you could assume that's probably why he managed to escape with his life and then come back um and the the coup failed carmona went to exile in the neighboring columbia who then had a very quick meeting with u.s secretary of state colin powell so yeah we probably did that shit. Like, yep. I'm not going to wait for the WikiLeaks on that one. But after all of this, Chavez became what could only be described as the best international troll in the game. Like I already talked about him going in front of the UN General Assembly and calling George W. Bush the devil. That was pretty good.

devil uh that was pretty good uh and during this time the u.s and venezuela were fucking with one other diplomatically like expelling diplomats making new alliances and various other ways that two countries could egg each other on though admittedly most of this seems to stem from shava's strong opposition to american foreign policy and support for uh the iranian nuclear program um like most of most of his agitation because i mean venezuela is largely on a global scale not that powerful of a country when you're trying to fuck with a country like the united states so he did it by being vocally opposed to you know illegal wars like invading iraq which like i guess i have to hand it to yugo chavez here. But there's a small side story to Chavez's hilarious trip to the UN in New York. The next president of Venezuela, and mostly the topic of this episode, was also at that UN meeting.

And he was the foreign minister at the time. He's a guy named Nicolas Maduro. When he tried to leave after the speech, he was stopped by customs and border patrol agents and they asked to search him. Now this is illegal because he's a diplomat. So he, so he refused, um,

as like you have like a diplomatic bag and they are just generally waved through. Uh, he refused to, uh, consent to a search, which allowed him to be, the word detained is not what I would use, but he was not allowed to leave. Um, but after a search, which allowed him to be... The word detained is not what I would use,

but he was not allowed to leave. But after a while, he eventually was let go. And then he left thinking that U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents were Nazis and racists. So never thought I was going to have to say Nicolas Maduro was right, but there you go. Anyway, Chavez got cancer and died in 2013 uh he gave power to his chosen successor nicholas maduro who has shown himself to be kind of the

dollar general brand of hugo chavez uh maduro did excel at being in power and being a socialist even if he was kind of a bad one which meant the u.s did not like him leading to the obama administration to slap the country with sanctions and call him a threat to American national security. Not a foreign policy wonk by any means. And I'm hardly even a historian, but I'm going to say that's suspect at best. I'm going to say that Venezuela does not have the ability to project military power. I don't feel like that's a controversial thing to say. No, doesn't sound like it either and when i'm talking about all this i don't mean to say that nicholas maduro

or yuko chavez are good people good leaders or the scions of democracy i'm just saying it's not our fucking business uh but the sanctions only increased during the recent trump administration uh these sanctions along with uh incredible amounts of mismanagement from both Chavez and Maduro when it came to the economy, as well as a massive drop in oil prices, led to the almost total implosion of the Venezuelan supply system and economy. This caused horrible hyperinflation of the local currency, which eventually broke the 800% level in 2014, as well as a shortage of basic goods like food, water, electricity, medical supplies, everything. It's led to a huge outflux of people immigrating away from Venezuela into neighboring Colombia, and it's all around not good.

It turns out, Nick, hyperinflation, economic collapse, bad. Thankfully, here in America, we don't have to worry about economic collapse, do we? Good thing you know what? I've been practicing this on my civilization games. Turns out I just restart it every time.

Yeah, have you tried unplugging and plugging the economy back in? Anyway, thank you for donating to the Patreon. It's my only paycheck. So after this collapse, Venezuela had another set of elections in May of 2018. President Maduro was declared the victor, but the results were heavily contested. Opposition parties said the entire thing was a fraud, and there is some evidence that there is a fair amount of irregularities thankfully i don't know that would never happen here right uh over a million new voters uh were purged from the rolls there's evidence of police intimidation and some people accusing the government of bribing people to uh vote for them by giving them food and these tactics are both sides uh i don't mean to like both sides this election because that's

gross but like um now depending on the food i might have to take that offer i don't know my price is pretty low give me an empanada i'll vote for you maduro some shits are bomb uh like the one guido's uh opposition party who would eventually declare himself president uh because he's the venezuelan pete buda judge uh well like they were also accused of buying votes effectively and uh there there's evidence that both sides did this um nobody's innocent here everybody sucks uh but yeah i'm just gonna it turns out the venezuelan politics is a land of contrasts, but most countries did not accept the election. Mostly those who had already had bad relations with the country, like us, and those who were their allies accepted the results. Weird how that works. which is the elected legislative branch of the government, was controlled by the opposition party and declared President Maduro's presidency illegitimate.

Instead, said the president should be Juan Guaido, a representative from the state of Vargas. And he was the founder of the Popular Will Party, also strangely kind of socialist party because they're a part of the Socialist International. So like who would have thought these leftist parties were fighting one another uh but anyway uh the the organization of american states also agreed that guido should be president the oas is a local continental organization that focuses on electoral monitoring but it had been started in the u.s in the 1940s to help them spread the uh it had been started in the U.S. in the 1940s to help them spread the spread of communism in the Western Hemisphere. So, surprised that they would really, really hate Maduro

and want the other guy to win. So, I guess what I'm saying is the OAS kind of sucks. I think so. Yeah, Guaido declared himself president and swore himself in. I believe he was in Miami when he did this. Hanging out in the Keys.

He just said that he was president. And he was recognized by 60 countries as the president of Venezuela. Mostly because we did it first. The US has been looking for a way to get one in on Maduro. Mostly because we hated Chavez and Chavez is dead and we can't fight Chavez anymore so to get one in on Maduro mostly because we hated Chavez and Chavez is dead and we can't fight Chavez anymore

so we're going to fight Maduro and this is a really good way to get one in on him and most people are just going to follow the US's lead and if you remember if you've watched the State of the Union Juan Guaido was there he's the one that's face doesn't move like the guy looks like

he's had terrible plastic surgery. He has a completely unemotional face. It's really weird. He's got doll eyes. It's strange. But with the world turning against him and the country imploding around him, international observers assume

Maduro would eventually just step down, which was the goal. It was to make his position so untenable he'd eventually just quit. But he didn't, because apparently nobody knew Nicholas Maduro would eventually just step down, which was the goal, like was to make his position so untenable he'd eventually just quit. But he didn't because apparently nobody knew Nicholas Maduro. Weird. As protests spread throughout the country, it quickly became apparent that Guaido, he would have to like resort to force to get control of anything because popular uprisings were not so popular uh they were outnumbered by maduro supporters shit got violent uh the police and the military are largely on maduro's side so like he's like hmm this isn't working uh and that's when uh in 2019 this led to our first

hilarious failed coup attempt where guido managed to ally himself with a small group of anti-Maduro elements within the military who attempted to march on the presidential palace. The march ran to Maduro supporters who shot at them, causing several leading members of the coup to run to various embassies for protection, abandoning the civilian followers in the streets. You were attempting to overthrow the government. Why are you shocked that somebody shot at you? You were attempting to overthrow the government Why are you shocked that somebody shot at you Like Those are if you're to make a like I don't know a risk matrix

Okay we're attempting to overthrow the guy Who kind of probably rigged the elections Do you think he'd shoot at us No he seems like he's okay No I think they're going off the old 50-50 chance they have a gun they don't have a gun That's a good way to put everything in life. And, you know, like, you know, Guaido's people shot back too.

But, you know, they were missing out. And the popular movement kind of died. But that didn't mean that Juan Guaido was done attempting to find ways to take what he thought was his. Enter Silvercore USA, the dumbest group of mercenaries that have probably ever existed. Some of the best memes that came out.

Now, Silvercore USA was founded in 2018 by a Canadian-born American ex-Green Beret named Jordan Goudreau. Goudreau was born in 1976 in Calgary, Alberta, and enlisted in the Canadian Armed Forces after finishing

college in 1998. But he quickly left the Canadian military because he turned out that he thought it was kind of boring. He got out, crossed the border into the U.S., and enlisted in the U.S. Army for a nice $75,000 bonus. Holy shit. That's something that you can just

do if goudreau sounds like a weird guy like because yeah he thought the canadian army was kind of boring and it wasn't as badass as he thought it'd be uh which would lead him to like join another country's military like normally that's like where the french war legion comes in for people like him but like he's a weird guy and he very much was he was living in the when he was living in the u.s he lived with a family member who described him as arrogant and off-putting she recounted the time that she asked him to stop at a store to pick up a loaf of bread gujo declined she said telling her that he did not know how to do that huh yeah he did not know how to go shopping. How did he live? How was he alive?

The military kept him alive. Yeah. Holy shit. Goudreau eventually joined the highly selective Charlie Company of the 1st Battalion 10th Special Forces Group and did deploy multiple times to Iraq and Afghanistan. While the people who served with him said that he was very good at his job,

but all of them also wanted to note that he was weird as hell. He loved fighting people and had a hair-trigger temper. Which, this tracks since we're talking about a fucking mercenary. He also might have been a bit of a criminal. So,

in 2012, the Department of Defense launched a criminal investigation into allegations that Goudreau had defrauded the government of $62,000 while he served abroad. What? Prosecutors allege that he collected inflated housing allowances for his wife by claiming that she lived in Brooklyn from 2009 to 2012

when she was actually in Arizona and North Carolina. Areas for which the military paid much, much lower allowances. He absolutely did that shit because I know people who did that shit. I would if I had the chance. I mean, don't say that now. You gotta wait until after you do it. But let's be honest. I already asked the Magic 8-Ball.

Definitely not getting married. Said it or wasn't. Magic 8-Ball, should I do marriage fraud? I don't know. Ask later. Damn. This Dependa 8-Ball doesn't work very well. No, no charges were levied against him. A person close to Goudreau at the time said he reached an agreement to pay back a portion of the money in monthly installments in order to dodge charges. Also, I should probably point out that if the DOD didn't want to dodge paperwork and did prosecute him, absolutely nothing I'm about to talk about would have happened

because old jordan would have lost his security clearance due to being a felon so way to go dod i'm assuming i'm assuming this is like cid that that botched this which is on brand for cid they're terrible now goudreau eventually medically retired from the military claiming in various interviews that he'd been shot multiple times and blown up problem with that his dd214 does not show he was ever awarded a purple heart yep liar too weird normally that's just seals that do that but i guess green berets do too i'm still waiting for his book deal huh quiet professionals i always say yeah i guess seals write books and commit war crimes and green berets just start fake companies and invade Venezuela. I don't know. Weird flex.

After the military, he really didn't have a plan for life, and according to a friend, he toured the U.S. on a motorcycle, lived out of a backpack, and slept on a hammock for a couple months before he turned up in Florida in July of 2018. I can't hate on him for that part, because that sounds kind of rad. It really does in all honesty in february of that same year some of you might remember a gunman barged into stoneman douglas high school with an ar-15 and killed 17 students in only a few seconds i remind everyone of that story because in july of 2018 goudreau had gone to florida to attend a school safety conference where he was now acting as silver core USA. It's only employee and founder and explained to school superintendents about how he could protect their students from harm.

That's right. He attempted to capitalize off the mass murder of school children. So I guess he has something in common with the NRA in that regard. He described himself as a counter terrorist, which I suppose is kind of true. And he tried to sell school leadership on the idea of putting undercover former Special Forces soldiers

in schools, posing as teachers, which might be the most fucking insane thing I've ever heard. You know what? You'd be able to tell apart because they'd be wearing the grunt-style tie or something. Why is everybody wearing 5'11 pants? Also, it should be noted that these people were not teachers, so it's why is everybody wearing 511 pants also it should be noted that these people were not teachers so it's like well what are they going to teach they're gonna figure it out because like

teaching is you know we're gonna teach kids how to do war crimes uh and and start apparel companies yeah it's like thankfully teaching is such an easy job and career to do. They might as well just have them be students, undercover students. You're like fucking... What's that movie called? Jonah Hill in it. Oh, 21 Jump Street. Yeah, 21 Jump Street, but with Eddie Gallagher. It's depressing.

Oh, wow. Now, it's interesting to point out that like how he was gonna sell this to schools it wasn't like you're gonna give me a million dollars and i'm gonna do this it was that it's gonna be like a netflix subscription for parents like they pay eight dollars a month to the school yeah it's a protection racket the fuck it's a it's a subscription-based mob protection racket using people using slightly unhinged veterans in schools look look look this whole safety thing's optional but if you care about your child's safety i already have a lot of guys with guns in the school it'd be a shame if something happened dollars this way slide me

the eight fucking 50 if you don't get it now, it's going to be $9. That's the worst grift ever. That's at a large school. I graduated from high school with 2,000 kids in it. That's not that much money for all of this because you're going to have to pay these guys pretty well.

You're going to have to pay for training in Florida. There's probably none of that. Any kind of certificates or anything. At the end of the day, you're're not gonna make a lot of money which is actually goes to show that this guy sucks at everything to do with everything he's that guy that uh when you negotiate with him he'll negotiate some random crazy off the wall shit where you'd be like yeah i'll take that for like 30 bucks. He's like, oh yeah? 10 bucks. What? All right. Just for you.

Yeah. Like, what the fuck? Thankfully, even in the fear-gripped brains of school leadership at the time, this sounded like a crazy idea to them and absolutely nobody took him up on it. But just because his plan to griff the Florida public school system didn't work out

did not mean he was down for the count. He ended up going into private security, acting as Silvercore USA, mostly because he happened to know the guy that was in charge of President Trump's personal security somehow. I'm not entirely sure how, but he managed to get him hired to work outside security for the president during a campaign stop at Bojangles Coliseum. Bojangles Coliseum. I just like to say that. That's not important. I just like to say the word Bojangles. Also, the chicken's really good.

But he also worked security in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. And we all know how that worked out. I'm going to personally blame him. Through all this, he's posting pictures on his, of his company, which was pretty much just him to the company's Instagram page. And to this day,

that Instagram page is up and sad, but in its heyday, I will let BBC explain what this looked like. Quote, its Instagram count is a mix of images of military prowess and Goudreau sprinting very fast on a running machine. There's so many

videos of him running on a treadmill. It's ridiculous. Why? I don't know. There's like half a dozen of him just running really fast. That's it? That's it. It's the whole thing. I don't think there's's like half a dozen of him just like running really fast. That's it? That's it. That's the whole thing. I don't think there's no context to it either. And it just like has all those normal hashtags like grind bro

you know Jim Shark or whatever like. Jim Shark. Now you're probably wondering how the hell this guy managed to find his way to Venezuela. Hell the guy didn't even speak Spanish nor did he ever learn Spanish. Enter Venezuela Live Aid, or Venezuela Aid Live, depending on who you talk to or what ads you see. There's a giant benefit concert put on a British guy named Richard Branson,

a man who literally looks like a puppet made out of month-old ham. He owns Virgin Galactic, Virgin Wireless. I think he's a fucking airline. He's that guy yeah i know who he is gotcha uh the concert was held just over the venezuelan border in colombia much like live aid in the early 1990s uh it was to be an all-day-long concert funded through massive amounts of donations the main crux of aid live as well as that of not president juan guaido was that millions of venezuelans required life-saving aid to stave off hunger and disease. And Maduro rejected it, mostly because

it would have been directed through and by Guaido's government, thereby giving it legitimacy. And also, that goes directly against Maduro's government, not saying that was the right thing to do but that's why he did it okay um so aid live was piling up all this money and there's like trucks of aid like uh like food and whatever on the border they knew weren't gonna get through and all they were doing is like trying to create like a spectacle they're like look look at the, won't give his people food. If you come in here, you will literally depose me. It's weird. It's weird that a charity was involved in that. It's gross, and I hate it.

While it's true that millions of Venezuelans did require dire aid during that time, and at the time of this recording, they still do need it. Let's just pretend that the international community gave a shit, because if they they would just give it to the actual sitting venezuelan government to then distribute to the people right i am not one to defend nicholas maduro but let's not act like the international community was not literally leveraging a suffering and starving populace to facilitate regime change because that's what we were doing and it's gross uh in the middle of all this was jordan goudreau who managed to make his way to Columbia working security for Live Aid and posting about it on Instagram this dude

never logged off did he bring a treadmill with him he did not and he thought he was being deep about it too like the photo caption at Aid Live was quote controlling chaos the Venezuelan border where the dictator looks on with apprehension there was no chaos there was a

concert Jordan you were at a concert he also tagged the video which is still up at the time of this recording which has such awesome hashtags as hashtag active shooter twice for some reason

hashtag Harley Davidson. Hashtag grind. And hashtag CrossFit. I don't know why. Pretty much every other photo that he ever put on Instagram is some variation of some QAnon shit, CrossFit shit, or like Trump 2020 shit. He sounds like every annoying vet bro that I've ever met. Voltron together to form the final boss

that you have to do battle with when you climb up the American Legion's racial slur tower or something. Like, he is the id of the vet bro. It's quite impressive. Also, one time he went to Germany and captured the photo, the fatherland. So take that for what it's worth. Yeah, that's sus.

That's sus as hell. I cannot confirm that he's a bit of a Nazi, but yikes. I don't want to libel a guy that has that many guns. And you don't know where he is. Yeah, he could be somewhere in Hawaii. It'd be hard to tell. There's a lot of really annoying Vetboro people here. Anyway, Juan Guaido thought this concert would be the thing that finally forced Maduro to step down.

To the surprise of probably only him, Maduro did not. So several of Guaido's main supporters began to look around for more military options. Soon, training camps began to be set up in various parts of Colombia. With what had to be the full knowledge of the Colombian and American governments, these camps would recruit disaffected members of the Venezuelan armed forces and police, and eventually train up an army that could confront Maduro's security apparatus directly. Spoiler alert, that did not happen.

Even though Guaido had a ton of notional international support, it really didn't seem like anybody actually wanted to do anything to get him in power. Nobody ever gave him any aid, nobody ever gave him any money. There's a guy named Herman Ehlman,

one of the founders of the camps of the exiled Venezuelan people. He was a former member of Venezuelan parliament. He said that he had to sell his car and apartment to afford food for the first wave of new recruits. What? And this isn't like thousands of people. This is at most below hundreds.

I thought you were going to say like 10. I think at most it was 300 people. This is at most the low hundreds. I was going to say like 10. I think at most it was 300 people. But if this is the exiled government of an internationally recognized head of state, even one that the CIA supported, we have to assume that the CIA is supporting some of this,

he'd at least have money. And he has none. So it's pretty obvious that at some point the EU and the US is like, well, shit, we called him president and Maduro's still there, so I guess that's a wash. And then they just gave up on him. Yeah, they did the old hands fucking clean.

Our job here is done. Anyway, let's pretend that none of this ever happened. In July, Goudreau was phoned to Colombia to meet with General Cliver Alcala, the main founder and technically the commander of the camp system there. Alcala and Goudreau talked about the plan that they had for finally deposing Maduro. Quote, we talked about the plan, a tackle operation to capture the big players in Venezuela that would then be handed over to the United States. Juan Guaido would assume a mandate as interim president, leading free elections in venezuela remembered herman

ailman the problem according to ailman was that they had no goddamn money goudreau was already selling himself as a counter-terrorist also sold himself as a money guy telling ailman that he could get financing because he knew some people and that is when goudreau met with guido's internet or the presidential commission that was supposed to be like the something of like the international headquarters based out of miami it was a guy's house yeah it was a guy's house headquarters it was like a mansion because like of course it was but still it was a house uh once there he told the commission that he totally had big business backers but they needed assurances that if they paid into the operation, they could reap economic rewards later on under a new Guaido government.

And this is where I should point out, there's zero evidence of anybody backing Silvercore in this. In the world of the PMC, or Private Military Corporation, or mercenaries, Goudreau was a fucking nobody. I reached out to other people that i have talked to when i when we when we need i don't know advice when it comes to talking about pmcs none of them have ever heard of fucking silver core silver core was not like a mover or a shaker or a player they were a fucking nobody caught like as a fucking green brace cosplay program uh. Was he still the only one at this time? Yes. He's absolutely the only employee still. The number was his

personal number and shit like that. He definitely ran all of their accounts. Everything was through him. He does get some other employees later on, which we'll talk about them too. What's important is that this guy had never worked on any big contracts for anybody.

He had always been a subcontractor. So when someone's signing up for million-dollar deals or whatever, they want to make sure that the person that they're dealing with can be trusted, and nobody fucking trusted him. Furthermore, if somebody did talk to him, he probably would have posted about it on fucking Instagram. This is the guy that cannot keep any secrets, but did prove himself to be an outright liar through most of his professional life gudro did meet with several

people but none of them bought into this idea mostly because they thought that he was unstable or probably some kind of atf or fucking cia plant because he's going around talking about privately funding a raid to capture the president of venez Jesus. Like, that's... Yes, I would like to talk to you about a business proposition. I would like to capture Justin Trudeau of Canada. Sir, this is L&L Hawaiian Barbecue.

No, no, hear me out. Hear me out. This is effectively what he's doing. It's like when you're in a baseball team for youth baseball and you have to go around looking for sponsors. He's very open with what he was attempting to do with this money. So everybody thought that he was nuts.

And one businessman did admit to talking to him, a guy named Rowan Craft. He's a Texas consultant. He said that he rejected the idea within minutes because Goudreau seemed crazy to him. So, yeah. I mean, good on him yeah i mean let's catch i don't often say nice things about texas and i won't so i'll move on uh but that uh this whole

time he's promising to the goudreau presidential people like i'll get the money or goudreau's promising guido's presidential people i'll get the, don't worry about it. And he promised it. But he had never had any evidence. But apparently being told, don't worry, I'll get the money, was good enough for Guaido. Because he signed a contract with Silvercore to, quote, capture slash detain slash remove Nicolas Maduro,

remove the current regime, and install the recognized Venezuelan president, Juan Guaido. Do you really believe that he could do that? He signed the contract and there's actually now Guaido refuses to believe that he did that. There is audio evidence that he did.

Yep. Not great. It turns out when you're dealing with a two-faced grifter like he might video record you. Weird. I mean, yeah. Goudreau would get a 1.5 million dollar retainer and then collect 200 million dollars once the job was done probably in oil kickbacks or something that wagner group would be familiar with but who cares right the deal is signed the shit is on who cares about the details yeah about that within only a few days

the deal between silver core and the not venezuelan government was on the rocks mostly because they were still asking where the fuck the big business backers were and goudreau did not have any but he did demand to be paid his retainer uh the commission correctly like well we want to see what you have like i'm not going to give you a million and a half dollars and you have no backing for us but he didn't have them so Goudreau produced nothing leading him to be literally physically removed from the meeting

holy shit and the commission then cancelled the deal though they did pay him $50,000 with a representative saying it was for travel costs he was already living in Florida. I don't know. He got 50 grand. Now,

with this sweet coup deal in the trash, it must have been time for Goudreau to finally buckle down and get into the racist t-shirt grift like every other Special Forces veteran, right? Of course not. Otherwise, we wouldn't be fucking talking about him. Goudreau just kept on working. He should have been on kept on working instagram during the meeting he should have been trying to been

like an instagram baddie or something yeah i don't know starting only fans and you're just it's just you're running on a treadmill goudreau just kept working on deposing nicholas maduro though now for absolutely for nobody in particular and with no one backing him. He also managed to recruit two more Special Forces veterans. A guy named Luke Denman and another guy named Arian Barry. Also, be suspicious of

anybody named Arian. Just don't trust them. That's an automatically weird first name. Now for reasons that will become clear by the end of this episode, they could not be reached for a comment. But people have since been interviewed, like their families.

And both of these men seem to have had a very hard time leaving behind their former military lives. And constantly were kind of floating around through life. Maybe they should have started a podcast. But they were contacted by Goudreau with the promise of a job.

A job that he said that was supported by the US government and the CIA. You might notice those two things are gigantic lies. But apparently Goudreau's word was good enough for both of them. Big liar pants.

Hilariously, one of the guys who did visit the camps in columbia uh now he was a green beret veteran sorry he's a navy seal veteran but uh he wasn't being directly targeted by goudreau for like being hired but like he was it was clear that goudreau wanted to show this off to him i was like look look what i got don't you want to be part of this so former navy seal ephraim matos uh spoke to the washington post and he said that he said that like he knew that something was wrong because what he was looking at is he said quote they didn't have enough food they were drinking water from the river a stagnant river and they were bathing in it and and everything It was horrible. I was like, you guys, if you were backed by the

United States government, you'd realize you'd have plenty of food, right? And then he left. Holy shit. A small side note here. As Goudreau was ramping up his dumb operation to bring in more Americans, the Venezuelans were deserting the camp. Yep.

Like General Al alcala had told uh goudreau that he had around 300 men at most he really only had about 60 and that number was rapidly dwindling and in in case this operation could not be going any worse they lost support of colombia a small hint of this was despite the camp being something of an open secret, the Colombian government seized a large shipment of military gear and weapons that was bound for Goudreau's operation. Some people might remember that from the news. It was like

hundreds of rifles. Really? And if you're wondering how he paid for it, that $50,000 that the presidential committee gave him was probably part of it yeah there was also another weapon shipment that got caught in venezuela um that was also his um nothing made it to this guy no uh because he wasn't good at smuggling he literally just put them in the back of a car and that's why like people were uh talking about how oh the u.s has to be involved in this look

they're all m4s or whatever from what i can gather is um through a connection that he knew in columbia he was able to buy a ton of weapons from columbia like as like they fell off the back of the truck of the columbian army type deal right which is hilarious because the colombians took his money and then busted him hey they got it back that's hustling right there to quote dj collard congratulations you just played yourself yeah uh so then something weird happened the u.s department of justice indicted general akala for drug trafficking what they would also go on to include nicholas maduro and a long list of other people that worked for the venezuelan government um and it's like all of those are still open um the

accusations are that a massive drug trafficking operation is being ran by the venezuelan military and that they funnel that pain to the government giving them a source of liquid cash when everything else had failed them they aren't the only country to do something like this probably the most notable one that does something like this and almost certainly still does is north korea uh they pretty much have what is effectively an entire ministry of government whose entire job is dedicated to the black market and running counterfeit money and drugs because it gives the country a lot of cash.

In Venezuela, this is a documented practice that began in the early 90s and the cartel's supposed name, the Cartel of the Sons, the son being the insignia of a Venezuelan general, first popped up in 1993 when two generals of the Anti-Drug

National Command were arrested for the role in it. The allegation is that the cartel continues to this day using the Venezuelan military as cover. A hint that this is true is that multiple generals of the National Guard have been arrested while moving huge amounts of coke around the country as well as over international borders.

And also the adopted son of Nicolas Maduro, Celia Flores, sorry, Celia Flores' adopted son, who was the wife of Nicolas Maduro and the first lady of Venezuela, was caught with a massive amount of drugs in his car. Really?

Yeah. But unlike everyone else I talked about, Alcala actually gave up, turned himself in. Some people have said that the U.S. and Colombia went after Alcala even though he was pretty much on their side is because uh while he had once worked in the cartel he had since left it but the camps that he was running were beginning to make people nervous and the U.S. is worried that he might do something stupid, like, say, hire Jordan Goudreau. So they assume that if they arrested him, the men in the camps would just give up and go home. But they didn't.

Antonio Siqueira took over command from the camps and the movement in general. Siqueira was waiting for Goudreau to come from Colombia to meet with him. But Goudreau wasn't going to make it there. So where was he well it's now march of 2020 at this point and he was grounded by the pandemic that we're all living through he wouldn't be getting on a plane oh yeah he's that he's he's running really fast forever yeah uh he wouldn't be getting on any plane again before the operation started another thing that happened before the start of Goudreau's big operation, the entire thing was leaked to the government of Venezuela. The real one.

Nobody's really sure who leaked it. I feel like he accidentally leaked it. Yeah, probably. I mean, he was posting about fucking Instagram. He probably tagged Nicolas Maduro in it. Yeah, coming for you. On March 28th on his weekly TV program, You probably tagged Nicholas Maduro in it. Yeah, coming for you. On March 28th on his weekly TV program,

Diosdado Cabello, who's Venezuela's number two after Nicholas Maduro, had some shocking revelations. He presented a comprehensive overview of the exiles camp in Colombia with the names of many of the Venezuelans and all three of the Americans involved. A lot of people think the camp had long since been infiltrated by Maduro spies, which probably would have been pretty easy, while still others think that Alcala spilled the entire plan to the US, who then leaked

it to Maduro on purpose in an attempt to get the idiots in the jungle to call the whole thing off. I'm going to go out and say I think both of those things are possible. But the fact remained that the government now knew everything. People in the camp saw the government was on to them and began to panic, which led Antonio Siqueira to tell them not to worry about it because the U.S. had it all under control. The other two Americans in the camp had no idea what was happening because they did not speak Spanish.

And when they called Goudreau, he reassured them that more U.S. veterans were on the way to reinforce them. Also not true. Dude sounds like a real scumbag. It isn't known if Goudreau knew about Maduro knowing about his plan, but if he did, he did not warn his employees. No. There may have been a good reason for this, though.

Goudreau was now in debt at around $30,000 to $50,000 because shipping tons of weapons to Colombia is expensive. And he now, since he spent all that money on weapons and that all got captured, he had no money.

But only a few days before, the Department of Justice put a $10 million bounty on Nicolas Maduro's head. Oh. His plan was already to capture him and place Juan Guaido in Caracas as president. Why not still do that and escape from this debt and make a profit? And maybe the presidential commission would then make good on their deal and give him $200 more million.

Probably not, but whatever. The plan was as dumb as it was reckless and insane soldiers were to load themselves in rickety boats and make an amphibious landing on the coast of venezuela after taking off from colombia after that they would sneak into caracas and lay low for a couple days in safe houses which i should point out had never been arranged before launching their attacks on the government institutions like the presidential palace, the military jail, and the headquarters of the SEBEN,

which is the intelligence service of Venezuela. On Friday, the 1st of May, at 6 p.m., a boat carrying 11 men left the shores of Colombia bound for Venezuela. They had eight rifles between them for 11 people. Ten minutes later, a second vessel did the same thing. This one with 47 on board and just two rifles. It was later revealed that one of those rifles was an airsoft gun.

Talk about that. Talk that piece for a second. It was an airsoft gun. Is there any reasoning behind why? I have a hard time believing they thought it was real. Maybe they're hoping they could scare a cop and take their gun or something. In which case, all they have to do is be black. Within an hour, one of the engines had failed and people began to get seasick.

Jeez. As the first boat pulled into the town of Makuto On May 3rd It immediately was ambushed by the army Killing 8 of them Holy fuck Fucking owned God damn

They were waiting for them the whole time They knew exactly where they were landing Alright boys this is what we've been training for Let's hit the beaches Fucking dead Immediately where they were landing. Alright boys, this is what we've been training for. Let's hit the beaches. Fucking dead. Immediately. The second boat was miles behind them, stuck out in open ocean and running out of fuel.

They used the last of the fuel to drop off some people in the woods while the two Americans were on board that were captured by Venezuelan fishermen without a fight. Though I guess that would be hard to do with an airsoft gun. That's my favorite part about the whole thing is that the airsoft guns were held by the most qualified people to actually fight that's who is holding them yes why i don't know were they did they not trust themselves i wouldn't trust them last time i had a gun i killed a

whole bunch of innocent people, so it's probably best I carry this airsoft gun with the orange tip at the end. In case anyone was curious where these two men came from, they made it very easy to be ID'd, because they carried their Silvercore USA employee ID card, their driver's license,

and in the case of Barry, his veteran's ID card. He was gonna hit up Caracas for the fucking veteran's discounts. You know what? I hope the Silvercore ID card was just like Coriola and a fucking index card. It looked purposely like a cat card. Like a normal military ID card, but without the chip because that would require them to be able to log into something.

Now obviously Maduro knew about this plan for a very long time but in case he didn't, Goudreau did a solid for him by live tweeting the entire operation and also making an Instagram video preaching about the mission's success hours after everyone involved had either been

shot dead or captured. Jesus. He put out the first video on May 1st, two days before the ambush and capture of the first group. Solid work by the U.S. Army's famed silent professionals. That dude there.

I'm not saying that this dude doxxed his own people, like like through Twitter or whatever but because I mean the government definitely knew about it beforehand but how bad do you have to be to not think that like the entire Venezuelan security apparatus

won't at least follow your Twitter account after they know who you are maybe they didn't think he was that big of a deal well I put Jordan I put Jordan. I put at not Jordan Goudreau. So like after it became clear to Goudreau that the world and the rest of the world that whatever the hell it was that he had planned had failed hilariously. The guy still could not shut up.

He instead went on a Internet news show and openly admitted that, yep, he was involved. And he had signed an agreement with Juan Guaido to do so, who refused to acknowledge that he had anything to do with any of this. So that's when Goudreau pointed out that he had secretly recorded the meeting. Jesus. Yep. As for Barry and Denmanman while all this is happening they've been sitting in a Venezuelan jail and facing enough charges to keep

them there probably till they die so they're still there oh they were just sentenced to 20 years which is interesting because at the being they're facing 30 years because I don't believe Venezuela actually has life sentences

they don't have the deathuela actually has life sentences um they don't have the death penalty either but if you've read anything about venezuelan prisons the death penalty is the prison itself they routinely have giant uh riots where like 40 people will be stabbed to death jesus christ so i am willing to bet uh barry and denman are not long for this world. Shame. And during the interrogation, which I'm sure was not friendly, Barry and Denman both said that they were employed by the U.S. government, which a lot

of people said like, see, look, they do work for the CIA. But that would make sense because both of them believed that they were working for the U.S. government because that's what Goudreau had told them. I wonder if Goudreau was ever actually going to go with them. He planned on it. There was actually a weird

thing where there was a boat that was floating towards Columbia that was found adrift and it was called the Silver Point USA and it was owned by him, Jordan Goudreau.

But he was not on it. And there was a theory that they were attempting to smuggle weapons from Florida to Columbia. And it ran aground or whatever or ran out of gas and they had to bail all the weapons out and then called for help and the US Coast Guard went and got it.

Huh. But he did have plans to get there but then the pandemic hit and everything shut down right uh which is why all this is really funny because you see these guys getting like frog marched by venezuela national guardsmen with a mask on like oh thanks for that as they're like they're like laying in the ground the puddle of their own piss pooling around them like cool they got a mask at least at least they're responsible now you're probably wondering like what the fuck has happened to jordan goudreau well i kind of spoiled that already but he has vanished off the face of the goddamn earth nobody has been

able to find him or interview him um and he hasn't said anything about anything since he outed guido for kind of employing him for a little bit. He, like the Silvercore USA Instagram account has not been updated in quite some time. And when it's been updated, he's very clearly not in the United States. And he is not currently wanted for any crimes. Really? The FBI has not admitted that they are investigating him

despite all of the crimes that he did. He's like, look despite all of the crimes that he did. He's like, look at all of the crimes that he did. But yeah, that's how this ends. Nicholas Maduro, still president. Barry and Denbin in prison forever, it seems like, probably.

And Jordan Goodrum, having a summer vacation, I I guess I don't know living his best life wherever he is living laughing loving I don't know that was interesting I definitely didn't know that yeah I was really hoping

that like Jordan Goodrow was running or something I don't know and like I was hoping that he had like an ATF warrant against him because like all of the weapons smuggling yeah that's And I was hoping that he had an ATF warrant against him because all of the weapon smuggling. Yeah, that's what I was kind of thinking. And the fact that he was working very closely

with a fucking member of an international drug cartel who was wanted by the U.S. Department of Justice. I don't know. This guy. I don't know. Glad you got to tell me about it because I definitely wasn't going to read about it. I was just going to keep looking at the memes. I had a lot of fun with this one, to be fair.

So, Nick, we do a thing on the show called Questions from the Legion. Hell yeah. And we've gotten a lot of them recently. So, what is, in your your opinion the worst experimental project in the US military history experimental yeah I think we did two series on that I'm

going to go with project 100,000 for people who are new to the show I know there's a lot of them after my recent appearances on other shows what's up I'm a clout shark project 100,000 is A lot of them after my recent appearances on other shows. What's up? I'm a clout shark. The Project 100,000 is the idea that during the Vietnam War, they could force people who had mental disabilities and defects and were otherwise not suitable for military service

to be suddenly suitable for military service and sent to Vietnam. Hilarity did not ensue, it turns out. It was all bad. And the army force-feeding acid to everybody was also not great. If I was to pick which one of these projects I would like to be involved in, I would much rather drink coffee cups full of acid than go to vietnam oh yeah but low-hanging fruit what about you i think i'd have

to go let's say some piece of equipment here i i think me and you were looking at that one picture one day of like the hovercraft of the two blades under the dude on like a bicycle seat oh yes the helicopter it was the personal helicopter yeah and if you fell off you would die immediately one wouldn't mind actually seeing that in action to be honest if we're talking about vehicles i'm gonna have to i gotta give a shout out to the davy crockett if you're familiar with that it was a nuclear recoilless rifle. Oh, okay. Yes, I am familiar with that. And we talked about it very briefly on my episode, The Nuclear Anthropologist. And the yield of the nuclear weapon was so strong that the person who fired it was not clear from the blast.

I would imagine they weren't. So it'd just be like a suicide mission for them. Yeah. from the blast. I would imagine they weren't. So it would just be like a suicide mission for them. Yeah, like, on the bright side you never have to go to the field or anything, because why do you need to practice? You're never going to practice, you can't miss. And you're never going to fire a second shot. They give him sim rounds,

and they're like, yeah, yeah, it's kind of like this. And then he goes out to the field, and they're like, this guy's a goner. We gave him the live one well nick as always it's it's been a pleasure talking about watching vet bros get fucking destroyed by fishermen um also like it's unfortunate that the people that got killed were all Venezuelan. None of the Americans died in this operation, even though they're the ones that

forced it forward. So, like, that sucks. And I guess thank you, everybody, for tuning into this wonderfully delightful show. And it is our solemn promise to you, the listener, that we will never use our Patreon dollars to attempt to overthrow Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela. Yet.

No. The king of Bhutan, though. That motherfucker has it coming. So, you know, I guess calling you out, King Wing Chuck. Fuck. Anyway, till next time, everybody.