white house official juan zarate is on his way across washington dc to a top secret meeting zarate is president george w bush's advisor on counter-terrorism he's called an urgent meeting in the dea office of mike braun mike braun was the uh the director of operations at the da at the time a former marine big guy shaved head all about you know very clear notions of law and order and good and bad braun has assembled his top team of agents the missions arati is giving them the capture of a man working in a trade making billions from the death of millions a suspected russian arms dealer who has escaped capture for 12 years zarate wants to know can they bring this man to justice i will always remember that as juan posed the question would you take a crack at him and do you think you could succeed i will never forget every one of them weren't pushing back they were leaning in this is the kind of stuff that dea agents live for but before they can catch their prey they need to learn everything they can about how he built his shadowy business [Music] nine years earlier a truck hurtles through the chaotic traffic in nairobi its destination the city center a bustling mix of offices and embassies it stops at the checkpoint leading to the u. s embassy [Music] this massive blast destroys the embassy and surrounding buildings [Music] there's a simultaneous attack on the u. s embassy in nearby tanzania 12 americans are among the 224 dead and over 4 000 people are injured we must find those responsible for these evil acts and see that justice is done the perpetrators of this mass horror are part of a newly emerging threat islamic terrorism they go by the name of al-qaeda and this is their first major attack against american citizens the kenyan embassy attack was a huge wake-up call suddenly it meant that people in africa with arms could hurt americans with this slaughter of americans africa becomes a battleground for the us in a war against muslim extremism like the ethnic conflicts and civil wars already ravaging the continent the extreme violence of these terrorist groups is fueled by a flood of illegal weapons and this surplus of arms turns africa into a bloodbath the overwhelming victims of the plethora of small and light arms and weaponry generally on the continent of africa ordinary people people who would have liked to go about living their lives on a day-to-day basis children are forced to turn against their own families in the democratic republic of congo a young soldier is drugged armed to the teeth and told to kill his own uncle his uncle who he'd been living with was sent to look for him when he found him in an army camp this young guy was made by his officers to shoot 30 bullets into the uncle who had effectively looked after him for most of his life [Music] and the reason they do that is so these young boys cannot return to the villages from which they come whole sections of africa are devastated by this proliferation of arms and for those witnessing the carnage there is one question [Music] who is army the deadliest combatants in africa [Music] the bloodshed and death across the continent horrifies those working in human rights organizations many are determined to unravel the mystery behind those facilitating the slaughter of millions across africa for those investigators the cause of the skyrocketing violence is obvious and the sudden availability of significant amounts of very cheap weaponry particularly small and light arms intensified those conflicts massively pilots and couriers across africa are interrogated about the supplier of their lethal cargo and one name is heard over and over so i mean you've got this period in sort of the mid to late 90s when you just start seeing on all these reports the words victor boot those kids wielding machetes and single-shot shotguns archaic forms of weapons and they didn't turn into genuine killing machines until victor boot provided that ingredient to the witch's brew that resulted in not thousands not tens of thousands but hundreds of thousands of innocent people i mean being caught up in armageddon so who is victor boot he's born in tajikistan in 1967 a mountainous outpost of the soviet empire bordering afghanistan wanting to see the world he joins the soviet air force in the late 80s at the height of the cold war ready to go into battle against the united states at any moment a powerful career in the military awaits him but in 1989 the berlin wall comes down it's the beginning of the end for the soviet empire with the cold war over the soldiers from the former soviet military find themselves with no purpose and nowhere to go victor boot is among them there weren't enough jobs for these soviets soldiers and airmen they were all told look you're demobbed that's it go and fend for yourselves now they were thrown onto their wits i mean some of them were eating rats and living under plastic sheets in moscow that winter worried that these angry soldiers might revolt the government opens the doors to thousands of surplus weapons stashed all over the country everything that wasn't nailed down everything that could be called surplus even if it wasn't suddenly everything went it was like the the biggest fire sale you've ever seen what was available to sell was a stockpile of arms several times bigger than the entire western stockpile i mean there are still silos now in the ukraine that have been plundered day after day and they still haven't got to the end of those piles of guns and grenades and armaments this brave new capitalist world presents victor boot with a golden opportunity to get rich in 1992 at the age of 25 he invests in three cargo planes and starts his own international air freight business [Music] he starts selling anything he can make a profit from flowers electronics and other items are shipped around the world what he is he's kind of he's honest vic the trader the guy that you can go to if you've got a problem and he'll sort you out best prices but boots prior military connections add a new and deadly category to his inventory eventually opportunity presented itself to him to begin trafficking weapons that quickly figured out he was very good at military experience connections in the russian military and so it sort of blossomed from there those looking to buy arms include african rebel groups who snap up crates of weapons with money from the sale of drugs or blood diamonds and boot it's claimed is a willing salesman he is a chancellor he's enthusiastic about doing business and doing the deal to the point where that blinds him to the consequences of the deal that he's doing boot is oblivious to the rape and genocide that his trade is causing and this makes him a fortune victor fleet was everywhere in africa the sky was black with his planes you could look up every hour of every day in places like angola and you could just see them coming and going it was huge [Music] soon boot isn't just allegedly supplying conflicts in africa he expands his business with bases in europe and the middle east his empire is growing by 2000 demand for his cargo reportedly makes boot richer than many fortune 500 companies he employs over 300 staff and has almost 30 aircraft at his command this former soviet soldier is said to be the biggest private arms trafficker in the world the guy wasn't making tens of millions he was making hundreds of millions if not billions but it's all money made on the misery of others and that's the sad part of it wars are won and lost depending on which side boot sells arms to [Music] the gruesome impact of weapons proliferation in the soaring body counts across africa is witnessed by un weapons investigators what u.
n inspectors want is a high-profile champion to drag victor boot out of the shadows and to expose his activities to the world peter hayne is a foreign minister in england but had also grown up in south africa he cares passionately about the carnage the influx of arms is causing to his fellow africans i was very concerned at how african countries were being destroyed by these conflicts for me this was a moral cause as well as a cause about international stability [Music] payne has seen the un reports on boot [Music] i was really frustrated that nothing was being done with this information we knew where booth was flying and the results of that the carnage and destruction and terror that resulted from their activities and yet they were doing nothing about it hayne wants to tell the world about boots activities but he could be sued for libel if boot fails to be convicted there is a loophole hang could name boot in the houses of parliament where the laws of libel don't apply when i first proposed the idea to my officials and to the secret services that i wanted to output and i wanted to use parliamentary privilege to do so they were worried that it might compromise our intelligence sources and i as a minister did not want to compromise any intelligence sources hane wants to out boot but what he is proposing is groundbreaking [Music] no minister had ever named international criminals like this under the privilege of parliament so it was quite a big thing and it took an argument within the foreign office and with the sacred services to agree to that hane wins his argument and the name victor boot becomes forever associated with a perfectly apt phrase [Music] countless lives are being lost and mutilations are taking place victor boot is indeed the chief sanctions buster at this time and is a real merchant of death [Music] the impact of haines speech naming boot as a merchant of death is immediate it increased boots profile to alert many people who might not have thought about it to the sorts of weapons trading that was going on particularly in africa and to the devastation that it was wreaking interpol the international criminal police organization are put on high alert american and european spies compiled dossiers on victor boot on february the 18th 2002 interpol issues an international warrant for his arrest for suspected illegal arms trafficking they know where he's hiding in his moscow lair but there's a problem the russians refused to hand him over russians claimed they had absolutely no knowledge of his whereabouts and as they issued that statement boot was at the time giving an interview in moscow on a public radio station and boot uses this interview and others to protest his innocence he strongly denies his business is involved in arms trafficking boot claims he is being hounded just for being a successful russian businessman the international hunt for victor boot has reached a standoff while he's on russian soil he is untouchable then a week later promising intel comes from the former soviet republic of moldova home to one of victor boots air bases spies there report that boot is leaving moldova for a country where interpol can arrest him [Music] the authorities had received a tip-off that victor would be on a hot flight to greece and he would be there and they could stop him british special forces waited athens airport for his arrival back at the moldovan airport british intelligence field agents send an encrypted message [Music] boot is definitely on the plane soon after that message is received the plane veers off course it was very very odd that his plane suddenly changed its route the jet disappears from view there was no explanation for it other than he must have got a message on board the plane to say there's going to be a reception party for you but after 90 minutes the plane suddenly reappears on its flight path to athens and the plane landed they were waiting we've got you now he wasn't on the plane before [Music] it became clear i guess at that point that they were chasing somebody who was all-powerful and who was this fox and always had the drop no one in interpol has a clue exactly how he escaped but the suspicion is that the so-called merchant of death has friends in high places in the u. s military in 2004 after the iraq war the uk military were desperately short of aircraft to ship supplies to begin reconstruction conveniently victor boot's fleet was available and willing someone like victor someone who has a any sort of air traffic capability would have been hired someone who's got a robust air traffic compatibility like victor or companies associated with him uh would have definitely been hired those names were entered into the database several of them came up as being companies that had just been listed they're sanctioned by the treasury department [Music] there was this irony well at one point victor boot was actually supplying international allied forces in afghanistan his planes were supplying them with legitimate uh materials and goods for some reason so he was actually being engaged by the very international forces including the united states of america that were apparently tracking him down i think given that sort of environment it's unsurprising that someone like victor boot would feel in some ways that he was untouchable meanwhile back in sub-saharan africa it's been nine years since victor boot has appeared on the radar of weapons investigators there are now rumors that boot is delivering weapons in the same planes carrying aid for war-torn countries fed up with official inertia some officials decide it's time to stand up to boot you cannot be in a situation like that and not want to go up to them and say how dare you you know you're not going to do this i'm not going to let you do this un soldiers are deployed on an airstrip known to be used by boots planes and when the russian pilots arrive snap inspections of every plane are ordered over 48 hours boots jets are grounded even in the face of aggressive russian pilots it is fantastically ballsy and it took huge clarity of vision to do that all of these non-governmental investigators who began taking a look at victor and began putting together these un reports that in some ways were sort of the beginning of the end for him and that they put a real crunch on his grandpa on his business uncovered are assumed payments for weapons suspected illegally mined tin ore and coal tan a valuable component in cell phones and laptops but this brave stand is just a drop in the ocean the operation only reportedly delays 26 planes many that are suspected to belong to boot the rest of his vast fleet continues to deliver their cargo not just to africa in the middle east but reportedly now south america one man in the u. s government has been watching with increasing frustration as boot continues to evade justice a white house advisor to president george w bush on counter-terror strategy juan zarate juan is a an american success story you know born and raised in uh in los angeles a fluent spanish speaker graduates from harvard with honors juan is uh the proverbial nicest guy you'd ever want to meet but he is a wicked smart intelligent guy zarate decides it's time to bring in the big guns the dea with most armed deals now funded by profits from the sale of illegal drugs the dea have become the go-to agency to stop arms dealers and terrorists the dea had run headlong into designated terrorist organizations involved in the global drug trade within two to three years after 9 11 the landscape began to change significantly we began to witness a significant decline in state sponsorship for terrorism designated foreign terrorist organizations more and more of them began to turn to the global drug trade and other forms of transnational organized crime to keep themselves afloat zarate lays it out to braun and his team victor boot has to be stopped once it became clear that the dea had a remit to do whatever they could to stop people who were part of the terrorist threat to the u.
s suddenly the dea has got authority to do all sorts of interesting things the team accepts the challenge and immediately begins brainstorming a takedown plan how the heck were you going to convince this guy who knew he was under watch who knew that if he left russia he was going to be in trouble how are you going to convince him to leave the country and go to another country that the u. s has an extradition treaty with they give their mission a code name operation relentless you talk about operational complexity and trying to break into those kinds of investigations and really making headway that you know they're very very difficult they don't have a moment to lose every day that passes is another day that boots global business is allowed to continue they were supremely confident that they could bring victor boot to justice running the day-to-day strategic operations of the agency is special agent louis milioni he is a phenomenal criminal investigator these guys are routinely involved in the creme de la creme of criminal investigations milioni figures there's only one way to get boot behind bars for good the investigative scheme was get him out of russia get him on soil of a third country that would agree to extradite him to the the united states to do that they're going to need to set a trap so irresistible that boot walks himself straight into it fortunately for law enforcement the bad guys are motivated and driven by one thing greed the agents calculate it will take a 20 million deal on the table to get the arms dealer's attention but what do they need first for this elaborate sting is a good cover [Music] a terror group that boot won't suspect and they settle on the revolutionary armed forces of colombia also known as [ __ ] these paramilitary guerrillas have been engaged in a fierce battle with american pilots and agents fighting the war on drugs in colombia fueling the brutal violence are large shipments of illegal weapons bought from arms dealers with drug money what would appeal to a guy like victor boot no doubt he was familiar with the revolutionary armed forces of colombia no doubt he knew that the farc possessed a genuine hatred for the united states and i think in many ways that's important because victor boot also had a real hatred for the united states and what we stood for pretending to be farc operatives strikes the dea team as a perfect ruse but the plan will require highly dangerous undercover work by dea agents and their informants it's like a chess game on steroids you can't say the wrong word you can't say the wrong things you better have your your story down if things get aggressive you better be prepared to defend yourself the agency has just the man to handle the intense heat of this mission an operative called carlos carlos had been in the guatemalan military had been arrested by the dea some years ago for trafficking cocaine in the united states he had then flipped while in prison and had begun working on more than 150 undercover cases with the dea carlos knows the risks but agrees to play his part in taking down the merchant of death now all they need is a way to get carlos to victor boot i believe the agency realized that we weren't going to be able to connect with him directly so we had to find someone in the middle that had a trusted past relationship with him that we could reach out to and provide a requirement that victor boot would be interested in phillips and they find someone who fits that bill perfectly a south african businessman called ten years earlier he'd been boots partner on south african weapons deals they had not seen each other in a while they had recently struck up some some casual conversation the dea learn that simulian is likely to be eager to do the deal since he's been having big money problems when he was approached by the dea he was working in the front office i think of a hypodermic needle factory in tanzania i mean the guy was really down on his luck he was the mark if you like and victor boot was the prize having identified the weak link to hook boot the dea team sets their plan in motion carlos will pose as a farc operative and offer simulian a hefty commission on the multi-million dollar deal to buy weapons from boot we had our sources that were able to send him an email we had an arms list prepared ready to be presented that needed to be filled smoothly and took the bait the tropical island paradise of curacao is bustling with tourists it's the perfect spot for carlos to meet with simulian began talking about what these south americans wanted they said they needed a lot of weapons to be able to shoot down american pilots and to help the farc's cause and i believe it was smoolie and said something like oh yeah my russian friend hates gringos carlos details the deadly arsenal he's looking to buy hundreds of very sophisticated igla surface-to-air shoulder-fired rockets ak-47s by the thousands all of the ammunition that's needed for those i mean it was a laundry list of arms smooling basically said it's too big for me to fill i'm not going to be able to fulfill this but i've got someone who most definitely can simulian will make half a million dollars if he can convince his old business partner boot to do the deal simulian travels to moscow to meet his old friend victor picks him up at the airport they go to victor's house and in the house uh smoolie tells victor this is what we've been proposed and tells them who's interested straight away boot picks up the phone to an arm supplier victor calls right then with smolin in the room and asks him if he can help get some igloos the word in russian for igla is uh it means needle victor said yeah we need a hundred sewing devices using their code and that was it that was the beginning of the uh that was the beginning of the deal eight days after the curacao meeting carlos and simulian are to meet again the dea explore every location they can to try and find a perfect setting for the meeting all these country-to-country relationships and the extent of police cooperation they differ place to place the dea settle on an ideal country in europe romania the romanian law enforcement counterparts second to none top notch worked very closely with dea carlos proposes romania's capital bucharest as the meeting place simulian agrees and tells carlos that this time they'll have company victor boot himself he's taken the hook and will join the meeting the dea have the hotel rigged and are ready to make the bust the d. a knew that the romanians would let them tap phones and so that was part of the reason why they chose to go to romania there was a positive relationship with the romanians and the americans this is it the dea will finally get their chance to take down the merchant of death unless he slips from their grasp yet again 24 hours later there's still no sign of the merchant of death simulian tells carlos that victor is having second thoughts about travelling [Music] victor's very aware that he's being watched he can't go to certain countries he he doesn't really want to leave russia at all frankly but undercover dea operative carlos demands that boot shows up it's not unusual for the client to insist that they meet with the main guy they have a lot of money at stake they're taking an enormous amount of risk inside the hotel dea special agent milioni must make a critical decision should they stay or should they go if these guys were real if they were real weapons buyers for the farc it'd be busy people they wouldn't be sitting in romania killing time waiting for victor boot to get his stuff together after 10 days milioni tells carlos to call simulian with a few choice words we can't wait around all day we're going home you've got to know when to call the deal you got to know know when to fold and walk away from it and that's exactly what lou and his team did but it's a huge gamble million has no idea whether he's lost his prey for good or saved his mission has the operation been compromised has our cover been blown and we were asking those questions when it happened then back on u.
s soil a week later millionaire gets a call from carlos samulian has just told him why boot never showed up what was learned was that the last time he had been in romania he had used a fictitious travel document it was either a passport and or visa he was turned away by their immigration officials and he simply didn't want to make that mistake again and there's more good news boot still wants to meet but somewhere else where he feels safer traveling to their cover hasn't been blown the deal is back on all melioni needs is a country that has an extradition treaty with the us and a police force ready to assist the dea and he knows just the place dea has a strong presence in thailand worked very very very closely with the thai national police and their injustice ministry the ties have never let down dea [Music] boot may know that thailand has an extradition treaty with the us but then so do many countries where he does business but thailand is also ideal for boot far away and familiar there was information that the d. a had that victor had spent time in thailand before and felt comfortable there so everyone felt comfortable in thailand fourteen days after the failed romanian sting carlos reaches out to simulian and boot can they meet in a hotel in bangkok thailand victor said sure i'll see you there in a few days the dea team raced to bangkok surveillance has to be in place before boot arrives his travel through bangkok needs to be monitored throughout the city the the thai national uh police provided all of the you know the mobile surveillance on the street that were following targets to and from airports as they moved around metropolitan areas in taxis this is tough work it's hard work and every bit of it has to be coordinated choreographed because you just can't make any mistakes or it's all over with and people can die with everything in place undercover interpol agents in moscow send word that boot is leaving the city but has always traveled alone to avoid drawing attention to himself and this time is no different you imagine a boss flanked by all these bodyguards and protecting him and you know here's victor kind of traveling you know by himself a red-eye from you know it just it seemed like such an ordinary situation except for the stakes from head of special operations mike braun in washington to special agents in bangkok the dea team waits anxiously as boots plane flies southeast to thailand it's a non-stop flight from moscow to bangkok will boots plane make an unexpected diversion again [Music] after nine hours mike braun gets a call boot actually stepped off the aircraft cleared customs boot is on route to the hotel if he spots anything suspicious on the way boot might slink off into the city he knows well and vanish for good fifteen thousand kilometers from their comfort zone and dependent on local police this is the dea's last chance to corner the so-called merchant of death on the route from the airport to the city boots every move is under constant surveillance by the dea and thai police from the time that victor lands at the airport the d. a has to make sure that he gets to the hotel they had informed him set up in toll booths along the way making sure that victor's car was moving once he gets to the hotel boot is met by middleman simulian and the dea's undercover operative known as carlos who's posing as a member of farc a colombian terrorist group boot is led into a conference room rigged with hidden cameras you see a man walking into a situation that is telling him in so many ways not to go in there are so many danger signals there in pursuit of a quick profit boot has traveled to a country that has close ties with the us he hasn't discovered carlos is an undercover operative and he hasn't arranged his own location for the meeting it was a victor boot convinced of his own business immortality convinced that let me deal with this i'll go there on my own because i'm victor boot i'm the personal brand they want to deal with me not an underling there's no salesman like me that kind of arrogance is what did for victor boot it was ego in a nearby room dea agents and thai police look for a signal a coded call from carlos to move in nine thousand miles away in washington mike braun waits for news of the mission [Music] but before carlos makes the call he needs boot to admit that he's supplying weapons to farc knowing they'll be used to kill americans in colombia this admission is critical to ensuring boots conviction if he's willing to sell arms to kill americans then under u.
s law that makes him a terrorist victor takes out a piece of paper at one point and says you know let's make up a list of the things you need and they start going off and you know and carlos is asking for missiles and victor's kind of saying well what else what else can i what else do you need carlos picks this moment to make his play he reminds boot that the arms will be used to take out helicopters flown by u. s pilots dude clearly understood that park's hatred for the united states long-standing and that was a natural part of the discussion with that admission on the record it's time for carlos to make the call [Music] [Music] [Music] the door gets kicked open and income tied police even as he's held at gunpoint boot makes what looks to be a threatening move has got his hands in his briefcase and the thai national police ordered him to remove his hands if he doesn't do what they say he will be shot on site fortunately for mr boot he complied with her orders and he slowly removed his hands from the briefcase [Music] victor and smolian are arrested and carlos steps away the merchant of death is in custody braun gets the first call they gave me a quick synopsis of what had happened and uh i told them they had done a great job and i was proud of them and braun shares the news with juan zarate at the nsc who never expected the dea to come good on their promise so quickly and contacted juan he was amazed that it had only taken about probably six or seven months to do what other countries and agencies and departments had had not been able to do brute is imprisoned in a thai jail but his extradition to the u. s is delayed [Music] the russian government objects to one of its citizens being arrested in this way the russian government applied tremendous pressure to have the thai government turn boot over to them for justice and in thailand a major tug of war begins between the us and russia kept seeming like it would go one way and then the other i mean at some point you know the the thai authorities said no absolutely he'll go back to russia and then america protested and okay we'll think again and for thailand this was a very very uncomfortable situation because they knew they were going to alienate one of one of two great powers so it was horrible for them and it rumbled on and on with objections and objections and time and again even the americans thought they got him out you know they had they had planes idling on runways repeatedly just in anticipation of i think it's going to be today oh no it's not today and it went on and on the russian government fight tooth and nail to try and get boot back on russian soil he is held in a thai prison while the courts decide but after two years the us finally wins the extradition battle and boot is flown to new york to face trial but on the 2nd of november 2011 victor boot is found guilty of all four charges against him including conspiring to kill us citizens and providing material support to a terrorist organization who denies that he has been involved in any criminal activity claiming that he was never an arms dealer that any weapons his companies supplied were legitimate and not in breach of sanctions or international law he is sentenced to 25 years in a federal prison with no possibility of parole boot is currently incarcerated at the u.
