Arms and the Dudes

The page-turning, inside account of how three kids from Florida became bigtime weapons traders—and how the US government turned on them.
In January of 2007, three young stoners from Miami Beach won a $300 million
Department of Defense contract to supply ammunition to the Afghanistan
military. Incredibly, instead of fulfilling the order with high-quality arms, Efraim
Diveroli, David Packouz, and Alex Podrizki—the dudes—bought cheap Communist style surplus ammunition from Balkan gunrunners. The dudes then secretly
repackaged millions of rounds of shoddy Chinese ammunition and shipped it to
Kabul—until they were caught by Pentagon investigators and the scandal turned
up on the front page of The New York Times.
That’s the “official” story. The truth is far more explosive. For the first time,
journalist Guy Lawson tells the thrilling true tale. It’s a trip that goes from a dive
apartment in Miami Beach to mountain caves in Albania, the corridors of power in
Washington, and the frontlines of Iraq and Afghanistan. Lawson’s account
includes a shady Swiss gunrunner, Russian arms dealers, corrupt Albanian
gangsters, and a Pentagon investigation that impeded America’s war efforts in
Afghanistan. Lawson exposes the mysterious and murky world of global arms
dealing, showing how the American military came to use private contractors like
Diveroli, Packouz, and Podrizki as middlemen to secure weapons from illegal arms
dealers—the same men who sell guns to dictators, warlords, and drug traffickers.
This is a story you were never meant to read.
"Lawson's eye for detail and research are commendable … details the backroom
machinations, corruption, red tape, and intrigue that go along with high-stakes
arms deals."—Publishers Weekly