Craig Jones: Jiu Jitsu, $2 Million Prize, CJI, ADCC, Ukraine & Trolling | Lex Fridman Podcast #439

So I like to to match looks from time to time in an homage.

You look sexy. How many legs did you break in Eastern Europe?

3 or 4.

To send a message or just for your own personal enjoyment.

If she wins, I'll personally give her a million dollars if I can foot lock her. We're going to collaborate together in an only fans sex tape.

Did she agree to this?

She shook on it.

You do have an only fans channel.

Is that still up after August 17th? It's gonna be fire.

It's gonna be on fire.

Honestly, when we talk about secret investor, I think that could fund the entire tournament.

I missed all that.

What gives you hope that you can still make fun of anything as long as it's funny?

The following is a conversation with Craig Jones, martial artist, world traveler and and one of the funniest people in the sport of submission grappling. While he does make fun of himself a lot, he is legitimately one of the greatest submission grapplers in the world. And underneath the veil of non stop sexualized Aussie humor and incessant online trolling, he is truly a kind hearted human being who's trying to do good in the world. Sometimes he does so through a bit of controversy and chaos, like with the new CGI tournament that has over $2 million in prize money and it's coming up this Friday and Saturday. Yes, the same weekend as the prestigious ADCC tournament. The goal of CGI tournament is to grow the sport so you'll be able to watch it for free online, live on YouTube and other places. All ticket profits go to charity, mainly to cancer research. So I encourage you to support the mission of this tournament by buying tickets and going to see the event in person. Craig gave me a special link that gives you a 50% discount on the tickets. Go to lexfreedman.com CJI and it should forward you to the right place. They're trying to sell the last few tickets now. It's a good cause. Go buy some. And also let me say, as a fan of the sport, I highly encourage you to watch both CGI and ADCC and to celebrate athletes competing in both. From CGI with Nikki Ryan, Nikki Rod Rotola Brothers, Phion Davis, Mackenzie Dern and more. To ADCC with Gordon Ryan, Nicholas Margali, Giancarlo Bodoni, Rafael Lovato Jr, Mika Galvao and more. I have a lot of respect for everyone involved. I train with many of them regularly and consider many of them friends, including Craig, Gordon and of course John Donahar, who I will talk to many, many More times on this podcast. This is the Lex Friedman podcast to support it. Please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, I invite you all to come to the pool with Craig Jones and me. When you brought the $1 million in cash on Rogan's podcast, did you have security with you?

We had security, but only by Joe Rogan's request because he said, you're really going to bring it?

Yeah.

Do you have security? I said, no. He's like, don't worry about it. I'll send my security.

So you were going to do it with our security?

Yeah, we're going to wing. I thought. I mean, I was told not to tell anyone.

Yeah.

But I sent pictures of it to everyone I know. Yeah, that was probably a security risk.

Yeah. So it's just you in a car with a bag of cash.

Yeah, it was a company that sponsors me, shuffle.com. it was their friend. A friend of theirs. So a guy that's never met me before.

Yeah.

Just took the risk to show up to a stranger's house with a million dollars in cash to bring to Joe Rogan. It was a big risk of him.

And he just put it in the car and drove it.

Drove it over there. Yeah.

Yeah. With no security. Except Joe.

Except Joe.

That's common sense.

And then Joe said he'd never seen a million dollars before.

Yeah.

But I don't know if I believe him.

That's what everyone says. That's what Pablo Escobar probably says. Also. What's your relationship with risk, especially with the risk of death?

I would say I'm very risk averse.

You are. No, you're not. That's a lie.

My relationship with risk, I like a bit of excitement. I like a bit of adventure. I'm more about the adventure, but I will not let the risk get in the way of. And also, obviously, just got back from Ukraine. I'm happy to take a few risks if it's part of what the locals want me to do. You know what I mean? Like in Kazakhstan, we did some things that were dangerous. Like if the locals are like, come along, join in on this activity, I feel personally obligated to go with them.

So it's not about the risk. Like, you're not attracted to risk. You're attracted to adventure. And the risk is a thing you don't give a damn about.

Yeah.

If it comes along with it.

Sometimes the best adventures involve the most risk, unfortunately.

Speaking of which, you went to Ukraine, like you said, twice recently.

Twice. Really pushed the limit there, including to the front. To the front.

Tell me the, the full story of that from the beginning. How did you end up in Ukraine?

So we're in Kazakhstan. We're doing some filming in Kazakhstan and obviously Borats do a very traumatic memory for them. And some of my jokes felt like they don't go as well in that neck of the woods. So we had some difficulty filming out there. So we filmed this horse game. Have you ever heard of kokba?

Thanks to you, yes.

It's a game, a very, very old game. They cut a, a goat or a sheep. I didn't get too close to look at it, but they cut its head and legs off and they use it as some form of bull. And then they'll have like up to a thousand guys on horses violently trying to pick this up and drop it in the other end's goals. Basically, the goals used to be concrete. Now it's just the top. But local business owners will throw down huge amounts of money for the winners. And these horses have been trained from a very young age. The riders have been trained. I've never ridden a horse before. We wanted to film something that made it look like I was going to go into the horse pit, into the cockbar pit. However, the drunk stuntman that we used just decided that when he took my horse reins, he would take me straight into the pit instead of ending the shot there. So I was in there amongst, I guess, the horse riders, the cockbar riders. And we weren't leaving. We just were in there for quite a while. And he was just. He could talk a little. He could talk English pretty well, actually. And he's like, oh, I thought you'd want to check it out from the inside. And then while we're in there, someone picked up the sort of carcass and a wave of horse riders came at me. I was quite concerned at that point because they're bashing into each other and obviously they're angry they're seeing a foreigner in there. I was wearing like basically Biggie Smalls Coogee Gekku looking sweater. So I stood out. They definitely didn't like that I was participating in a game that they probably trained their whole life for. And that amount of money they could win is very, very significant. And there's me in there. They're also pointing out Borat, Borat thinking I was making Borat jokes, which again, very traumatic memory for the people at Kazakhstan.

Were you making Borat jokes?

No, but I guess it's the same type of humor. But sure. Just I Guess I'm not pretending to be Kazakh. I'm just there being an idiot and enjoying the local culture. But we're over there in Kazakhstan. We did that. That was obviously a bit risky.

Did they learn to love you?

I think they learned to love me and then to hate me again. So it was like a bit of a all encompassing relationship for the Kazakh people. But we, we basically abandoned ship. It was proven too difficult to film some things, some sensitive subjects over there. And I said, where should we go next? And I just looked at the map and I was like, we're near Ukraine. Ukraine was a place that I'd been offered to teach a Jiu Jitsu seminar prior to, I guess the war commencing, the full scale war commencing. And we're looking for a bit of adventure, something interesting to film. So following the news, obviously very controversial in the news, people have very strong opinions. And I was like, let's go over there, let's throw a charity event. Let's do something. Let's train with the people and really experience for ourselves. So we set up the seminar. Turned out to be the biggest seminar for Jiu Jitsu in Ukraine history, which is wild considering obviously they are at war. But everyone came together to support it. And one of the soldiers there, one of my friends there, good friend now who's on the front line, he made a comment on there and he said, hey, like, this is a seminar to donate profits to the soldiers, but we're on the front line. And I was like, you know what? I'll come to you. And he's like, listen, I can't promise you'll survive, but I'll promise you have a good time. And I said, that's all I needed to hear. So we connected. And my friend Roman, we went really, really close. I think we were at the closest point, 7km from the front line. Obviously very surreal experience to be over there seeing basically how the battle's fought with all drones.

How long ago was this?

I think it would have been March or April. So we went there, we went, basically spent two nights up on the front line, went back to Kiev and that was it for that trip. In terms of crazy stuff that happened, obviously just the people living, like you download the air defense tracker. So at any time there could be an air siren going off, an air alert on your phone could be like drones heading your way, planes are in the air, missiles flying, and then those missiles will change direction and stuff. So the air alert, you don't know if it's heading a different direction, but they Just sort of warn everyone. So you live under a constant state of fear, basically. And then on that first trip, the heaviest moment was I was going downstairs in the hotel to work out, which is honestly a rare thing these days, doing something healthy with myself. You're working out, getting in the gym, pumping some iron. And this was divine intervention that a hypersonic missile was shot down by the patriot defense system just like five minutes from the hotel. So the whole hotel and the attached gym just shook like crazy. And people started. Some people started freaking out. Most people went to leave to go outside, which I don't think is recommended, but you want to see what's going on out there.

This was in Kiev.

This was in Kiev. So it got shot down. And then some of the local troops actually took me to the site of where just part of the missile had landed in the ground and left this huge sort of indentation that already cleared up most of the, I guess, shrapnel from the missile. I don't know if I should or if I was legally allowed to do this, but I took some of that missile back home with me. I don't know where I left it, actually, but I thought maybe that would raise some alarm bells and airport scans. But I took. I took it regardless. And that was basically the crazy thing that happened on that first trip.

The patriot defense system is. Is incredible. It's an incredible piece of technology that's from the United States. It's expensive, but it's incredible. And then. So that's protecting Kiev.

That's protecting Kiev. Yeah. That was at the time where us hadn't voted to, I guess, keep funding the weapons over there. So it was kind of a tense moment because I think. I don't know, everyone was thinking, like, when do those air defense missiles run out? So that was a heavy moment for me, thinking, look at what it shot out the sky. Like, imagine if that didn't. They didn't have that. But we. Yeah, that. That was probably the most surreal moment. But, Keith, largely, life goes on most of the time as per normal. I was faced with crazy messages and comments, even just posting that video, like I'm getting paid by Ukraine and stuff. And it's just like, people just don't understand that, like, life has to go on. Like Keeves here. The front line's far away. Like, the cities have to largely try to operate as normal or just life. Life will not go on in those villages and cities.

Well, it's human nature as well. It's not just Kyiv. It's Kharkiv it's even Donbass Kherson. People get accustomed to war quickly because it's impossible to suffer for prolonged periods of time. So you get adjust. You adjust and you appreciate the things you still have.

Yeah, some bowler moves out there. I love seeing, like, people that just crazy stuff's going on from the war and they don't even react to it. They don't go to the bomb shelter. It's like a baller move. Like, I'm not going to change my lifestyle actually on that first trip as well. Something else that I probably shouldn't have been allowed to do was go to Chernobyl. Yeah. So Chernobyl, I believe troops came through Belarus and there was some fighting going on in Chernobyl. I think the whole world got concerned at that point if any sort of radiation leaked. But Chernobyl as it stands, the troops back down and it's completely covered in mines. Very, very difficult to go to. Go to Chanel, basically, as a tourist or as like a. I guess an idiot like myself should really probably not be allowed in a place like that. But we were able to get there. We passed like four security checkpoints. It took two attempts. First time we tried to go in there was with the special forces guy. We cleared two security gates, then they stopped us and basically threatened us with arrest. I. I rightfully so really have no business going to Chernobyl. We made a connection. I won't say this connection was. But he had heard about what I had done, sort of with a charity event and opened some doors for us to be able to go to Chernobyl. So we got to see Chernobyl. We had some filming restrictions there just because it was a crazy military sort of conflict at one point. And we got to actually see Shinobi. Shinobi always been a dream of mine to see because it's just such an interesting place and to see it under these conditions. Very, very strange.

Yeah. What was that like? So there's no civilians there now.

It's just completely empty. I guess it's kind of like the fantasy you have. I imagine people go on tours of Chernobyl back in the tourist days when it was a tourist spot and it would be busy, full of tourists. We got basically a private tour. So we got to really feel that abandoned sort of vibes. I guess I was interested in it from blank. Call of Duty and then. Right. Chernobyl series, all the documentaries and stuff. But very, very strange place to go visit.

And it is now a minefield, like a lot of parts of Ukraine. That's one of the dark, terrifying aspects of war, is how many mines are left even when the war ends, for decades after, there's mines everywhere because demining is extremely difficult and that, that could continually kill people.

I don't think it'll be a tourist spot for a very long time because if you were thinking about areas to demi on when the conflict ends, an area where if you accidentally trigger a mine could cause a radiation leak, it's probably going to be very low on the list. So tourism for Chernobyl, who knows how long until that returns?

Why do you think you were able to. To get to Chernobyl is there? Why, why don't you think Ukrainian people, the Ukrainian soldiers don't see you as a threat?

Maybe they were hoping I did step on a mine. Maybe my jokes didn't go too well there.

So your connection was actually Putin, he was trying to get rid of you.

Yeah. Now, I don't know. I mean, we felt pretty safe when we're there. There was an air alert went off. They were kind of more concerned with me dying just for the PR side of things. It's like Australian tourists.

In one of your videos, I actually, you know, heard Ukrainian language. They're talking about, we don't, we don't want to lose an athlete. That's what they're saying as you're loading the. The rocket launcher.

Oh, yeah, the rocket launcher. I shot a rocket launcher with the troops on the first trip. But the second trip I went back to, which was only maybe four to five weeks ago.

Yeah.

This time we went to some crazier spots. So we went to Odessa, which has been hit a ton.

I really enjoyed the video of old man stretching and like exercising on the.

Yeah, what is that? Local, Local custom?

Well, Odessa people are known historically to be wild.

That was wild. It was abrasive to the eyes, but I appreciated it. Especially a middle aged man in underwear with a beer belly doing a Sundance at dusk. That would frighten many people.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The battleship would turn around. Yeah.

So where else we went? Yeah. So we went Odessa. We briefly went back to Kyiv. We. So I made a connection with the police chief of basically the entire country last time. And he had said to me that if I wanted to go somewhere sort of really heavy in terms of action, we could go to curse on. And he's like, I'll personally escort you to curse on.

Yeah.

And I was just like, well, here we have an invitation for adventure. I think it's a great idea to go and I thought, you know what, I'll completely lie to my cameraman and tell him it's a safe trip to go on so that he can pass that information on to his fiance.

Yeah.

And she won't have any concerns.

Yes.

So we basically take this huge journey all the way down to Kon. We switch at a city outside. I can't remember the name, but we had to switch to sort of armored vehicles. And I remember the guy that picked this up there said, hey, give me a phone number for someone to call to recover your bodies.

Yeah.

And he said that in a joking way, but I think it was serious. But I said, just leave it. You know, I'm not. I don't think they need it. I don't think we much left probably if we get hit over there. But we go basically into Kherson. I think Kherson's population used to be like 250,000. Now it's like basically all military down to 50,000. So we went into the police, basically stationed in the bunker underneath. The top of the building was destroyed. And then one of the local guys just took us on a city tour, which again, we had some filming restrictions because obviously anytime something's hit, I guess the other side wants to be able to see what damage has been done. So if you take any footage of recently destroyed buildings, that's going to help them recalibrate and target the next shot. So curse on being so heavily hit. It's basically within range of every single thing. Russia has every form of weapon, drones. Before we took the tour, he put some drone blocking things on top of the car, which didn't look reassuring. He also took a helmet out the back of the car, which I thought he was going to give to me, but he just threw it in the back of the pickup truck and said, oh, you won't need this, you'll be dead anyway. And I was like, ah, I've made a great life decision with this little Curson tour. But then we took a tour of the city and Curson used to be kind of like a beautiful beach city by the Dnipro River. But basically it's just the river that separates River Russia from, well, the, I guess the Russian land they've, they've taken from Kherson. So Kurzon split across that river and there's just Russians on the other side of the river and Ukrainians on this side. So very, very dangerous spot. Kharkiv makes a lot of press because of the long range missiles that hit. But Kherson's Just being hit all the time. So we took this tour. We went along the river. We went to within 1 km, the front line. So that was the closest we got after this point. We heard artillery strike. And because you're in an armored vehicle, it sounds further away than it is. Obviously, the sound doesn't get in. So I thought it sounded far away. We could see some smoke that actually appeared close in the distance. The guy driving us took us to a point where a large building was blocking us from, I guess the angle at which the missile, what it came from. And I thought, well, I thought everything was cool. Thought it was. That must have been off in the distance. And then we heard two more strikes hit very, very close. They sounded really loud. And then I think he's radio in to see if everything's safe, if we can leave this point. And then we basically raced back. But we kind. I started to realize we were in danger at any point where he really sped the car up or sort of took sort of evasive movements in the car. But we got out of there, and I think I had someone translate it later. And basically, yeah, he was checking to see if the roads were clear for us to leave. Ultimately, it ended up being someone died and a few people injured from that blast, which was less than half a kilometer from us. And basically they were ratings radioing saying, end the tour, come back to the police station.

Artillery is terrifying because there's just shelling and it's. The destructive power of artillery is insane.

Yeah. And it's constant all the time. Yeah. And you hear that noise and you're like, is that coming or going? Very, very concerning. Right. You don't know. Yeah, I don't know.

And just like that, it could be you gone.

Last time, the village we went to, basically it was the day we left, so we stayed there overnight. The day we left, it just started getting extremely shelled. And the soldier we're with just took a selfie video of us. And basically the location we were in, just hearing just artillery strike after artillery strike, just being like, oh, you guys left, and the fun began. So they. They take it in good spirit. I was trying to use their energy to reassure myself, but I guess when they see it every day, it's. They're kind of more adjusted to it. They're not like, they're not freaking out every time something crazy like that goes on.

Well, they have to, right? Yeah, they have to be in good spirit. You have to be joking and laughing and.

Yeah, the guys are always laughing and joking. They were Laughing and joking at me quite a bit, holding weapons, trying to shoot weapons and stuff. They got a lot of enjoyment out of me shooting the rpg.

Yeah, they're. They're probably still telling stories. That crazy Australian American that rolled in, they helped.

They helped me out, though. In my marketing campaign for the tournament. We're able to secure a Lada Classic Soviet Union car. We towed it, we painted it with the logos of the other event, the ADCC.

Yeah.

And we got to shoot some RPGs at it.

Yeah.

Great experience, Great fun.

Yeah, it's a very creative marketing campaign.

Very dangerous one.

I don't think, like Coco Pepsi are going to do that one. So it's very, very innovative.

It was a bold move. Luckily they let me get away with posting it. But when we were there, it was at a. Basically at a shooting range. And we cleared them out for a while. So we'd blown up the car, we'd set it on fire. We'd done all this sort of stuff. I remember we tr. We were trying to blow it up. It wasn't quite hitting. One of the missiles was lodged in under the car. So it's kind of risky. That could have gone off at any moment. But we needed to get it to ignite. We needed to get a shot where it was on fire. The logo of the enemy tournament was basically on fire. So we poured gasoline on it. We shot the gasoline tank. That didn't work. That must be a movie trick or something. And then we decided we had light on fire a rag and just throw it, the blowing out back window. So I'm with this guy, special forces guy, and we throw the rag in.

The back, like soaked in gasoline. Rag.

Yeah. And we start running and he's like, stop, stop. He's like, it didn't go off. So we're sitting there quite close to the car, lighting it, trying to light more as we walk back to the car. And then we just hear the car ignite and he's like, run, run, run. So it came quite close to death already at that point. But we wanted to get this shot with some photos in front of the burning logos. But we told the guys at the shooting range to basically give us 10 minutes or so so we could take the photos. I don't know if they didn't wait the full 10 minutes or if we took too long, but they started firing at the targets anyway. And then the ricochets were flying very, very close to us over our head. One landed right by my leg. We're like, we better get out of here. Obviously not much safety concerns at that point, but we survived basically artillery strikes. We survived a bit of friendly fire with the bullets coming our way. But again, I was strangely calm because the other guys were calm. But then afterwards they were, they said to me, they were like, oh bro, if you got shot, we just have to dump your body at a hospital. We wouldn't be able to explain why you're here blowing up cars.

Right, right. And you're American and athlete, international celebrity.

They'd be like, what is, what is he doing on the front line? There's no real good explanation for it, but I mean through, even to the jokes and stuff, it's good to like highlight what's actually kind of happening over there. You know, it's obviously very, very bad.

What's the morale of the soldiers like? Is there still an optimism? Is there still a hope?

I mean there's sort of the battle fatigue, you know, and as they say, like all the heroes die early. You know, the guys that the real heroes that are willing to sacrifice themselves, they're the ones that are going to get taken out quick. Unfortunately, that's the reality from over there. But their thoughts are mostly that it's going to be a prolonged war. Like when I ask them about how fast the front line moves, they're like, oh, it could take six months to move 1, 200 meters. So it just feels like it's going to go on forever. And from the Ukrainian side's perspective, those guys talk to me about how when they hear radio intercepts of Russian soldiers marching to the same front line spot is that basically they're marching into certain death at certain locations and based on the radio transmissions, they know they're going to die, but they head forth anyway, straightforward into a Ukrainian position, which is just wild to me. I could say World War II. They just keep throwing troops at it and you see a ton of footage, they take themselves just as mind blowing. Obviously some of this footage doesn't make it to the Internet because it's got important sort of details in those conflicts. But like they're showing first person perspectives of trench warfare. It's just crazy to see what some of these guys have, have gone through.

So I went to a lot of the same places as well, including Kherson. What was your sense of the place?

Curse on was likelihood it was just so destroyed. I think at this point, yeah, most of the civilians are gone. I saw a lot of just elderly people left behind, especially a lot of old men. And I just think they're just like, hey, I've lived in my whole life, I'm just never leaving. So no matter the level of danger, those guys just remain. And then for the. It's largely just, I guess, military and Curson. But that place felt very, very dangerous. I didn't realize until we got there just quite how destroyed it is.

How did that experience change you? Just seeing war head on.

How to change me, I guess just realizing a lot of these soldiers are just like, you kind of distance yourself from them, thinking that they're something separate. But really speaking to a lot of the Ukrainian soldiers, like my friend Roman, he hadn't lived in Ukraine for eight years. He lived in France. He had a life. He's got a wife over there, he's got a daughter. He basically volunteered to come back to protect his mom and brother who still lived there. So it's like you sort of. I used to view them military guys because in Australia and I guess in the US they don't have this conscription ongoing right now. You know what I mean? Like, whereas obviously there's guys like Roman who volunteered, but then there's a lot of Ukrainian soldiers that were conscripted into the war. So it's like you just realize how a lot of these guys are everyday people. They're just in this crazy situation, like where Roman felt obligated to return to Ukraine. Like, from my perspective, anyone in it, from Australia or us, just, it's just a different perspective on like those. They feel different to the regular people fighting in Ukraine.

From my perspective, yeah, it's defending the land that is your home.

Yeah, Like Japan was coming for Australia. I guess In World War II they attacked the north, but really there was no foot battle and there was no soldiers on the ground within Australia, I guess us too, during World War II. So it's like a completely different perspective from our recent histories. Compared to, like, if you were a Ukrainian and there's Russians within the defined border, their responsibility to protect their homeland and their family. It's just something you can't imagine. But also after having spent time with them, you can see why they feel such a strong sense of obligation to protect. To protect Ukraine, protect their family and friends.

And in a lot of cases, the soldiers are using their own funds to buy equipment, whether it's bullets, whether it's guns, whether it's armor. Is that still what you saw?

Yeah, I mean, in terms of the weapons, America provides weapons. So we saw a wide selection of weapons. Some of those would be old Soviet weapons. Like, obviously the RPG we shot and what we shot out of it is all Soviet. It's very old weaponry. And then you've got US weapons that have been given as well. But in terms of the basic soldiers equipment, like if they want good quality stuff that might be the difference between them surviving the winter or the summer, just in the extreme temperature range, like they have to pay for that all themselves. So they always joke about when foreign soldiers come over to train them or they, a lot of foreign soldiers come to learn about sort of the drone technology they've developed on a budget is they always joke with them about how like everything from most countries is basically supplied. All the good quality standard equipment they'd need is just supplied by the government. But in Ukraine obviously funding is very stretched. So these guys to have the best equipment, they have to basically find money to pay for themselves. And they'll do that by seeking donations. Best way to get donations would be to grow social media profile. So that's when you see a lot of sort of social media warfare from a perspective of gaining fame to secure donations for their battalion to be able to fight better or protect themselves. And also some of the social media warfare I guess is psychological warfare against the enemy. Yeah, you'll see like private telegram groups where they're showing what they've done to the enemy, what the enemy's done to them. It's just crazy. It's just crazy.

Yeah, there's telegram groups on both sides and there's basically some of it is propaganda, some of it is psychological warfare, some of it is just the human nature of being like, of increasing your own morale and the morale of the people around you by showing off, successfully killing other human beings which are made other in war. And the nature of this war has, has evolved. So drones have become more and more prevalent. They're consumer level cheap drones. Can you speak to that? Have you seen, have you seen the use of FPV? FPV drones?

Yeah. So I mean basically like a 3 to $500 drone, I think it's like carbon fiber, 3D printed and they can address, attach different forms of weaponry to it. Whether it's just dropping a frag, they could drop a mine out of it. I know they were talking about how they had a liquid that could basically burn through sort of a lot of cars and tanks. So the person inside would basically melt alive. Which sounds horrible, but what's mind blowing to me is you could have like a 3 million dollar Russian tank that could be destroyed by, by a $300 drone. Which is just crazy. How fast the War changes. I think they're kind of the world leaders in budget drone technology. They didn't obviously don't have the budget for these crazy, elaborate, massive drones. I did see some higher budget, bigger drones over there, but for the most part, those FPV drones is really how most of the battles are fought. And you're seeing the, you're seeing the cameras on them. So you can see like basically kamikaze drone will chase someone down and they have that footage. And that's what the police chief said to me when he, he gifted me one of the drones they used. And he basically said he's like, artillery is scary, but a drone will follow you into a building. It's like kind of a haunting thing to think about. Like they'll see the drone, they'll hear the drone, they might try to shoot it down or they might try to run. But if it's a kamikaze one, and those guys are pretty good at flying them, it's gonna chase the soldiers down. A lot of soldiers, like pretending to be dead. It's really crazy. Some of the footage out there of those FPV drones.

So it's a terrifying tool of war and tool of psychological war. And used by both sides increasingly.

Yeah, both sides use it. I remember I was with Roman in Marseille and he had his break period. He was allowed to leave the country because he's volunteer. He basically volunteered to join the army. Ukrainian men can't really leave Ukraine right now. But Roman, I was in Marseille and this was a surreal experience for him. We went to the beach and there was some tourists there flying a drone. And you just saw his instinctual reaction to that drone sound in the sky. Flashback to that.

Currently they're all, as far as I know, all human controlled. So fpv, but to me, increasingly terrifying notion is of them becoming autonomous. It's the best way to defend against a drone that's FPV controlled is for AI to be controlling that drone. Just have swarms of drones that are 500 controlled by AI systems. And that's a terrifying possibility that the future of warfare is essentially swarms of drones on both sides and then maybe swarms of drones, say between US and China over Taiwan.

That would be wild because, I mean, they do those crazy drone light shows where they do those performances with the lights and stuff. So they're already pretty sophisticated with sort of pre programming.

Those are pre programmed. So the, the low level control, flight control of those is done autonomously. But there's a interface for doing the choreography that's hard coded in, but adding increasing levels of intelligence to a drone where you can detect another drone, follow it and defend yourself. Like in terms of the, the military on both sides of the Ukraine war, that's, that's a, that's a technology that's like the most wanted technology is drone defense. Like, how do you. Defending as drones on both sides. And anybody that comes up with an autonomous drone technology is going to help whichever side uses that technology to gain a military advantage. And so there's a huge incentive to build that technology. But then, of course, once both sides start using that technology, then there's swarms of autonomous drones who don't give a shit about humans just killing everything in sight on both sides. And that's terrifying. The civilian deaths that are possible, that are terrifying. Especially when you look 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years from now.

Yes. I mean, it's surreal. When we went to Kherson, he was like, the entire sky is just full of drones. At any given time, they could decide to come and attack. So just the. They could just sit there forever waiting, waiting for you to come out of that building. They'll wait a long time when someone goes and hides inside, or potentially, if it's an open window, fly straight through the open window to get it, to get people.

Yes. You're not even safe indoors.

Yeah. There's nowhere to hide. And they can wait for a very, very long time.

And as far as I know, even politicians like, you're in danger everywhere in Ukraine. So if you want to do a public speaking thing and doing outside, you're in danger because it's very difficult to detect those drones. It could be anywhere. So it's a terrifying life where you don't know if you're safe at any moment anywhere in Ukraine.

Well, sure. I mean, it's crazy what happened to Trump. I thought maybe the next attack on a public figure might come in the form of drone technology, some sort of something along those lines. I wonder how they protect against that here.

If that happens, just imagine the insanity that would ensue because we understand the idea of a gunman with a rifle shooting somebody, but just like a drone, just imagine the conspiracy theories. Who controlled that drone?

Where did it come from? Yeah.

And now everybody. I mean, that will just cause chaos.

And the range is ever increasing. One of the battalions in Ukraine, because those FPV drones have short range, pretty short range, but they were able to attach it to one of the larger drones with a signal booster. So they could potentially go up to 30, 40 km into the distance. So the drone that hits you could be flown by someone so far away from you. And if they did that domestically, that would be very frightening to think of the sphere of where it could have come from.

Do they. When you talk to the soldiers there, did they have a hope or a vision how the war will end?

Not really. It just say, I guess it just seems to everyone that it's sort of there's gonna be no middle ground.

When I was there, there's a kind of optimism that they would be victorious, like definitively. And so is there still that optimism? And also, are they ready for a prolonged war?

I mean, I think it'd be a soldier by soldier basis. I know like each of them had a different perspective. I remember I would ask them about like, in terms of US politics and their fears, because the first trip I went there, US hadn't agreed to resupply weapons. So it was a very different feeling in the air there of concern over what was going to happen. But they still remained quite optimistic that no matter who got in, they felt would do the right thing. But in terms of prolonged war, most people think going to go for a very long time. Like the children's hospital that just was bombed in cave anytime there's a moment like that that reignites everything. And I think it happens on both sides. So I know that there was an attack in Crimea. It was an attack on a beach, I guess, and I don't know if that attack in the hospital was retribution for that, but that's sort of the energy that has felt like they might have battle fatigue, but when something happens to civilians, especially kids on your side, kind of reinvigorates the energy to fight for as long as necessary. And in terms of a case by case basis, one of my friends, Dimitri over there, who trains Jiu Jitsu, owns a gym. He was very passionate about it just because of the history. Like, he brought out documents of his grandfather being executed by, by the ussr. So I know that when the war started, he basically, he took a, a bicycle helmet and his AK47 and went out into the streets and he's like, I'd rather be dead than live under Russian rule again. So, I mean, very case by case basis sort of personal history for them, I think.

Did they comment on US Politics, whether they hope for Trump or for, in that situation, Biden now Harris, to win the presidential election?

I think they, most of the guys tried to keep it pretty positive, you know what I mean? Like, some people did think that maybe if Trump was elected he wouldn't continue to fund it. But they really try to stay optimistic. Most of the people I spoke to really tried to remain optimistic that they would be protected if, if it comes down to it, like. But obviously there was a nine month period where they weren't refunded. So as that stretched, obviously they're refunded now, but it takes a lot of time to get that equipment back to the points at which they need it. So, I mean, if ammunition had ran out, Patriot defense system had ran out, really, really sort of scary prospect there. I don't know what's all. I guess no one knows what's going to happen there, but did you lie.

To people and say you were close to the President so they can be nice?