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War Dogs

Penguin Shop: 3 Clothbound Classics for £33

Like the best stories about rogues, con artists and scammers, the magic is in the details. Guy Lawson's Arms and Dudes misses nothing. He gets it all

A triumph of investigative reporting and storytelling. This book is a mind-blowing account of how two kids turned themselves into some of the world's biggest weapons dealers in the chaotic years of the Iraq war. I couldn't put it down

Rajiv Chandrasekaran, author of 'Imperial Life in the Emerald City'

A great story... and a fun new take on a moral as old as time: when you fly too close to the sun, you end up on the ground

'This is one of those books that, God help us, shouldn't be true - but is. US governmental bungling, war in Afghanistan going awry, foreign hustlers making millions out of bilking heroic soldiers, and in the middle of it all are two barely post-teenager dopers fumbling their way into and out of the highest level of the sleazy arms business

The True Story of How Three Stoners from Miami Beach Became the Most Unlikely Gunrunners in History

In January 2007, three young stoners from Miami Beach won a $300 million US Government contract to supply ammunition to the Afghanistan military. Instead of fulfilling the order with high-quality arms, they bought cheap Communist-style surplus ammo 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. 
 
That's the 'official' story. The truth is far more explosive. Originally published as 'The Arms and the Dudes', this is 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. 
 
This is a story you were never meant to read.

Guy Lawson's Arms and the Dudes is the page-turning, inside account of how three kids from Florida became big-time 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. Instead of fulfilling the order with high-quality arms, they 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. 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. 
 
This is a story you were never meant to read. 
 
'Like page-turning fiction, but 100% true' - CNBC

Guy Lawson is a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning investigative journalist whose articles on war, crime, culture, and law have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the Guardian, Rolling Stone, GQ and Harper's.

War Dogs

The True Story of How Three Stoners from Miami Beach Became the Most Unlikely Gunrunners in History

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