In this episode, I talk about my trip to the annual arms show in Washington, D.C. and what I learned there. I also talk about the rise of drones and artificial intelligence and how they are changing the way we live and work.
00:00:00.000It's absolutely massive. Think about this. Eight Walmarts. Eight Walmarts of weapons. Eight frickin' Walmarts of every weapon known to man. And it's from everywhere in the world, including China, but not Russia.
00:00:19.480Russia was not invited this year for obvious reasons. So it's just absolutely incredible. I was overwhelmed. And you have to have an app to find a particular booth. Well, it's between 1,700 and 1,800 booths. Imagine the BMO center. Imagine four BMO centers. That's how big this thing is. I've never seen anything.
00:00:48.520I've been to AUSA in Washington, D.C., and it's big, but it is not like this. And this is the weapons central. And it happens every two years. People come from all over the world to make deals, to study the weapons and the new technologies, which are just, you know, I don't want to say exploding, but basically, that's the pun.
00:01:13.160The technology is absolutely exploding for a weapon. And it's just a massive industry. I had no idea until I came here just how incredible it is. It really is something.
00:01:26.600I guess, you know, it's just that mixed thing. I mean, it's fascinating on how much tech advancement we have and things such as that. But at the same time, you know, leave it to us with humanity that we get our most creative when it's finding ways to obliterate each other.
00:01:38.160Unfortunately, yes. Unfortunately, yes. It's new ways to kill people. However, let me say this. The one thing I learned, I took a poll from all the arms dealers at the show, and I asked about Ukraine.
00:01:54.740And I asked, you know, it's a sensitive question. Not everybody wants to answer it. But basically, Europe has woken up. Ukraine has changed everything. Europe has woken up. And now there's more demand. There's more budget.
00:02:12.740And Germany that is not spent much on defense since the Second World War. Everybody said Germany, Germany, Germany. They're spending incredible amounts of money. And they boosted their budgets. It's just incredible. And they're saying the demand is up.
00:02:33.420There's still competition out there. But demand is up. And it has absolutely changed the world.
00:02:40.180And when it comes to, I talk to ammo dealers from all over the world there. I talked to several. I concentrated. There was two areas which really interested me.
00:02:53.680The Israelis and the Israelis and the Turkish are really coming on. There you see a nice lady there displaying a Turkish gun with a silencer on it. Very nice lady. And then you see the Elbit precision weapons.
00:03:08.380Well, I talked to her and she said, yes, we are dealing with Ukraine. And of course, Turkey is sending them drones. But also Elbit in Israel is just doing incredible. It's changed everything.
00:03:24.740And the fellow from Elbit told me that studying what happened in Ukraine. Everybody's looking at that. Everybody. And they're all thinking the same thing.
00:03:40.860It's going back to basic military strategy and weapons. Do we buy tanks? Are tanks obsolete? Now, what you're looking at is a robot tank. A mega robot tank. It has to be controlled by a human being.
00:03:59.620But right now, in future, it may have artificial intelligence and it may decide who to kill on its own. Raising questions about friendly fire. How does it determine a friendly? I asked everybody, how does it determine a friendly? Friendly or false? We're working on it.
00:04:18.840Everybody told me the same thing. Because this thing can identify a threat a second, millisecond and end it just like that. Well, how in the hell, if you've got your troops on the ground, how can you tell? Do they wear a badge? Do they wear a patch? What the goddamn hell do you do when you've got a monster? This is a monster. I mean, look at this thing. This is the Terminator. This is the Terminator.
00:04:48.840Yeah, from RoboCop. I mean, so it kind of shows also just the new front of military and battles. I mean, if we've got things like this and unmanned drones and a lot of remote military hardware going around, hackers are going to be more powerful in some ways than we've ever imagined.
00:05:08.480Because if somebody could manage to get control of those things, even a guy in a basement in India could suddenly take over a division of an army. I mean, they better make sure they can figure out their controls on this stuff.
00:05:20.480Loitering munitions. Drones that can fly around and wait until they see something or you see something and you target it or then come back and land.
00:05:31.340Okay, you see that one on the right? That is a suicide drone. That thing on the far right is a suicide drone. And if it hits you, it's over. And that thing, and that's made in Israel, and that thing can fly, you know, forever.
00:05:49.020And if you want it to come home, it'll come home, and it'll turn on its back, and it'll have a little parachute and a little cushion, and it'll fall, and you can use it again if you don't find a target.
00:06:00.400Now, what's better, to have a drone or to have a pilot up there who could get killed? That thing is just, and it's exploding. In the Israel area, I must have seen like seven, eight drone companies.
00:06:14.480And then I walked down the aisle, and I found an Israeli jamming company that can jam drones, and it has a weapon that you can hold, and that's what shoots the thing down.
00:06:28.380So, I mean, there's weapons, and there's counter weapons, and that's the game of the future. And it's being played out. You can see that. You can take a look at that. That's not a .50 caliber. That's bigger.
00:06:40.620That's bigger. That thing is on the top of that, of a robot tank, and it can see you, and it can, you know what I mean? I mean, it's a whole, the whole strategy and technology of war is changing, and it's just amazing. It really is, you know?
00:07:01.880I was saying, you know, actually, it's one of our commenters, yeah, Kerry, saying, you know, AI will be our doom. I mean, we dehumanize some of what these, you know, equipment does,
00:07:10.280but we do have to remember the target on the other end is often going to be human casualties, so, I mean, you're not putting a soldier at risk in the air or on the ground,
00:07:17.540but you're out there to destroy somebody somewhere. It's pretty chilling.
00:07:21.300It is pretty chilling, but this is, you know, unfortunately, you know, this is mankind.
00:07:28.240It's never going to be, you know, I mean, I would like it to be a Disneyland world, but it just isn't.
00:07:34.840And it's filled with, you've got a bad dude in Russia who's just changed the world and put the fear of God into everybody,
00:07:42.160especially in Europe. They've broken up. Budgets are rising. It's just, you know, it's amazing.
00:07:51.620But let me say this. I talked to one Turkish fellow who, their company does a lot of things,
00:07:58.660including armored cars, and I said, okay, is Ukraine good or bad? And he said, well, there's a lot of
00:08:08.660negatives. He said, first of all, inflation. It's driven inflation. Toss her up. There's a loss.
00:08:19.740There's a price of fuel has gone up. There's no grain. There's no grain. And a lot of those grain
00:08:27.280goes to African countries. Shipping containers have skyrocketed. And the basic of disruption of trade
00:08:36.000and cyber attacks of bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, you've got all these things happening. And it's changing
00:08:43.660the whole landscape. I mean, on the good side for the arms dealers is that demand is up. Demand is up.
00:08:52.920That's not necessarily a good or bad thing because competition will still, will still happen. But
00:08:58.940like I say, Ukraine has changed the world. Some people didn't want to talk about it. Some people
00:09:06.260wouldn't say two words, but some guys just said, yeah, yeah. It's like, do we buy tanks? You know,
00:09:12.160should we, and how do we protect them now? Because we're looking at the same, what's
00:09:16.840happening in Ukraine? How do we protect those things? You know, and it's about this, again,
00:09:22.300these Israeli companies, a precision guided weapon. The only country who can get away with
00:09:29.520dumb bombs is Russia. They're the only country. Nobody else can do that. Everybody else has to go
00:09:36.180by the rules. And that is precision weapons so that you don't have collateral damage. Putin doesn't,
00:09:42.920you know, doesn't care. So, but he's the only, Russia's the only one who does that. Everybody else
00:09:48.920got to play by the rules. And it's all about precision guided weapons. And I posted some,
00:09:55.040there's some there that have GPS and, you know, that are just amazing and will hit direct
00:10:03.200target. And this is only one area. I mean, there were so many, I just decided to concentrate on a
00:10:09.700couple because it was just too overwhelming. Well, you encountered some other stuff too.
00:10:14.880I was at a robotic dog. You ran across in there. Yes. Yes. And I got to tell you something really
00:10:21.340funny. I got to tell you something really funny. And I've got a kind of a scoop for you too.
00:10:26.820I got a scoop for you too. There was a robotic dog and it walked around and everybody, but the one
00:10:36.200thing that was common to everyone who saw this dog wanted to pet it on the head. It's a robot.
00:10:45.900It's a dog with a little face and two little eyes. Everybody, everybody who came up, I like it. I took
00:10:52.000some pictures, but it's on my camera. I couldn't send it to you. But everybody wanted to pet it on
00:10:58.080the head. And I just thought that was hilarious. It's a robot. You know what I mean? But the urge of
00:11:05.780a human being, you know, is to, is to pet this thing on the head. So that, that, that was just kind
00:11:14.740of a bizarre, uh, uh, thing I witnessed, but let me tell you about, uh, a fairly big scoop that I came
00:11:22.000across. There's a couple, there's a couple I want to mention. And, uh, one of them, unfortunately due
00:11:30.640to, uh, their security, uh, uh, uh, reasons, they won't let me write about it. I'd love to, but I can't,
00:11:38.740and I can't, I can tell you it's a country in Europe, but I can't tell you where, and I can't even tell
00:11:44.700you the name of the company. They don't want anything. Everything was off the record, but this
00:11:49.760is one of the biggest security companies in the world, probably the biggest, and nobody knows the
00:11:57.800thing about them. And that's the way they want it. And these people do security for 80% of the world's
00:12:04.960airport. Their machines detect everything, everything. Think of it. 80% of the world's airports have their
00:12:12.760equipment. Who else has their equipment? The White House has their security detecting equipment. The U.S.
00:12:21.560Secret Service has their secret detective detecting equipment. And not only that, but, but also Air Force
00:12:32.600One. The guards, the president of the United States has the equipment, the security detection equipment
00:12:38.260of this company. And they are, they want to stay under the radar. They said, you can't write about
00:12:45.160it, but they didn't say you can't talk about it. So I'm telling you now, this is one of the most
00:12:50.280incredible things I've found at the show. Unfortunately, I can't tell you anymore because
00:12:55.400of a journalistic ethics. And I gave my promise. I wouldn't. So, but this is, this is an absolutely
00:13:01.800incredible company. And they've come up with new detectors to, uh, the Russians, for example, in
00:13:08.780Ukraine, are leaving booby traps in houses. And they put it under things, under carpets, and they're
00:13:15.780called brush wires. And ISIS also use these to booby trap homes. And they put them under carpets and stuff.
00:13:23.460And the Ukrainians are getting these detectors to detect these weapons. So it's, I just found it
00:13:30.960really fascinating. Yeah. Well, that's a different end of things, I guess, more in a defensive end,
00:13:36.540but you can see why it's very proprietary or why they're keeping it tight too. Because again, I mean,
00:13:41.240as you said, if we're talking, somebody who's dealing with 80% of the airports and things like
00:13:45.420the, uh, uh, the White House itself, I mean, if you get yourself into that software, you could, again,
00:13:52.440it doesn't matter how many, uh, old, uh, out of date takes the country has on the ground somewhere
00:13:56.220else. They can bring a lot of the world to its knees again from a computer on the other side of
00:14:00.100the planet. It's kind of scary. And again, this company also gives detection equipment for metal
00:14:06.880detection in the food company around the world. Uh, you know, when food is processed, occasionally a
00:14:13.120piece of metal will get in that food and they can detect it. They can detect anything. Uh, this is one of
00:14:20.160the, uh, there are competitors and there are other companies, but this one I think is probably
00:14:24.400one of the best in the world. And Canada actually bought some, uh, I think it was Vance, General
00:14:30.900Vance, who, uh, said, look, I want to protect my boys. And he said, I want the best. So he bought
00:14:38.440about a hundred grand worth of these, uh, landmine detectors for, this is going back to Afghanistan.
00:14:45.600And when the feds in Ottawa found this out, they went ballistic. How dare you, how dare
00:14:52.480you spend a hundred grand and Vance said, you know what? I did this to protect my boys
00:14:57.920and I have authority to do that. So to hell with you medicine a little stronger, but he
00:15:05.280said to hell with you, we're buying these things. And there was a right choice and I'm
00:15:09.960not defending general Vance for any of the other stuff, but he looked after his men and
00:15:15.240that was a wise decision. And that was this company that I can't name, unfortunate. So,
00:15:20.840but okay. Okay. Go ahead. Oh, I was just saying, so kind of go a little further in the, in the
00:15:25.880whole thing. So there's some really interesting, you know, very high tech, very targeted technology
00:15:29.720there, things like that. Uh, one of the commenters was asking though, but it's not like Walmart,
00:15:36.520they're not going to be a price tag hanging on, on front of it when you get there. But
00:15:39.880this is pretty, I imagine some of this technology is very, very expensive for countries to acquire.
00:15:45.000Extremely expensive, extremely, it's big bucks. And it's getting more and more expensive because
00:15:50.600it's also high tech. I mean, it's just, uh, again, it's all about, uh, this, um, a multi, uh,
00:16:00.040multi-domain or, uh, where you can, you know, an F-35 can talk to a ground station and a, and a,
00:16:09.880and a guy will have a, uh, a 3D glasses, a troop, a captain with his, with his troops. And it can all
00:16:17.080be, everybody's talking multi-domain. Everybody's talking to each other. Well, that's expensive.
00:16:22.680That's expensive technology. And that's where it's headed. It's about information,
00:16:27.320the sharing of information and, and, and, and how to do it without it being bought by, uh,
00:16:35.000by an enemy. And, uh, it's, it's, uh, it, it just is getting so incredibly set. Well, okay. Just to
00:16:42.760tell you, maybe you're, you're, your listeners don't know, but we're buying F-35, right? And we
00:16:48.520haven't signed the deal yet, but we will sign the deal in the fall. Okay. Well, I don't know how many
00:16:54.040going to 88 or however, we've got to buy these things. Everybody bought them. Italy bought them
00:16:58.760for God's sake. And, and, and, um, so we have to buy them, but the helmet, the helmet and the, and the,
00:17:07.400uh, containment helmet has to be custom fit for every pilot. Can't buy it off the shelf and put it on.
00:17:16.520Oh, you're a size this. No, no, no. Custom fit. And, and that helmet alone cost more than a Ferrari.
00:17:25.560The helmet alone. So the expenses, and we're walking into that and we're going to have 88 of them,
00:17:32.920or supposedly, supposedly, and, and fellows to fly them. Whereas the American air force is now getting
00:17:39.320into, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, these, uh, uh, uh, AI aircraft, uh, uh, that will fly along with, uh,
00:17:49.320the pilots and act as the wingman, you know, it used to be Tom Cruise and, and, and a wingman.
00:17:55.720Well, no more, no more Wolfman. This is a, there's going to be a robot flying next to you,
00:18:01.240but believe it or not, that is cheaper than training a pilot and, uh, losing a pilot.
00:18:07.000I'll go too. That's something that, and that's, that's where it's all going.
00:18:12.200Yeah. Well, it's pretty wild stuff. So, uh, have you, you know, encountered any other, uh,
00:18:18.440fellow Canadians? I guess most of the people that would show up at those would be, uh, working for
00:18:22.760their military departments, their bureaucrats, they wouldn't be recognizable or anything like
00:18:26.440that. They're working. No, no. And one thing I did found out that I didn't know, uh,
00:18:33.160I didn't know that two years ago, Canada bought, uh, drones from Israel and it's called the, uh,
00:18:41.160blah, blah, blah. What's it called? It's called the, uh, uh, uh, Star, uh, Starliner. It's called the
00:18:48.680Starliner and it's huge. It's massive. This is not a little drone that you buy at Costco. This thing is
00:18:58.280massive. It's huge. It can stay up there for 36 hours. It can fly at 25,000 feet and Canada signed
00:19:07.000a deal to buy them. I didn't know that until I talked to the Israelis. I said, what, what are you
00:19:12.440kidding me? He said, oh yeah, Canada and Switzerland both bought them. And I said, well, why did we buy
00:19:17.960them? And he said, according to the Canadian government, they bought them because, uh,
00:19:24.520for, uh, uh, uh, uh, what was the reason? Uh, for, for monitoring, uh, uh, the ice pack, uh,
00:19:34.440for reconnaissance of the fisheries. And, uh, let's see, what else did I write down here?
00:19:40.040Uh, uh, uh, fisheries, wildlife surveys and reconnaissance and, and, and also monitoring
00:19:52.440the Arctic ice. Who knows what else it's going to be used for? But this is no ordinary drone.
00:20:00.280This you will not believe. This is the drone that has been cleared to fly
00:20:05.160by NATO and by the Canadian government and by the Israeli government to fly in regular airspace.
00:20:16.600It can fly in regular airspace. It knows how it will report and they will, it will let you know
00:20:22.600where it is. It'll let air traffic control know. Unbelievable. This thing can fly. And, and to get
00:20:30.680this approved, they had to, uh, make it able to land and take off in zero, zero weather. This thing can
00:20:41.320land in zero weather where a pilot can't, this thing can actually do it. And it, it, uh, has satellite
00:20:49.800lifts up. Uh, it's, it's also, uh, uh, can handle, it has the technology to handle lightning strikes.
00:20:58.200And, uh, I mean, it's just, this thing is absolutely unbelievable. And we bought them.
00:21:03.080I had no idea. So that was a small discovery that involved Canada.
00:21:09.640Well, before I, uh, let you go, I know you're going to get back to your, uh, beer and cigar
00:21:14.040and touring out there. Uh, anything else you'd like to add from your, your Paris term, uh, tour there?
00:21:19.400Well, it's just nice that there are more good people than bad. Uh, I, I, I had the, uh, experience
00:21:27.720of being, uh, you know, my phone, but you know, maybe I was kind of naive and leaving into my, my cargo,
00:21:34.920my Costco cargo pants pocket. Somehow the guy got it out and lifted the, the felt so flat and got it
00:21:42.200out and I didn't even feel it. So this guy was good, but there are more good people than bad in Paris.
00:21:48.040Paris is a great place to come and visit. And, uh, and also Euro Satori has just been
00:21:53.560absolutely amazing. I learned, uh, I mean, I, I, I, I learned so much from everyone.
00:21:59.480And I took a poll from just about everybody. And like I said, some would talk, some wouldn't,
00:22:04.680but they all, they all said, I said, is demand more? They said, yes, demand is up and there's more
00:22:12.360budgets in Europe. And, uh, so there's going to be, this show is probably the world has changed and
00:22:19.800this show reflects that. And, uh, and again, the French are a fantastic host. They were great all
00:22:26.200the way. The concierge at U.S. Satori tried to help me in every way that I, and even said, look,
00:22:33.960we'll buy you a phone. Do you, do you want a phone? Like, you know, well, that I have to pay for it,
00:22:38.120but they said, we'll get you one for, you know, you want a hundred, 200 year old, we'll get you one.
00:22:42.680Where else can you get that kind of, um, of, uh, uh, you know, service. And, uh, so it was a,
00:22:49.880it was a great experience and I'm just, I'm very lucky. I'm very lucky to have, uh, uh, seen and
00:22:56.200learned all the things I did. So two thumbs up for you, Uro Satori and Paris. Well, thanks for
00:23:02.680sharing with us. I'm waiting for my red wine. I ordered, uh, then really, but she still hasn't
00:23:07.320brought it. They probably don't want to interrupt the broadcast. Perhaps they're too polite.
00:23:11.720Yeah. But thank you for giving me this venue and I hope I shared some interesting stuff to your
00:23:16.840listeners. Yeah, no, it was great. And I appreciate you starting with a positive note and ending with
00:23:20.760a positive note with, cause we know there's a lot of dark material in between there. So it's,
00:23:24.840it's pretty interesting and informative. Uh, we'll have to hook up and chat when you get back here to
00:23:29.880the land of the snow and ice. Okay. Thanks Lori. Thanks again. Take care.