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1. Once upon a time, Gregg Smith woke up to "10 miles of bad road." The Old Grunt was a Corporal in the U.S. Marines. <THREAD> https://thenib.com/erik-prince-s-private-air-force/
2. When Gregg woke up, as he tells it, he asked the other corporal what was happening. The other corporal explained, "I see nothing but ten miles of bad road." Gregg moved on to a degree in Finance from Michigan State and MBA from University of Michigan.
3. Why do we care? This was Gregg's route to Blackwater. Yeah, THAT Blackwater. https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20070625006241/en/CIT-Names-Gregg-H.-Smith-National-Managing-Director-of-Mergers-Acquisitions-Advisory-Group
4. I do NOT know Gregg's story with the Marines. But he's told us that it involves October 23, 1983. https://www.cnn.com/2013/06/13/world/meast/beirut-marine-barracks-bombing-fast-facts/index.html
5. Those ten miles of bad road? Those were in the Beirut area, if I understood correctly. I doubt "bad road" was referring to potholes. That's the sort of experience that begins to qualify one for Blackwater.
6. With that MBA, Gregg became an investment banker. CEO of Deloitte & Touche Corporate Finance. Skip ahead to 2013... Blackwater. https://www.macroaxis.com/invest/manager/0500.HK--Gregg_Smith
7. As of November 2013, Gregg became CEO and Executive Director of Frontier Services Group. That's Erik Prince. Formerly now-infamous Blackwater.
8. "The Nib," with David Axe, tells the story. https://thenib.com/erik-prince-s-private-air-force/
9. "Prince began dabbling in corporate air power during the height of the U.S. occupation of Iraq..." Gregg resigned as of May 1, 2016. https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/FRONTIER-SERVICES-GROUP-L-6165919/news/Frontier-Services-1-RESIGNATION-OF-AN-EXECUTIVE-DIRECTOR-2-GRANT-OF-SHARE-OPTIONS-3-RESIGNAT-22268951/
10. Gregg came to Twitter.
Sure, hanging with the Marines in Beirut is one thing, but... Twitter.
He surfaced several times and disappeared several times. He happens to know Robert Young Pelton @RYP__ - we'll get to that soon. https://dpxgear.com/collections/books/products/come-back-alive-ebook
Sure, hanging with the Marines in Beirut is one thing, but... Twitter.
He surfaced several times and disappeared several times. He happens to know Robert Young Pelton @RYP__ - we'll get to that soon. https://dpxgear.com/collections/books/products/come-back-alive-ebook
11. Pelton described Gregg's disappearance, in October 2020, "He is fine. I told him I am going to set up a memorial page and a gofundme every time he does this." https://twitter.com/RYP__/status/1315023110987378688
12. What's the point? Wendy Siegelman explained, July 2020, "Gregg Smith, former CEO of Erik Prince's Frontier Services Group, who has worked behind the scenes with law enforcement and..." https://twitter.com/wendysiegelman/status/1287763646010073089?lang=en
13. "the media to try to expose him, is tweeting out a dossier of info on Prince..."
14. And so he did. But there's more, and that's our purpose here. Let's get to it. @10milesbadroad @PrivateerActual
15. You see, Gregg asked us to do our homework. Ouch! Is that allowed? Ummm... yeah. Out in the real world it is. And that, my friends, is where we'll find Erik Prince. So what happened? That's our purpose here.
16. Over the summer of 2020 Gregg gave us lots of hints and some inside facts. Interesting conversations back and forth with Robert Young Pelton. And then, toward the end of summer... oops.
17. Gregg cleared his twitter timeline. "Oh, No!" his followers lamented. Gregg announced that pre-season is over. He then ASKED something of us.
18. He asked us to do some background reading. So that we'd understand the context. One of those items was the story from The Nib that I linked above. He'd been giving us clues to find the story for months.
19. Pelton, also, kept reminding us that GIYF. Google Is Your Friend. People ask questions and, well, the answer is there online. Gregg's bio pic comes from The Nib's story. A google image search turns it up immediately. https://twitter.com/RYP__/status/1303128494684086272
20. This, you see, is part of the approach with the U.S. Marines and associated travelers. They don't expect everything to be handed to them. See if you can do it yourself, and if you can't, THEN ask.
21. That, by the way, is the same philosophy for software developers on Stack Overflow. When you ask a question, we expect you to show us what you tried to figure out for yourself. We want to clearly see what blocked you - and we can help you with that block.
22. Gregg disappeared again. Now what??? That brings us to Robert Young Pelton - and the point. https://twitter.com/ryp__/status/1120335065483862016
23. Perhaps things are happening behind the scenes. We don't know. Perhaps there's a world out there, beyond twitter. Who would know??? Not me!
24. But Gregg did tell us there is some world-class stuff going on and that one of the players is Erik Prince. "Heads on a pike" level of stuff. And he asked us to LEARN about that stuff.
25. Non-fiction military stuff is not my thing even though you might get the impression it is. Royal Navy during the Age of Sail, sure. The vast Pacific during World War II, sure. Historical fiction. https://www.blogs.va.gov/VAntage/57393/veteranoftheday-edward-butch-ohare/
26. But that's not what we're talking about here.
27. "...Yet, Erik's agreed to go on record with me." That's on page 1 of "Licensed to Kill: Hired Guns in the War on Terror" by Robert Young Pelton @ryp__ (2006)
28. "I can only speculate that my having spent a month running the deadly Baghdad Airport road with Blackwater's security teams, and my occasional encounters with Prince at closed social events..." https://dpxgear.com/products/roll-hard-ebook
29. "have convinced him of my sincere desire to understand what his world is all about."
30. And there ya have it. That's my homework. I'm only on page 21 - but this is the background that Gregg asked us to learn.
31. For the record, I don't have any inside information on Gregg himself or his current status. I've had no communication other than public twitter. What you see is what I see. But... I'm still doing my homework. There's an exam coming up.
32. That's the end of this thread - but no doubt we'll be discussing this and adding to the thread! If there's archived Smith material I should add here for reference please tag me in!
33. From Robert Young "Daily Planet" Pelton, more perspective. If you've started doing your homework you'll know the "Daily Planet" reference! It's a hilarious scene :) https://twitter.com/RYP__/status/1317146440137756672
34. October 23rd, you say, Tim? That date is highly significant to the U.S. Marines. Beirut. 1983. So... could be interesting. https://twitter.com/TimInHonolulu/status/1317148817729363969
35. This was the key article Gregg recommended for background. I've not yet found it...!
36. Getting closer.
37. Aha. (Part 1) https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/national/102347/malta_arms_dealer_supplied_rhibs_to_company_un_report_says_was_backing_khalifa_haftar#.X4ncSVlOlTY
38. Published ten days after the above (part 1) - https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/national/102537/suspected_mercenaries_were_released_from_arrest_after_two_days#.X4ncmllOlTY
39. "Steven Lodge" becomes a search key. https://twitter.com/kelly2277/status/1300951381428391936
41. More discussion in replies to the thread below. This was at the start of September as Gregg cleared his timeline to start afresh.
https://twitter.com/Lynette30067504/status/1300801897457233921
https://twitter.com/Lynette30067504/status/1300801897457233921
42. In Gregg's own words: Why he's here. Unfinished business.
https://twitter.com/oldgrunt0351/status/1345817202130264065
https://twitter.com/oldgrunt0351/status/1345817202130264065
43. This Paul Behrends article provides considerable background.
https://twitter.com/oldgrunt0351/status/1348325489195159552
https://twitter.com/oldgrunt0351/status/1348325489195159552
44. Here's the direct link to the Intelligencer article in case Gregg does more cleansing. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/01/life-and-death-of-paul-behrends-d-c-s-most-notorious-man.html?utm_source=tw
45. Dominique's thread. https://twitter.com/dominique6138/status/1348330454542241795
46. Arapahoe's threads. https://twitter.com/arapaho415/status/1348420574150725632
