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War Dogs
In 2005, David Packouz, a massage therapist living in Miami, Florida with his girlfriend Iz, spends his life savings on an unsuccessful venture to sell bedsheets to retirement homes. David runs into his old friend Efraim Diveroli, whose company, AEY Inc., sells arms to the US government for the war in Iraq. Efraim explains that all military equipment contracts up for bidding are posted on a public website, and he bids on small orders that, although ignored by larger contractors, are still worth millions of dollars.
After Iz informs David she is pregnant, Efraim offers him a job at AEY. David accepts, but he lies to Iz, telling her they will be selling sheets to the military; when she later learns the truth, she tells him she understands what he is doing, but insists that he stop lying to her. Efraim gives David a crash course on arms dealing and introduces him to his silent partner, businessman Ralph Slutsky, who funds AEY’s deals under the false belief that the company only sells arms to protect Israel.
David and Efraim land a contract to provide 5,000 Beretta pistols to the Iraqi police, but they have to circumvent an Italian embargo by sending the shipment to Baghdad through Jordan, where it is seized by customs. If they fail to deliver the pistols, AEY will be blacklisted from future contracts. They fly to Jordan, bribe local officials to release the shipment, and, with a smuggler, take it into Iraq themselves by truck. They are paid handsomely for driving it through the “ Triangle of Death ”. David again lies to Iz, telling her he was in Jordan the whole time.
AEY expands its operations and David's daughter Ella is born, while Efraim grows more unstable and untrustworthy.
The company has a chance at a contract to supply 100 million rounds of AK-47 ammunition to the Afghan military at a time when this ammunition is in short supply. At a convention, David and Efraim encounter arms dealer Henry Girard, who has sole access to massive stocks of unused Soviet-era weapons in Albania that the Albanians are required by NATO to liquidate. Barred from dealing directly with the US, Girard proposes to sell AEY the ammunition it needs. AEY wins the contract.
Before David leaves for eight weeks in Albania to supervise the loading of the ammunition, Iz, who is fed up with David lying to her, leaves him to stay at her mother's with Ella.
In Albania, David discovers the ammunition is Chinese -made and thus illegal under a US embargo, so Efraim has it repackaged to mask its origin. On learning Henry has charged them a 400% markup, Efraim decides, despite David’s protests, to cut Henry out of the deal. Henry retaliates by having David kidnapped, beaten, and threatened at gunpoint, leading David to return to Miami to confront Efraim. As David is about to leave, Enver, the Albanian handling the repackaging, tells him he has been paid nothing; David promises Enver to get his money wired to him from Miami.
On returning to Miami, David quits AEY and demands compensation for his work on the Afghan deal, but Efraim refuses to pay him anything. David returns to working as a massage therapist and convinces Iz to move back in with him after telling her the truth about AEY. Three months later, Efraim, with Ralph serving as a mediator, offers David a paltry severance package; David tells Ralph what they have been doing, unaware that Ralph is wearing a listening device for the FBI. They have been denounced by Enver, who was never paid.
David and Efraim are arrested. Efraim is sentenced to four years in prison, while David pleads guilty and is sentenced to seven months of house arrest.
Some time later, Henry contacts David and apologizes for abducting him in Albania; he also thanks David for not mentioning him in his testimony and offers him a briefcase full of money he made from the Afghan deal.