In their new book Merchant of Death: Money, Guns, Planes, and the Man Who Makes War Possible (John Wiley & Sons, 2007), Douglas Farah and Stephen Braun paint a grisly picture of Russian gunrunner Viktor Bout. The intrepid authors recently spoke with Men's Vogue editor Hudson Morgan, discussing the perils of taking on one of the world's most dangerous men, the rivals whose wings Bout clipped, and those awkward moments when they were forced to break news about Bout to U.S. officials who'd been kept in the dark.

Men's Vogue: You've both covered some pretty treacherous territory in your careers. How risky was reporting on Bout?

Douglas Farah: When I was covering the wars in Sierra Leone and Liberia, I wasn't aware of him as a threat, although of course he was arming the people who were a threat. He and Charles Taylor, the president of Liberia, put a contract on my life, and that made me nervous and I had to be evacuated with my family from West Africa. We had a few instances where Viktor's people were threatening people that were talking to us about him. In some cases, he knew who our sources were.

MV: They were in his organization?

DF:They were in and out, but he still had the facility to be aware of some of their movements. As far as we know, everyone is still alive, but I think it was hairier for them than it was for us.

Stephen Braun: On the other hand, Bout has long tried to present himself as just a simple businessman who does, at times, carry legitimate cargoes as well as contraband cargos. Having a foot in both worlds has made him reluctant to get his hands too dirty. If you want to do business with the U.S. government—as he ultimately did—you have to stay somewhat on the up and up.

MV: So how did you get people to cooperate when they had everything to lose, especially their lives?

DF: Some people, especially in the intelligence communities and the law enforcement communities in both the U.S. and Europe were incredibly frustrated by their inability to get him. There were feelings of bitterness and deep unhappiness that they had lost Bout—that he had ultimately won. Some of the people inside his organization in Africa were motivated by a revenge factor against him and Taylor. When they looked back after the wars were over, they were just really unhappy that their country had been destroyed—and they viewed him as an integral part of that.