WOE Dispatch

Watch Industry SITREP - May 2025

Watch Industry SITREP - May 2025

More Tariffs, Al Capone’s Patek, CIA Recruiting Ads, The Pope’s Apple Watch, Rolex Rippers Getting Busted, & More 

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Watch Industry SITREP - May 2025

More Tariffs, Al Capone’s Patek, CIA Recruiting Ads, The Pope’s Apple Watch, Rolex Rippers Getting Busted, & More 

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Apple Watch Saves Drowning Swimmer In Australia

Apple Watch Saves Drowning Swimmer In Australia

Maybe Smartwatches Aren't That Bad? While body surfing off Byron Bay, Australia, 49-year-old Rick Shearman was unexpectedly swept over a kilometer out to sea by a powerful rip current. Despite...

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Apple Watch Saves Drowning Swimmer In Australia

Maybe Smartwatches Aren't That Bad? While body surfing off Byron Bay, Australia, 49-year-old Rick Shearman was unexpectedly swept over a kilometer out to sea by a powerful rip current. Despite his apparent swimming prowess, the relentless waves and currents rendered his efforts to return futile. Treading water and becoming more...

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The Watches Of Jonny Kim

The Watches Of Jonny Kim

The Navy SEAL, Medical Doctor, & Astronaut’s G-Shock, Omega, & Rolex Watches Last month, SEAL turned NASA astronaut Jonny Kim blasted off into space aboard a Russian-made Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft....

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The Watches Of Jonny Kim

The Navy SEAL, Medical Doctor, & Astronaut’s G-Shock, Omega, & Rolex Watches Last month, SEAL turned NASA astronaut Jonny Kim blasted off into space aboard a Russian-made Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft. Soon after, Kim floated through a hatch into the International Space Station. These crew changeouts are relatively straightforward, taking place...

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Get The Most Out Of Your Watches This Summer

Get The Most Out Of Your Watches This Summer

Water Resistance, Spring Bars, & Straps For The Use Your Tools Lifestyle By Benjamin Lowry Last week, W.O.E. wrote about the importance of integrating watches into our daily lives. Watches...

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Get The Most Out Of Your Watches This Summer

Water Resistance, Spring Bars, & Straps For The Use Your Tools Lifestyle By Benjamin Lowry Last week, W.O.E. wrote about the importance of integrating watches into our daily lives. Watches are a talisman of a life well-lived, and this can only be true if you wear them, not keep them...

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Use Your Tools - It's Never Just A Watch

Use Your Tools - It's Never Just A Watch

Watches Are Talismans Of A Life Well-Lived, This Is What We Mean By “Use Your Tools” -When a timepiece comes off the production line in Switzerland, Japan, or even China,...

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Use Your Tools - It's Never Just A Watch

Watches Are Talismans Of A Life Well-Lived, This Is What We Mean By “Use Your Tools” -When a timepiece comes off the production line in Switzerland, Japan, or even China, its inherent value is the sum of its parts combined with the intangibles of brand equity.

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W.O.E. YouTube: How Criminals Use Luxury Watches For Money Laundering

W.O.E. YouTube: How Criminals Use Luxury Watche...

For criminals, moving large amounts of illicit cash through transnational networks presents a serious problem. Cash is bulky, heavy, and difficult to explain away if you’re caught holding the literal...

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W.O.E. YouTube: How Criminals Use Luxury Watches For Money Laundering

For criminals, moving large amounts of illicit cash through transnational networks presents a serious problem. Cash is bulky, heavy, and difficult to explain away if you’re caught holding the literal bag. Bolstered by rising secondary market prices for luxury timepieces from brands like Rolex, Audemars Piguet, and Patek Philippe, bad...

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Beneath The Surface: Recovering WWII Heroes In Palau

Beneath The Surface: Recovering WWII Heroes In ...

Diving For The Remains Of WWII Service Members In The Western Pacific with Project Recover

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Beneath The Surface: Recovering WWII Heroes In Palau

Diving For The Remains Of WWII Service Members In The Western Pacific with Project Recover

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Watch Industry SITREP - April 2025

Watch Industry SITREP - April 2025

Bremont Ambassador trains Chinese Pilots?, Rolex-Wearing National Security Advisor Ousted, A Legendary CIA Director's Pocket Watch Up For Auction, Rolex & US Watchmakers Respond To Tariffs, & Trump Watches Are...

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Watch Industry SITREP - April 2025

Bremont Ambassador trains Chinese Pilots?, Rolex-Wearing National Security Advisor Ousted, A Legendary CIA Director's Pocket Watch Up For Auction, Rolex & US Watchmakers Respond To Tariffs, & Trump Watches Are Finally In The Wild By Benjamin Lowry For most of the industry, the talk of the past few weeks centered...

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Hollywood Watches Of Espionage - Part III

Hollywood Watches Of Espionage - Part III

Archer’s Spy-Watch, John Travolta’s Sketchy Aerospace, A G-Shock in Speed, & The Kingsman Bremont Despite the massive delta between the on-screen antics of fictional spies and real-life intelligence officers, the...

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Hollywood Watches Of Espionage - Part III

Archer’s Spy-Watch, John Travolta’s Sketchy Aerospace, A G-Shock in Speed, & The Kingsman Bremont Despite the massive delta between the on-screen antics of fictional spies and real-life intelligence officers, the link between watches, espionage, and film is strong and only getting stronger. It is often difficult to differentiate between fiction...

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W.O.E. YouTube: Seiko Watches & Toyota - Tools Of Warfare

W.O.E. YouTube: Seiko Watches & Toyota - Tools ...

Look back at pictures of conflicts from the past six decades, and you are bound to see one thing: Seiko watches on the wrists of military personnel, often on both...

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W.O.E. YouTube: Seiko Watches & Toyota - Tools Of Warfare

Look back at pictures of conflicts from the past six decades, and you are bound to see one thing: Seiko watches on the wrists of military personnel, often on both sides. For the same reasons that the Toyota Hilux and Land Cruisers are commonly spotted in war zones—relatively low cost...

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Rolex, A Love-Hate Relationship

Rolex, A Love-Hate Relationship

I love Rolex, but after buying my first new Rolex GMT from an AD, I am not sure modern Rolex is the brand for me. The Crown’s customer experience may...

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Rolex, A Love-Hate Relationship

I love Rolex, but after buying my first new Rolex GMT from an AD, I am not sure modern Rolex is the brand for me. The Crown’s customer experience may be an existential threat. I’m a simple man. Give me an old steel Rolex—Submariner or GMT—with drilled lug holes and...

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Watches Of The Shawn Ryan Show

Watches Of The Shawn Ryan Show

Unfiltered Conversations With America’s Elite Warriors Offer Unique Insight Into Military Watch Culture The Shawn Ryan Show has exploded in popularity in recent years and grown into a media platform...

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Watches Of The Shawn Ryan Show

Unfiltered Conversations With America’s Elite Warriors Offer Unique Insight Into Military Watch Culture The Shawn Ryan Show has exploded in popularity in recent years and grown into a media platform amassing some 16M views per month. Shawn, a former SEAL and CIA GRS contractor, is known for diving deep into...

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W.O.E. YouTube: James Bond & The Omega Seamaster

W.O.E. YouTube: James Bond & The Omega Seamaster

After over three decades of wearing Rolex watches in some of history’s favorite spy films, James Bond made an unexpected leap to Omega starting in 1995’s GoldenEye. What might have...

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W.O.E. YouTube: James Bond & The Omega Seamaster

After over three decades of wearing Rolex watches in some of history’s favorite spy films, James Bond made an unexpected leap to Omega starting in 1995’s GoldenEye. What might have appeared like a genius marketing coup for Omega was actually the work of a single savvy designer helping to guide...

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Tudor Cements Its Role As Tool Watch Leader

Tudor Cements Its Role As Tool Watch Leader

As The Industry Trends Toward Luxury, Tudor Embraces Its Tool Watch Heritage With Watches and Wonders 2025 Releases Last year, we compiled a list of Watches and Wonders releases for...

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Tudor Cements Its Role As Tool Watch Leader

As The Industry Trends Toward Luxury, Tudor Embraces Its Tool Watch Heritage With Watches and Wonders 2025 Releases Last year, we compiled a list of Watches and Wonders releases for the W.O.E. community (Read Here), and we planned to do the same thing this year, but the reality is that...

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The Canteen Watch & The OSS Maritime Unit - Forefathers Of The Navy SEALS

The Canteen Watch & The OSS Maritime Unit - For...

When it comes to Watches of Espionage, dive watches reign supreme. The history of watches like the Rolex Submariner and the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms is well-known and backed by celebrated...

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The Canteen Watch & The OSS Maritime Unit - Forefathers Of The Navy SEALS

When it comes to Watches of Espionage, dive watches reign supreme. The history of watches like the Rolex Submariner and the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms is well-known and backed by celebrated connections to amphibious SpecOps, including the French Commando Hubert and the US Navy SEALs. But over a decade before these...

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W.O.E. YouTube: Blackwater Breitling Emergency

W.O.E. YouTube: Blackwater Breitling Emergency

At the intersection of W.O.E. and Breitling watches is Erik Prince, a former Navy SEAL turned CEO of Blackwater, history’s most notorious military contractor. After losing members of his team...

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W.O.E. YouTube: Blackwater Breitling Emergency

At the intersection of W.O.E. and Breitling watches is Erik Prince, a former Navy SEAL turned CEO of Blackwater, history’s most notorious military contractor. After losing members of his team in a plane crash in Afghanistan, Prince commissioned a custom Breitling Emergency with Blackwater’s logo on the dial. More than...

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Watch Industry SITREP - March 2025

Watch Industry SITREP - March 2025

Signal Chats Gone Wild, Stranded Astronauts Return To Earth, FBI Deputy Director Has Expensive Watch Taste, Kristi Noem LARPs Wearing A Daytona, & Jonny Kim Wears A Rolex To Space...

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Watch Industry SITREP - March 2025

Signal Chats Gone Wild, Stranded Astronauts Return To Earth, FBI Deputy Director Has Expensive Watch Taste, Kristi Noem LARPs Wearing A Daytona, & Jonny Kim Wears A Rolex To Space (Maybe) By Benjamin Lowry Let’s face it, no matter what side of the aisle you land on, the regular news...

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How I Would Steal The Watches & Wonders Releases From Rolex

How I Would Steal The Watches & Wonders Release...

A Former CIA Case Officer Dissects How To Penetrate Rolex SA We are now one week out from Watches and Wonders, the annual trade show in Geneva, Switzerland, where many...

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How I Would Steal The Watches & Wonders Releases From Rolex

A Former CIA Case Officer Dissects How To Penetrate Rolex SA We are now one week out from Watches and Wonders, the annual trade show in Geneva, Switzerland, where many of the premier luxury watch brands debut their latest designs. W&W is a masterclass in marketing, with weeks of blogs...

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