The Next Elon Musk

“If we continue to develop our technology without wisdom or prudence, our servant may prove to be our executioner.”

–Omar Bradley

June 6, 2025 — “I’m a crusader for vengeance. Not for truth.” – Palmer Luckey

It’s fitting that Donald Trump and Elon Musk had a very public, 11-hour, 47-minute social media spat yesterday.

We were… and are… already searching for the next Elon Musk.

And have found a good candidate.

In an age when our imperial fantasies are powered by microchips and monitored by drone, it’s only fitting that one of the strangest champions of the new American war machine looks like a cross between a Renaissance Fair cosplayer and a Mountain Dew-sponsored Bond villain.

Palmer Freeman Luckey — a man whose name sounds like it was cooked up in a video game character generator — has turned the Silicon Valley archetype on its head, stomped on it in sandals, and stuffed it into the fiberglass cockpit of a killer robot.

Yes, he invented the Oculus Rift.

Yes, he sold it to Mark Zuckerberg in 2o14, making him a billionaire at age 21.

And yes, he got fired from Meta for supporting a pro-Trump meme squad who were buying up billboard space to mock Kamala Harris on roadsides in real life.

All that is true.

But what really makes Palmer Luckey tick isn’t just tech, money, or the flashbulb of notoriety.

It’s a combustible cocktail of vengeance, obsession, frontier philosophy, and — ironically — hope.

At least, that’s what the picture painted by Jeremy Stern, a freelance writer profiling the young tech geek for The Tablet, asserts.

The article itself is worth an entertaining read.

Luckey operates less like a conventional entrepreneur and more like a techno-Tolkien paladin with a VR headset in one hand and a killer drone in the other.

He’s the anti-hero of Silicon Valley, the mullet-and-cargo-shorts engineer whose mission is as much metaphysical as military: to reclaim agency in a world trying to algorithmically strip it away.

He admits it himself. “I am a crusader for vengeance,” he said in 2024. “Not for truth.”

The fire that drives him isn’t moral purity — it’s a long memory and a longer grudge. Burned by Facebook, blacklisted by the media, disowned by the culture that celebrated him — Luckey did what a lot of fallen wunderkinder only dream of.

He came back. With drones.

His second act, Anduril, named for the sword that Aragorn wields in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, is not just a company. It’s a vendetta masquerading as a defense contractor. A challenge to both Silicon Valley’s performative pacifism and the Pentagon’s bureaucratic rot. A living bet that the defense of Western civilization can be outsourced not to government, but to a privately funded anime-loving armorer with a thing for Henry VIII cosplay.

This is what makes Palmer Luckey tick: He builds weapons to ensure peace. He seeks power not to dominate but to deter. He’s both a nationalist and a futurist, a capitalist with messianic undertones.

A man who knows that he can’t go back to the garage — but who also refuses to accept a world where being cancelled means being conquered. He is the prickly porcupine he wants America to become.

And he knows he can’t do it forever.

“This can’t last,” he said. “I cannot survive my whole life like this.”

But for now, that fuse is lit.

The rest of the story chronicles the events and ideologies that shaped this unlikely architect of empire…

And we’re only at the beginning. Stay tuned. It’s only fitting that we write these words on the 81st anniversary of D-Day.

Anduril is far from a household name – it’s still privately held, after all – but we suspect that it will come into the public’s eye in the months and years ahead much like another Tolkien-named company: Palantir.

Addison Wiggin
Grey Swan

P.S. We were joined by Frank Holmes, CEO of USFunds.com, on Grey Swan Live! yesterday. If you’re a paid-up member, it’ll also be worth your time to hear Frank talk about how the “sausage is made” behind the scenes of his successful ETFs covering the airline industry, luxury goods, AI and crypto data centers and his latest military tech.

You can catch the recorded conversation from Grey Swan Live! here.

In a follow-up conversation this morning, Frank told me he’s having his top researchers dig into Palmer Luckey’s private company, Anduril, to find more ways individual investors can get in before it goes public. Frank’s top Ukraine analyst is also going behind the scenes to understand the logistics of the surprise drone attack the Ukrainians launched in Russia on Wednesday.

“The Ukraine attack looks like a live beta test of Palmer Luckey’s ideas in action,” Frank suggested.

As you might guess, there’s way more to this story than a simple e-mail. The recent drone attacks have also been described to Grey Swan members by John Robb – but now we’re seeing the extent and reality of what 21st-century drone warfare can look like. We’ll keep you posted.

Your thoughts? Please send them here: addison@greyswanfraternity.com