The arms trafficker who reportedly inspired Nicolas Cage's character in the Lord of War was captured this morning in a luxury hotel in Thailand.

Viktor Bout, known also as "Embargo Buster" and "Merchant of Death," was nabbed for supplying arms to revolutionary guerrillas in Colombia, but is said to have used his fleet of old Soviet cargo planes to fuel virtually every armed conflict in the world. The Russian often armed opposing sides of the same fight, including the one between the U.S. and the Taliban.

Bout's talent for the difficult job of supplying war zones was such that the U.S. for years seemed not all that serious about actually stopping him—the U.S. military continued utilizing Bout in Iraq even after the Treasury Department froze his assets. His capture now in a sting orchestrated by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency is a pleasant surprise to those who've spent years pushing for stronger action against the elusive gun-runner. A former congressional investigator who's now in the private sector tells Radar that most countries, including the U.S., did little beyond lip service when it came to stopping the world's most notorious arms dealer. "I spent years tracking this guy and got nowhere with the feds, the Europeans, or the Arabs."

Bout's capture comes a day after President Bush pledged support for Colombia's fight against the FARC rebels, who happen to be using Bout's services. The Russians will likely try to have the gun-runner extradited back to Moscow, which would effectively halt any justice-meting. But if Bout is prosecuted, and should he decide to tell his side of the story, some of America's unpleasant, covert misadventures could be laid bare. "Bout was in bed with the Pentagon for years," says our source. "He presumably knows where very many things are buried."